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engines. They work hard, and the people who use them
play hard and work hard. Names like Dominator,
Interceptor and Saber speak directly to those people.
Action News:
But it's not all in the name. Can it be
assumed that these oils perform as advertised?
Amatuzio:
Better than advertised. You can count on
that.
Action News:
Do you see a big market for these oils?
Amatuzio:
A huge market. And it's a market where
we've established a significant presence. Along with our
Dealers, we've really capitalized on our snocross and
supercross sponsorships. This year AMSOIL is the offi-
cial oil of nearly every major snowmobile racing asso-
ciation in North America. We're also the official oil of the
AMA Chevy Trucks U.S. Motocross Championships
and have entered an agreement to become the pre-
senting sponsor of the Loretta Lynn Amateur Motocross
Nationals.
Action News:
The new Torque-DriveTM Automatic
Transmission Fluid is another interesting product.
AMSOIL took a different approach with that product in
terms of the formulation process. Talk a little about that.
Amatuzio:
Castrol
®
manufactured a synthetic trans-
mission fluid called TranSynd
®
in conjunction with
Allison
®
to be used in heavy-duty Allison
®
transmis-
sions. With the introduction of this oil, Allison
®
estab-
lished the Technical Engineering Specification-295
(TES-295), and only operators using TES-295 oils can
extend drain intervals according to Allison
®
recom-
mendations in bulletin 10-TR-99 Rev. B, and only those
operators are eligible to purchase the Allison
®
extended
transmission coverage (ETC) warranty. Although
Castrol
®
has since made that product available to other
marketers, manufacturers outside that limited sphere are
handcuffed. To achieve TES-295 is virtually impossible
because Allison
®
has not made the TES-295 test stand
available and has not established the necessary for-
malized field trial protocol. Therefore, AMSOIL per-
formed a reverse engineering process on TranSynd
®
to
uncover its chemical make-up, and then formulated a
product based on the same type of chemical technol-
ogy. Our product is a TES-295 quality fluid.
Action News:
And AMSOIL can claim TES-295 qual-
ity without having run the tests?
Amatuzio:
Yes, because Allison
®
did run the tests on
TranSynd
®
and AMSOIL successfully reverse engi-
neered TranSynd,
®
creating a
fluid based on the same type
of technology. Both contain
PAO, both contain ester, both
contain enhanced additive
systems and neither contains
VI improvers. Not even
sophisticated laboratory anal-
ysis can accurately measure the
differences between Torque-
DriveTM and TranSynd
®
.
Action News:
What differ-
ences will Allison
®
customers
notice when switching from
Transynd
®
to Torque-DriveTM?
Amatuzio:
The only difference they will notice is
price. Torque-DriveTM, at commercial prices, is con-
siderably less than TranSynd
®
.
Action News:
How about the warranty issue?
Amatuzio:
The use of Torque-DriveTM will not affect
the standard Allison
®
warranty for defects in material or
workmanship, and may only be challenged if there is
clear evidence of a lubricant-related failure, in which
case AMSOIL provides full warranty coverage. Torque-
DriveTM does not fulfill the Allison
®
warranty requirements
for those customers who have already purchased the
Allison
®
extended transmission coverage. This is a sep-
arate contract that binds the parties according to its
terms. Customers who are considering purchasing the
Allison
®
extended transmission coverage should be
aware that it can be very costly, ranging from $235 per
unit for one year in school busses equipped with 1000
model transmissions to as much as $4,000 per unit for
three years in busses equipped with a B500R trans-
missions. Allison
®
customers need to ask themselves
where the savings are if they have to pay big dollars for
additional warranty coverage which forces them to use
the most expensive transmission fluid available. If
Allison
®
customers consider Torque-DriveTM as an alter-
native, they will find that the standard Allison
®
war-
ranty for defects in material and workmanship is not
compromised and AMSOIL provides additional war-
ranty coverage for lubricant related failures indefinitely.
Action News:
Thank you, Alan. Any other new prod-
ucts we should know about?
Amatuzio:
There's always something brewing in our
lab, but that can wait.
Executive Vice President
and Chief Operating Officer
Alan Amatuzio
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