Engine Oil Change Frequency

[edfortmiller]

The owners manual that came with my 1997 Kubota B-7100 recommends an engine oil & filter change every 75 hours. The person I purchased it from claims to have changed the oil and filter every 25 hours. Every 25 hours seems a little excessive to me given that the recommended it 75 hours. I know that many car manufacturers recommend a change every 6000 miles but many people recommend a change every 3000. How often do you treat your 'bota to new oil and filter?

 

[gerard]

I go by my manual and use amsoil synthetic. I think it's every 100 hours. You can change it more often, won't hurt but may not derive enough benefit to justify the cost.

 

[upgw]

Kubota's engine engineers know best, go by the manual. The mechanic at my dealer uses only Case diesel tractor oil. I'm filled up with 30W right now.

Personally, I've never seen an oil-related engine failure in any type of machine (car, tractor, lawn mower, etc) unless it was very seriously abused.

- Patrick W.

 

[cp1969]

Every 100 hours or annually, whichever comes first.

 

[Youare]

I am leaning on changing my oil and filter every 30 to 50 hours or twice a year which ever comes first. A fall and spring change seems good even if the hours are not there.

What is a few dollars for oil and filter compared to the cost of the tractor. Nice clean oil makes me feel better even if it doesn't make much difference to the tractor.

Randy

 

[Boondox]

The manual for my L3010 says to change the oil every 100 hours and the filter every other oil change. But I'm with Youare on this one. Oil and filter get changed every 50 hours on Clementine.

Pete

 

[kyoders]

Ed,

I think the oil companies recommend 3000 miles. I haven't owned a lot of cars, but the owner's manual for every one of them had a chart relating operating conditions to oil change frequencies, which usually ranged from 4 to 8000. I always go with what the owner's manual says, and will with my [not quite as shiny anymore] new tractor. Of course it probably won't hurt to change more frequently, but all you might be doing is making the oil/filter companies richer, with no gain to you.

Kevin

 

[wdn]

I follow the user's manual on oil change intervals.

After the initial 50 hour service, for the BX2200 that is change the oil at 100 hours and change the oil and filter at 200 hours. Those become the intervals, oil every 100 hours and oil & filter every 200 hours.

I don't see a reason to consume 3 times as much refined motor oil as you need to, or generate 3 times as much waste oil to be disposed of. You're throwing out perfectly good oil even with the 100 hours interval, but Kubota is being conservative and this makes sure your engine is always running good oil.

 

[Anonymous Poster]

One additional comment - I like to put a small magnet on the base of the oil filter. This helps keep small metal particles inside the filter rather than allowing them to circulate (if they are smaller than the micron size rating of the filter).
I buy rare earth magnets for something like $.50 each and remove them after I've removed the filter, then install them again on the new filter.
Maybe a little overkill, but it's the same idea as the magnet the car mfgs install inside the transmission pan.

 

[wdn]

The magnet seems like a good idea and it doesn't cost anything. I used to have a magnetic oil plug on my Isuzu Trooper, and it did attract some filings.

 

[frank_f15]

i agree, change the oil at 100 hrs. even that seems like a waste, as i don't think 100 hhrs on a machine used like most of us use it is a lot of wear.but i will change the oils and filter once a year. usually in the spring.

 

[popeye]

I learned a couple of things about oil in diesel engines from the one that was in my pickup. Oil in diesel engines picks up more contaminants than oil in gas (higher compresson ratios means more blow by). It needs to be changed more often than gas engines. But the most important message I learned from it was that water in injectors and injector pumps is a really bad thing! I change oil with manuals recommendations on diesels I might go a little longer on the gas engine in the truck I have now (it gets Mobil 1). Just my .02
Mike

 

[JohnMiller3]

<font color=blue>... oil every 100 hours and oil & filter every 200 hours...</font color=blue>

/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif Heck, changing the oil without the filter sounds like taking a nice clean shower and putting back on dirty underwear... /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

 

[art]

I don't often varing from what the manufacturer says. But this one does warrant some special considerations. The Tractor is a 97 with 75 hours on it, thats 5 years with three oil changes? Even the cars say once a year if you don't put on many miles. With the thoughts of condensation, the fact the engine never was run enough to even break it in yet and all the partially burnt fuel in the base from the cold starts and lack of warm up time, yes he should have changed it when he did at a minimum. I would hope that you will be putting on more continuous hours and than go to the 100 hour oil change.

 

[Anonymous Poster]

I change the oil/filter pretty frequently - I just look at it as cheap insurance. Since the changes are very regular, I use dino based oil rather than synthetic for economy and I think it's a must to change the filter at each oil change. If I lived in a cold climate I would probably use synthetic for its cold temp stable visocity.

Oil not only lubricates, it cools and carries contaminants/particles away from the internal engine components. The particular additive packages that the mfg's put in are designed to supplement these functions. As the oil does its job it deals with an increasing amount of contaminants, including mild acids from the combustion cycles - at the same time the additive packages as well as the shear and viscosity indexes are slowly breaking down. Generally the higher the difference between the viscosity index (ex: 10w-40 vs straight 30w) the more tendency there is for the oil to eventually de-stabilize so to speak and lose some of the viscosity index. This is usually a more extreme situation of long hard miles and no oil changes - bottom line is the oil thins out and begins to lose its shear index. This can do bad things to bearings since they ride on a very thin film of oil. For my thinking, I like to maintain a reasonable supply of fresh oil in the engine.

One other bit of info and I'll get off the soapbox - here's a good automobile oil filter evaluation that was done pretty objectively and I think was well organized. Might surprise some of you!

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.frankhunt.com/FRANK/corvette/articles/oilfilterstudy/oilfilterstudy.html>http://www.frankhunt.com/FRANK/corvette/articles/oilfilterstudy/oilfilterstudy.html</A>

 

[JohnMiller3]

Hi Nick,

I agree wholeheartedly…

Religiously, changing the oil and filter is the best and cheapest insurance your money can buy for your tractor, automobile, lawnmower, atv, etc.

1) Obey the owner’s manual recommended timely schedule.,.. who knows better than the company that made the machine…?

2) A lot of people don’t put enough hours on a machine on an annual basis to keep up with the suggested schedule… so guess what… change your oil/filter anyways at least once a year… preferably before long periods of idleness…

With a polluted oil pan sitting idle… condensation starts, a number of chemical reactions occur making “acid”, (and we all know what acid does to surfaces…), little “critters” start multiplying like bacteria… and “growth” springs up from nowhere… making slim and gunk and chunks appear… (for some reason these little critters thrive on “dino” products like oil and diesel fuel…/w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif)…

Changing your oil/filter regularly gives you this clean bill of health for your equipment and the dollars you spend will pay you back many fold in engine longevity and helps keep it reliable and smooth running for a long long time… /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Turfman]

<font color=blue> John Milller III wrote:
and “growth” springs up from nowhere… making slim and gunk and chunks appear… (for some reason these little critters thrive on “dino” products like oil and diesel fuel</font color=blue>

Is there less chance of this using synthetic?

 

[JohnMiller3]

<font color=blue>...Is there less chance of this using synthetic?...</font color=blue>

The synthetic engineers promote something similar... but you still have the "water or moisture" aspect that accumulates from condensation whether it's dino or synthetic... /w3tcompact/icons/hmm.gif

 

[wdn]

The BX only takes (nominal) 2.6 quarts of oil so maybe that is why they want the oil changed more often? It has less oil than some so the oil gets dirty before the oil filter is used up?


Interesting the Kubota maintenance web page says change oil AND filter but every 200 hours (but the manual says change the filter every other oil change).

 

[JohnMiller3]

My little Satoh is a hair under 3 qts as well, I believe the owners manual says basically the same thing as alternating the filter every other change...... but the cost of the filter is minuscule ~~$4.

It just doesn't make sense not to change it everytime... /w3tcompact/icons/hmm.gif