The only recommended engine oil for the 3200 is Selenia Racing 10w60. Do Opie Oils, as good as they maybe, know better than the factory? In a word, no.
As for the link provided to the Alfa forum, the posters there still seem to believe FLselenia is owned by Fiat. It is not and hasn't been for over 30 years!! It is currently owned by Petronas, effectively the Malaysian Government.
Regarding TBN and its reduction, the Alfa bods have all assumed that this is bad news and degrades the value and efficiency of the oil.
As some will know, I work in the Shipping industry. The marine diesel engines on our Ships always have to match the TBN of the cylinder oil (bottom end lube is a separate system) with the acidity of the fuel actually being used. In close quarter manouevering such as entering port, they will switch from Intermediate Fuel Oil to Marine Diesel Oil (or at least a mixture of the two) for more reliabilty. Since the FO is a residual fuel it contains a high proportion of Sulphur and therefore the combustion deposits are highly acidic needing a much higher TBN than the refined MDO.
Some years back on one of these engines, we had some piston damage caused by operating on the MDO for too long a period with cylinder oil being mismatched (by the engineroom staff) having too high TBN. This had caused a rapid and excessive build up of calcium deposits on the piston crown leading to its overheating and ultimately failure. These engine are turbocharged 2 stroke diesels and produce huge power - about
The point is that the TBN value has to match the fuel and when mixed with combustion products should neutralise same but never over compensate. Too much alkalinity is just as bad as too much acidity. Could it therefore be that changing the composition of gasoline by decree of the damn EU governments by insisting on a proportion of bio fuel, has actually changed the acidity of the fuel and therefore the characteristics required from the lube oil? I do not know the answer to that one but I am guessing is has a lot to do with it. No matter, most 3200 owners will change the engine oil well before 20,000 kms.
hope this helps
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(so we can avoid it) currently it is a running debate on two threads