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I'm sure there is the "oh no not another oil thread" reaction to this, but then in light of the 0-20 spec there is understandably concern. The move to 0-20 is a continuing effort to meet fuel mileage standards. Lighter oil = better fuel economy. There is one auto manufacturer specing 0-16 oil. I think you will see more and more move to the 0-20 spec with the coming tighter fuel mileage standards.
Myself I'm not sure i trust the 0-20 for performance driving, say sustained runs above 4000 rpms. For daily driving I'd have no problem with 0-20. My dilemma is the first 3 year period where the oil changes are provided by BMW. If i can't convince them to switch to say 5-30 then i may live with it and then switch when i change my own after the 3 year period (i normally change my own).
One oil tester has shown SOME 0-20 oil to have some very high resistance to thermal breakdown. There is an oil blog called 540 RAT where the guy has tested and compared hundreds of oil relative to thermal breakdown of the oil. He has separately tested a few 0-20 oils. He has some lengthy discussions of his methodology and a lot of self kudos but is one of the few places i have seen CURRENT oil testing done. At that blog you have to wade thru a lot but there is a section of ranking of 200 plus oils by thermal breakdown. There are some other interesting oil related articles he has authored that follows the ranking. There is somewhat of an index that can help wade thru the stuff. (Note there is no test of any BMW spec LL-14 or 17 oil that i noticed in the compilation of oil comparisons).
Me, personally i will have no problem with going outside of the BMW spec and using a high quality full syn 5-30 or 0-30 in the M240.
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