Oil change intervals

[seville009]

lol -- That reminds me of when I was a kid working in a service station. Girl brought in a 68 Firebird for its first oil change in 1978 because her dad was nagging her about it. When I pulled the drain plug, nothing came out. moved a screwdriver around in the drain hole & got some sludge to drain out along with pieces of the fiber they used on the timing chain sprocket. Told her it needed to be opened up so I could replace the sprocket. She didn't want to spend the money & said just do the oil change. After the oil drained & was changed, the oil pump wouldn't prime so no oil pressure. Her Dad came down to make sure we weren't taking advantage of his daughter ... then I showed him the chunks & residual grease like substance in the drain pan filter. Ended up needing a new oil pump, new timing chain & sprocket and a new water pump to drive off so he could trade it in for his baby girl's next car. I'm guessing the next owner needed a full rebuild because when I cleaned up the pan, I found metal shavings everywhere so the bearings were toast if not the shafts.

Better story was a guy drove up to the full service pumps & asked me to check his oil ... (wife's car was the story). Nothing registered on the stick & I wound up putting 4 1/2 quarts into an engine designed to hold 5 quarts before it showed full. I told him that for another five bucks I'd put him on the rack & change his filter as well. He just drove off after paying for the gas & oil.

Maybe the guy that didn’t want to spend money on a new filter figured that the old one was still good since there was basically no oil running through it……

 

[RalphVa]

Anyone do a valve job with the stick with a suction
cup on it? I did a valve job on my dad's 48 Pontiac
Rub your hands on the stick/handle like your trying to
start a fire

When over to a friends house he was going to overhaul
his engine think it was a chevy V8 all I can remember he
had the engine on a hoist and was under neath it taking
off the oil pan but he for got to drain the oil first and got
his oil bath.

willy

Done that stick and suction cup thing. Did it on a couple engines that I overhauled.

 

[5030]

One thing I never do is go to one of those 10 minute oil change places,, oil changes and filters are done right here. Those oil change emporiums are staffed by basically incompetent employees but even worse you have no idea what they are putting in your crankcase far as oil is concerned and never, never have your slush box flushed either.

 

[JimRB]

People forget that as someone mentioned severe duty. Driving the car 5 miles in Atlanta to work is not as hard on oil as driving 5 miles to work in Cleveland Ohio. Not sure how many miles are on my car. I have a good idea though. The odometer stopped counting at 1 million kilometers. That is about 621,000 miles. A year later and still reading 621,000 miles. I drive about 33,000 miles a year so I change the oil every 4 months. Easy on oil driving where work is usually 44 miles one way. Oil gets warm enough with a long drive. Living where it is warm my vehicles do not suffer October to April cold weather. 10,000 mile oil changes with Mobil 1 diesel synthetic as recommended by the manufacturer has worked for me. Head never been off the engine. Still gets good mileage. Drinking oil like crazy. It uses at least a half quart between oil changes. Maybe closer to a quart. Still gets 50 mpg during the 60 degree season where there is no need for AC. AC kills the mileage knocking off up to 5 mpg or 10%.

I have done oil analysis when the engine was low mileage (100,000 miles). Reports came back high silicone like possible leaking air filter. Half a million miles later and it still runs well. Lots of air filter changes, fuel filter changes and timing belts and water pumps every 100,000 miles. I am still a fan of oil analysis. I should do one one in 3 months to see what it reports.

Wasn't BMW kind of forced to offer free oil changes because people who lease their cars turn them in after the lease is never having changed the oil?

 

[dodge man]

As a rule I go by the oil change monitor. I usually change it when they get near 10%. I also don’t like to go much over a year before I change the oil in something. I use full synthetic in everything, car, truck, tractor, small engines.

 

[tmeric7]

We are the original owners of my wife's car, a Toyota, and 10,000 is the recommended change interval. I have changed the oil myself with a quality synthetic of the recommended grade every 10,000 miles. The car is now at 173,000 miles. Never an issue, runs great. If I can remember, perhaps I was skeptical too, but after 10 years and 17 changes, 10,000 is just standard procedure (for this vehicle).

 

[JMER817]

Simple…just tell them that you want your free oil change every 5k miles. If they say no…then walk out. Give it a day and they will be calling you. Also, your first oil change should be around 1500 miles…lotsa wear in material and leftover factory shavings in the block

 

[dh206]

VW has been doing this for more than a decade on whole fleets. They use the Amsoil-like stuff (slightly higher ranking than Mobil-1)

I have a Touareg. 10,000 miles recommended. Many, many of these on the road, and it has/had 10 year warranty on the engine as well.

I used Mobil-1 and then Mobil-1 extended on my '98 Subaru Forester after the first 8 years or so. Got more than 200k miles on it before it succumbed to body rust this year. The engine was fine. 10k changes and filter at the same time. The engine probably would have gone at least another 250K had the there not been body rust at the wheel well. I added a little Lucas from time to time in the last few years.
JJT also had an excellent empirical, data-driven post.
Yes, synthetic oil is better, and better by a big margin. Study after study has shown this, and major manufacturers have confirmed it and stand by it enough to give longer warranties on their vehicle engines. If manufacturers trust their entire fleets and are willing to standby it to a very large extent, it should give anybody comfort.

 

[TMBRWLF]

Im getting a new Tacoma and this will be my first vehicle that uses full synthetic oil. They will change the oil every 10,000 miles for three years. But it’s hard to imagine going 10,000 miles on oil even though it’s synthetic. I’m old school and my thinking is I could change it at 5,000 and then they change it at 10,000 etc. Then after the three years of free oil changes I would then change it every, say 7,000. Is my thinking wrong?

Wrong site. No disrespect but this is a tractor site...

 

[oldpilot]

I drove my VW Beetle from New Hampshire to California in 1966. Many or most cars in those years had no oil filter. When I visited a pal in New Orleans, I emptied all my belongings into his apartment and got the oil changed. Didn't dare go the whole 3K miles without a service!