Oil Change Question

I am going to change the oil in my Tacoma instead of the dealer on the Toyota Maint Plan.
I am not familiar with the synthetic motor oils out there on the market but think I am going to use the Pennzoil Platinum 5w-30.
My truck has around 13,000 miles on it and is a 2010 V6...

How to you all rate this oil for year around protection?

And change intervals are what..5Kmiles or 10kmiles with this oil??

Thanks so much....

 

I like Mobil1 5w30 synthetic myself

 

I use it all the time, its good, i also use pennzoil ultra, since I was going to do it myself, why not get the good stuff! I change it every 5k just to keep it clean, but when the winter comes along... I change it maybe 6k or 7k, the oil will still be good.

 

The only real way to find the optimal Oil Change INterval (OCI) is to get oil analysis done...Take a sample when you change it now-Send that in. Take another sample in about 4800 miles and send that in. They'll make recommendations for you. (I use blackstone labs).

 

Good advice, but if he's still under warranty it would be best to stick with the 5K OCI, otherwise any warranty issues could become problematic.

BTW OP, if you do stick with a 5K OCI, then any oil labelled Synthetic will be more than sufficient (over-sufficient actually for that OCI). You could easily buy on price for that. If you want to extend your drain intervals then you should invest in the oil analysis mentioned and finding what you think is the best oil for the price and OCI.

 

Any arguments about warranty coverage are going to happen anyways - The onus is on the dealership to prove that the modification or process caused the failure.
You could change it every 5k with Mobil1 and they'll tell you you didn't use Toyota oil and that caused the problem.

 

Record keeping is key, they cannot force you to use any particular brand, they must document a specification, so if you have records of oil used and OCI, there will be much less pain then if you document any OCI higher then what they deem to be the minimum.