oil change... time vs mileage

I've been changing my oil every 1,000 miles due to short trips, towing the boat, wheeling on dry dusty dirt roads, etc. Looking back through my records from the last 37 changes the time between changes varies between 2 months to 1 year... average time 6 months. Just curious what others time periods are... do you think 1 year is too long even though it's only been 1,000 miles? Sending a sample in to Blackstone... oil is usually pretty dark (Mobile One synthetic 5W-30.) What's the time between your changes?

 

1 year or 5,000 miles, which ever comes first, is good enough for me.

 

Every 5K miles for me, 6 months or 6 years.....send it

 

I don’t really see the reasoning behind changing to a calendar schedule, exactly. Does the bottle of oil expire on the shelf at the auto parts store?

That said, if you do a lot of idling you are going to want to change your oil before hitting 5k miles. I guess in that case, it might be useful to put an hour-meter on the engine and change the oil based on that.

The other thought I have is that living the in the northeast, I don’t want to change my oil in the dead of winter. So I might change the oil in December rather than waiting to hit 5,000 miles in February.

 

Is it Friday already?

Oh, every 5K miles without exception.

 

Darkness of oil has little to do with the chemical robustness of the oil. Your main driver for changing oil should be "TBN" (total base number) which reflects the oil's ability to resist acidification.

There are some oils that can be used for 10,000 miles and still end up with a good TBN which means the oil is still very usable.

 

I watch a ton of YouTube motorhead videos to relax including I Do Cars, Farm Project and the Motor Oil Geek to name a few. Seems the general advice I've seen is that these folks seem to recommend lowering modern manufacturers OCI's to about 5k miles max but with the properties of modern synthetics, calendar time doesn't make much of a difference. A year is likely fine but would be interested to hear what Blackstone has to say since I use Mobil 1 and also drive my 2nd gen no more than a few thousand miles a year.

 

I'd be lying if I said I haven't done that.
300zx set in a garage for over 3 years with no oil change.
Driven less than 1,000 miles in those 3 years.

But this is the internet, so that car had to have been ruined by my neglect.....

 

194,000 miles and I've always done every 5000 miles regardless of time.

 

Roughly 1 yr or 10k miles whichever comes first.

Usually it's the 1 year-ish.

Pro tip. Color, taste or smell may help ID a vehicle fluid. But it won't tell much about the condition of the fluid.

Exception: Automatic transmission fluid is best when a pinkish red. When it's blackened, it's a problem. I can check this on my transmission dipstick, which many of you cannot.

#savethedipsticks #dipsticksmatter

 

There is alot of factors that determine how long the oil is good for.
This is why many vehicles oil life systems don't just factor in miles but also engine temp, load, runtime, idle time, actual time, etc, while they still go too long IMO they are alot more accurate than just counting miles.

Short trips especially in cold ambient temps are the hardest on oil because it never gets hot enough to burn off moisture and also the engine runs alot richer when cold so fuel dillution is higher especially in DI engines.

Extended idling also shortens oil life.


If most of your trips are under 10 miles I wouldn't go longer than 6 months, oil is cheap compared to replacing an engine.

 

37,000 miles and 37 oil changes!?!



Dude, you could literally be selling your old oil for money

 

NOT FRIDAY!

every 5K
[or in reality probly closer to 6K by the time i get my shit together and actually do it]

 

Every thousand miles, total waste of time and money. Just follow the OM.

 

259,000 miles. I changed it every 10,000 miles for the 1st 180,000 miles. Full synthetic only. At that time I drove about 20,000 miles/year so it worked out to about every 6 months. For the last 80,000 miles I don't drive it as much. It's a 3rd vehicle now used mostly around town or for shorter road trips within about 50-75 mile radius. Because I use it differently now, I have now change at 5000 miles. In the 18 years I've owned it I've never added a drop of oil between changes. It still doesn't use any.

Every 1000 miles is insane unless you only drive 1000 miles/year. Oil should be changed every year regardless of miles. I wouldn't do it at any more often than 5000 miles or 1 year.

 

some of the oil changes in the winter months are 1,000 miles after 12 months... normal is around 1,000 miles every 6 months or so. Just curious... is your oil pretty dark when changed out? Mines dark (almost black)... allways thought is was due to the short trips, towing fishing boat up a mountain to lake at 6,000', and occasional offroading on dry dusty dirt roads.

 

Your oil being black is normal. It will vary from engine to engine but in my experience, oil turns dark/black VERY quickly and is not an indicator of it being bad or needing to be changed.

Since you're sending your oil in to Blackstone, I suggest you ask them about this. You're going to get a whole lot of armchair quarterbacks here online. This topic has been beaten to death and you'll see people equally passionate about their opposing opinions but none of these people have the knowledge that Blackstone does.

Now, my $0.02. I've been getting my oil analyzed for nearly 20yrs now. Every car. Every oil change. I've also spent some time listening to the Blackstone podcast from time to time. Based on my experience and knowledge, oil should be changed based on mileage and conditions - not time. Time intervals are typically not helpful and usually just result in you changing your oil more often than you need to. Which isn't harmful, but it is wasteful/expensive. I'm sure there are some use cases where time based OCI's make sense, but those will be few and far between. Blackstone always provides their suggested OCI and I follow their guidelines. Every car we have is on a different OCI, which shouldn't be a surprise considering they are all different engine designs and different use cases.

Additionally, one of my cars sits most of the time and sees very little mileage. I've gone multiple years without changing the oil and the oil analysis always comes back just fine. Never has Blackstone told me to change it more often.

 

While modern oils can last longer, the plain fact that contaminates are suspended in the oil. And the only way to get rid of them is to put fresh oil in. Now is your oil still looks new after 5,000 miles, well...
For me, I'd rather not pump dirty oil through my very expensive engine for an extended period of time. Thirty bucks every 4k or so provides me peace of mind.