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OT oil change intervals on autos

W

wally b

Member
I have a chevy duramax diesel and a vw tdi diesel. I do mostly highway driving, very little start and stop city driving and don"t drive very agressively. I get oil changes at a reputable service location. The want me to change the oil every 3000 miles, I think it should be every 5000 except like before a long trip when I might haul something. I use synthetic oil.

What do you think?

wally
 
I have a 98'ford contour.4 cyl.296,000 miles on it.Changed oil and filter every 5000 miles.Used mostly Penzoil 5-30 wt. oil.(non-synthetic)
 
I change mine at 5000 but with synthentic i would go 7500.A friend of mine owns a trucking company and they very seldom even change oil anymore.Each truck has a tank with adative that adds it to the oil as needed.They test the oil on a regular basis.
 
The oil change intervals seem to being going longer and longer. When asked by customers, I simply say that I still change the oil in my personal rigs at three thousand miles. I call it cheap insurance. Plus, a good check over that goes with a proper oil change, can never hurt.
 
Of course they want you to change oil every 3000 miles. That way, they'll get to do 33 oil changes every 100,000 miles instead of 20. On each vehicle. Like the monkey said as he peed into the cash register: "This is running into real money."
 
Change at the intervals suggested in your CAR'S MANUAL for the type of driving you do.
They go to a lot of trouble to determine what is right for what type of driving you do. Same with type and weight of oil.
What I have learned to like even better is the oil change monitor built into our Chevys. That sucker calculates the optimum oil change intervals based on how that vehicle is being driven.
The oil change places would LOVE to have you come in every 3000. About twice as often as my oil change monitor tells me to do it. 30 vehicles, we trade out around 250,000 and have not lost an engine in 10 years.
 
Synthetic oil gets dirty just like dino. Can't see why some folks think you can run it longer. I change my oil to get dirty oil out of the engine, not because the oil is wore out.
 
I have always changed my own oil every 3000 miles on the "fleet". No less than three vehicles for the last two decades.

Perhaps coincidence but I've never had a vehicle with internal engine issues.

Also ..... The oil at 3000 miles really looks crappy.

Then again... I used to work with a fella that drove 60 miles per day to work. He'd trade for a new vehicle every three years .............. and never changed his oil.

So I guess it's whatever makes you feel good or can afford.
 
I'd go by the owners manual. That said, I have a Dodge Ram pick up. The oil change interval in the manual was 7500 miles. At the same time, I bought my wife a Dodge conversion van. Both had the same engine and were 1 year apart in age. The van's owners manual had a 5000 mile oil change interval. Go figure.
 
I'd go by the owners manual. That said, I have a Dodge Ram pick up. The oil change interval in the manual was 7500 miles. At the same time, I bought my wife a Dodge conversion van. Both had the same engine and were 1 year apart in age. The van's owners manual had a 5000 mile oil change interval. Go figure.
 
For the most part,I change the oil in my '85 Ford 6.9 diesel everytime I change batteries. Last time,it was too cold when I put the batteries in,so it went about another year and a half before an oil change.
You think I'm kidding,but the guys on Car Talk were doing an experiment to see how long they could go between changes. I don't know how far they ended up going,but last they mentioned it,they were into the tens of thousands. A guy who used to work at the co-op said he had customers who never changed oil. Just changed the filter and added a quart.
 
What oil are you putting in your VW?
The reason I ask is because just regular diesel oil is not recommended by VW and I've seen people drive a great distance to get the correct stuff.
 

Are there any alternatives to the one oil VW suggests..?

For extended change intervals, is there a recommended brand of Oil Filter..??

I agree with just changing the oil filter and adding a quart for light-duty use..changing every-other-time..in a Jeep or "Beater"..
Ron..
 
I change oil once a year, or whenever I remember. I run 15w40 in everything. Synthetic oil is just a waste of money. Think about it, when was the last time you heard of engine failure that was caused by failing to change oil? Never. If anything, failure was caused by lack of oil, not condition of oil.
 
Oil change intervals of consumer highway vehicles depends largely upon driving habits and conditions.

The owners manual for most gasoline powered passenger cars recommends changing oil and filter at around 7500 miles, which is fine if most driving is done in highway conditions.

If one puts around town most of the time, putting few miles on the vehicle in a year and rarely operating the engine for extended periods at full operating temperature, I recommend ignoring the odometer and changing oil and filter on a periodic basis.

I no longer do much highway driving and change my gasoline powered highway vehicles 3 or 4 times per year. Every 3 months is overkill but I would not recommend extending such intervals beyond 6 months especially in seasonal climates.

Dean
 
you are right, synthetic does get just as dirty as conventional but unless you are running without a filter, that is a mute point. The advantage to synthetic is it does not degrade because of heat as soon as conventional oils do. If your oil is getting dirty then you have other issues, but if your oil is thermally breaking down, it doesn't provide the protection needed.Thus the benefit of synthetics.
 
Neighbor lady changed the oil in her Crown Vic at 42,000. She did it then because the engine started to squeak and she wondered what the noise was. No oil on the stick!
 
you still have to change the filter using synthetic oil every 3-5000 miles , and all oils get polluted from gas at about 5-7000 miles making it more of a solvent than a lube . And as far as big diesels only a fool dumps early send off samples as ADM in Decatur IL runs plain rottela 35-50,000 miles between drains .A 5-10.00 sample is cheaper than 35-55 quarts of oil
 
Just look in the manual-

My VW (1.8 Turbo) says every 5000 miles. My Wife's LeSabre says every 7,000 or so, and it's got the light that comes on when it needs an oil change.

I've got Synthetic in my VW now so I'm going a little longer, and I still have a few quarts of non sythetic to do my wife's car 1 more time before I switch it over.

Donovan from Wisconsin
 
I just got done changing oil on my Lincoln Mark VIII. Car has 205,000 miles on it and the oil change went 13 months and was right around 16,500 miles. That was with Amsoil synthetic and fram extra life filter. Oil still looked very good when I drained it. I could have ran it twice that long with no problem. Dont't even get me started on 3000 mile oil changes. What a waste of resources. Just because you can afford to do it doesn't make it right. My car doesn't burn oil and the motor will probably outlast the car before it rusts out.
 
Synthetic oil can go a little longer than conventional oil between changes but going excessively long isn't a good idea. Oil is still relativel cheap. A better filter is a much bigger help. The place up here that does oil sampling, says it is better to buy the more expensive name brand oil(doesn't have to be synthetic) but they also sell 3 micron oil filter kits that can extend oil change intervals. I have a friend that owns a repair shop. He had a Ford truck with a gas engine come in because it was really sluggish and running horrible. The owner had synthetic oil in it for 25,000kms. When the valve covers were pulled off told the story. They had already run 3 oil flushes through the engine to try and clean it up. With the valve covers off, it looked like there was shredded rubber inside the engine. It was contaminated oil that had balled up into thousands of sticky little BB shaped particles. It was disgusting seeing an engine neglected like that. Dave
 
Who is "they"? I don't know about the Duramax, but every GM vehicle I've driven in the last ten years has an oil life indicator. It's very simple: you wait until the oil life indicator tells you to change the oil.

If it's the clowns at the oil change place telling you to change every 3000 miles, consider their motivations. Let's take my wife's Trailblazer, for example. It takes 7 quarts of oil per change and I have to change the oil about every 15,000 miles. If I changed every 3000 miles I'd be buying an extra 84 quarts of oil every 15,000 miles or .0056 quarts/mile. So driving 20,0000 miles per year that's 112 quarts of oil per year. If an oil shop's markup on synthetic oil is 2 bucks a quart, they stand to make an extra 224 bucks a year by convincing me to change every 3000 miles. (Actually I do my own oil changes, but at the current price of Mobil 1 it's still ridiculously expensive to do an oil change.)
 
Wow. It is interesting to hear all the varying comments and strong misconceptions.
1. Every oil starts as a base oil. This means, it all started with the same initial product. The additive package that an oil manufacturer develops is what makes the difference.

2. An oil can only run as long as it's additive package is good for. After you run out of antiwear or depending on an oil's TBN, you are done.

3. Filters are a necessary part of this combination. Newer sythetic filters have more consistent fiber placements than Fram/Wix/Baldwin with their cellulose medias.

4. The best filters on the market are the Fleetguard Stratapore filters. Also note that Fleetguard (now known as Cummins Filtration) is the only filter company owned by an engine manufacturer.

5. Cummins Filtration/Fleetguard is the OEM supplier to Case IH, New Holland and John Deere.

You can check my info.
 
How about what the owner's manual instructions?
Are you really going to listen to the local lube and goob shop people?
As for frequent oil changes.Some folk here are still stuck back in 1970. With carburetors,leaded gasoline,manual choke or stuck automatic choke and fixed fuel metering.
Any old gasser of any make now goes 300,000 miles on gasoline with oil changes every 10,000miles.
The old wives tales need to be put to rest.
 
If it isn't Amsoil,Mobile 1,Royal Purple or Lubrication Engineers. It isn't a real synthetic, it's doctored mineral oil.
There is also a problem with offshore counterfeit auto parts. It's pretty easy to dump 1$ per quart mineral oil into the $10 a quart synthetic bottle.
In our industry some crook is always trying to sell us counterfeit lube,filters, bolts, electronics etc. In brand name boxes no less.
 
That truck might have been more than 25,000 miles and not Kms. on the oil change. Apparently it isn't a big problem in Canada but in the US a lot of smaller stores sell oil in their own container with an API/SAE label that has never been tested or approved by either of them. Dave
 
<Any old gasser of any make now goes 300,000 miles on gasoline with oil changes every 10,000 miles.The old wives tales need to be put to rest.> Really??? I would love for you to offer some proof for that statement. I have been in the automotive repair business for thirty five years now and while I really don't like to do oil changes I still do a few if my lube guy doesn't make it in for some reason. I drain the oil out of some rig with 10,000 miles on the oil change sticker and it comes out like tar. Plus, many people never check their oil in between oil changes. So I stand by what I said that oil changes are cheap insurance.
 
I like 5000 for oil change. Easy to remember and never had internal engine problem. Old timers used to change every time oil was black. Don't remember how long that would take. Any regular oil okay by me. Two cars 15 years old, several 12 and 13. Used to put a little trans fluid in like pint or so. Used to have whale oil in it. That was supposed to keep lifters clean and quiet. Dave
 
Won't argue with Ya , Because I push the mileage envelope myself... But ... One VERY COLD Morning You might spin a rod bearing ,, Especially if its General motors V -6 Junk That has been built after 1980 ... Iknow of 4 GM V-SICKS that have done that over the years , All owners were LaX (didnt have a flippn' Clue ) about oil levels And in all honesty ran it dry .. So you are probably way ahead of them education wise ..
 

Pretty sure your VW manual is going to tell you to change every 10k, that's what mine says.

As far as oil, I run Delvac-1 5w-40. It's good stuff.

K
 
I wouldn't even consider changing the TDI at less than 10000 miles. That's about what it's rated for I think, BY VW... and I'd probably push it well beyond that on highway miles. Probably same on the truck.
Stop and go driving where it never gets warm would be another thing entirely. Then you'd change it a 5-7K miles. Remember that synthetic oil is rated for double the change interval of dyno oil...

Rod
 
I use Rotella T 15W40 in everything on the place, diesel or gas, except small engine stuff. Change at 5000 miles in three vehicles that get only highway miles, 3000 in vehicles running around at home in the dirt, 200 hrs. in tractors and combine. I figure if it's a good oil for OTR truck engines, it'll work for me too, and it does. And if you watch for it to go on sale, and buy it in larger containers at WM, it doesn't carry the premium price any more that it used to, a little more than the super cheap oils, but cheaper than synthetics I would think, though I've never had any interest in those, and don't look at or price them. My 2 cents!! :wink:
 
Wow. It is interesting to hear all the varying comments and strong misconceptions.
1. Every oil starts as a base oil. This means, it all started with the same initial product. The additive package that an oil manufacturer develops is what makes the difference.
2. An oil can only run as long as it's additive package is good for. After you run out of antiwear or depending on an oil's TBN, you are done.

3. Filters are a necessary part of this combination. Newer sythetic filters have more consistent fiber placements than Fram/Wix/Baldwin with their cellulose medias.

4. The best filters on the market are the Fleetguard Stratapore filters. Also note that Fleetguard (now known as Cummins Filtration) is the only filter company owned by an engine manufacturer.

5. Cummins Filtration/Fleetguard is the OEM supplier to Case IH, New Holland and John Deere.

You can check my info.


1. True but there are different base stocks.... some better some worse. Some synthetic some mineral

2. I agree 100% on this one, I know Amsoil has a starting TBN of about 12!

3. Again I agree with ya!

4. I can't say that the Fleetguard are the best, I do know that in light duty applications Amsoil makes filters to go along with their drain intervals, upto 25k miles! I beleive Donaldson makes the filters for them. I do know Donaldson had to figure out a way to cure some serious oil contamination problems on the Humvee's that were out in the harsh deserts, the fine silica in the air was causing all sorts of problems. So I am gonna assume Donaldson makes a filter as good or better than Fleetguard.

5. True again going off my memory

I would highly suggest Amsoil and going 35k/17.5k highway/city miles before changing the oil. At the very least go with Mobil 1, they now offer extended drain intervals. I then advise oil analysis to determine the amount of life left in the oil and base future changes off that!
 
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