The simple answer is for your type of driving, is to change your oil every 6 months like the owners manual says for severe driving. If you go to a quality place, every 6 months you will get all fluid levels checked, air filter, tire pressure also. If you want to go longer oil drain intervals. at 6 months take an oil sample and send it off to a quality oil analysis lab to see what condition your oil is in, and then base your oil change intervals off of what they recomend. Every body drives differantly, under differant conditions, and every engine behaves differantly. What oil drain interval that works for one car may or may not work for another. If you want to extend oil drain intervals, the smart thing to do is take a sample and have it tested. You may need to to this a few times to get a good idea of what is a good oil change interval is for your car under your particlular driving conditions.
Recommended Oil Change Intervals?
- Thread starter JaCkaL829
- Start date
jimmie jam
Active member
todays oils are far superior than 10 -20 years ago. if the manufacturer thought that 10,000 miles would get them ANYWHERE near warranty trouble/costs with their engines they would recommend shorter oil changes. does this make any sense to anyone??? one of my vehicles is a 04 corvette. gm puts mobile 1 in from the factory and wants the oil to be changed when the DIC (computer) says you have 10-20 % oil life left OR 10,000 miles OR at least once a year. they further state that you can change the filter only every 5,000 if you like. 3,000 mile changes are a waste of time and money IMO. (for 30 years i would change my oil and filter EVERY 3,000 no matter what). 30 miles of driving should get the oil hot enough except maybe in winter conditions. 5,000 miles is certainly an ok interval but 3,000 is crazy today. just my .02 worth.
A lot of people over on Titantalk (Here's a link to the thread) have been having really good luck with the new Mobil 1 Extended Performance oil.. they've sent it off for analysis after running it to some pretty high mileage and the reults have been very positive.
I'm going to try going to 7000 miles or so in my WRX this time around. Ive been a 3000 mile fanatic for years.
I'm going to try going to 7000 miles or so in my WRX this time around. Ive been a 3000 mile fanatic for years.
JayC said:
The only bad thing about the Mobil1 Ext. Perf. is that by changing the M1 formula for really extended DIs, they lost the energy-conserving certification. You will get less gas mileage when switching from reg. Mobil 1 to the new Extended Performance.
This is just FYI.
:xyxthumbs
SpoiledMan
New member
Two of my cars only see new oil once a year. My minivan on the other hand sees them twice a year or about 6k miles. My Integra always gets up to temp when driven (I like V-TEC) but is only driven <1k miles per year and the other car is driven enough to keep the oil in a "golden" color for at least 7 months but wont see 3k miles in a year.
jimmie jam said:
Research some of the comments (even admitted by GM) on some of the oil consumption issues of the '07-'04 ls1 engines. I bet it will be an eye opener for you. The problem had been addressed in '02, but there were still some instances of excessive oil use among a small scattering of ls1 (and one or two ls2-GTO) owners. Mobil 1 was the culprit oil in all of those cases of high consumption. Not to say that in those cases frequent oil changes would've corrected the issue, since that type of consumption was due to manufacturing.
jimmie jam
Active member
lbls1 said:
your last words say it all.... "that type of comsumption was due to manufacturing"!
Thanks for all the info, oil is like a science 
I researched and asked on CRSX, I think my best bet is to change it 5k which will probably be once a year. After I use up my 14 quarts of Valvoline 5W-20 oil, I think i'm going to switch over to Mobil Clean 5000, seems like it fits my application pretty well.
I researched and asked on CRSX, I think my best bet is to change it 5k which will probably be once a year. After I use up my 14 quarts of Valvoline 5W-20 oil, I think i'm going to switch over to Mobil Clean 5000, seems like it fits my application pretty well.
imported_Aurora40
New member
chml17l said:
Just a quick note, but if you have a car with both an oil temp gauge and a coolant temp gauge, this isn't quite true. In my experience it takes a fair bit longer for oil to come up to temp than for coolant to.
ntoddalbert
New member
Aurora is right, huge difference between oil temp and coolant temp. It takes a lot longer for "most" oil systems to heat up. My BMW holds 7 quarts, takes forever, my old Nissan holds 4 quarts and heats up fairly quick
Also dont forget most modern cars have a buffered coolant temp gauge, meaning it doesn't give you an accurate reading. To alleviate complaints of "my temp goes up when im in traffic or with the AC on" most Mfgs now use a gauge that reads dead center whenever the car is between a preset value, meaning you wont know if its cooler or hotter than "normal"
You also wont know your overheating until it happens, I would love an oil temp gauge
Also dont forget most modern cars have a buffered coolant temp gauge, meaning it doesn't give you an accurate reading. To alleviate complaints of "my temp goes up when im in traffic or with the AC on" most Mfgs now use a gauge that reads dead center whenever the car is between a preset value, meaning you wont know if its cooler or hotter than "normal"
You also wont know your overheating until it happens, I would love an oil temp gauge