World's Leading High Performance Jet Oil Reaches New Heights

June 12, 2013
The milestone, which coincides with the oil’s 15th anniversary, effectively means that BPTO 2197 has lubricated engines travelling the equivalent distance of six million trips around the world.

Air BP Lubricants’ Turbo Oil (BPTO) 2197 recently passed a milestone that very few products in commercial aviation can claim – clocking up its 250 millionth successful hour of on-wing service.

The milestone, which coincides with the oil’s 15th anniversary, effectively means that BPTO 2197 has lubricated engines travelling the equivalent distance of six million trips around the world.

There are currently over 11,000 engines being flown by 94 leading airlines, globally, that are lubricated by BPTO2197.

Air BP Lubricants Global Sales Director Rodger Harris said BPTO 2197 was developed in the early 1990s to address the problem of oil-related carbon deposits (aka “coking”), which can restrict or block oil flow and lead to engine shutdowns and failures.

“Oil choice is a key factor contributing to efficient, smooth airline operations where safe, on-time arrivals are expected by the ever-demanding, paying passenger,” Mr Harris said.

“With increasingly hot and severe engines being used on new aircraft, maintaining a focus on reducing coking propensity is even more critical today for both engine performance and maintenance.

“We are proud that, after 250 million hours in-service, BPTO 2197 has been consistently proven as the cleanest, high-performance turbine oil available, meeting the current and increasing demands of today’s and tomorrow’s jet engines.

"Although it has been in the market for more than 15 years, BPTO 2197 is used on many of the newest fleets in the industry today, and it is approved by the industry's major OEMs."

Air BP Lubricants Technology Manager Dr Andrew Markson said BPTO 2197’s industry-leading on-wing performance record of more than 250million hours of in-service performance, was a testament to the unique approach taken during the research and development that led to the oil’s formulation.

“Air BP Lubricants has a highly specialized testing rig colloquially referred to as the ‘Coker Mister’, which we believe provides the best environment to accurately simulate ‘on-wing’ engine conditions within a laboratory.” Dr Markson said the Coker Mister could simulate the varying pressure, temperature and oil flow regimes encountered in the hottest part of an engine bearing compartment.

By repeating these test conditions on a cyclical basis (akin to typical airline flight operations), oil performance, oil health and coking propensity can be analyzed over many flight cycles.

The ‘Coker Mister’ test rig was very much ‘front-and-centre’ during the development of BPTO 2197 as a means of evaluating coking propensity by simulating the highly-dynamic oil lubrication environment.

“Surpassing 250 million hours is a true testament to the integrity of BPTO 2197 as well as the technology capabilities and confidence within Air BP Lubricants to formulate and test new products extensively before they enter service.”

BPTO 2197 was the first oil approved as a High Performance Capability (HPC) oil to the SAE AS5780 specification and is relied upon by many of the world’s leading airlines for their most demanding applications. BPTO 2197 is approved by many of the industry's leading OEMs and is the leading choice of HPC oil for the world's newest fleets.

About Air BP Lubricants

Air BP Lubricants specialises in developing aviation lubricant solutions for the commercial aviation industry. The business supports aviation turbine oil technology through new product development as well as providing customer and manufacturing support. As the industry’s leading turbine oil provider, Air BP Lubricants supplies the cleanest, most technologically advanced lubricants to major airlines, private operators, helicopter and military customers. Air BP Lubricants has a strong presence globally via direct sales as well as being represented locally through key distributors.