Extreme short tripper OCI advice

[yaris0128]

So I use my Yaris as my errand runner most of the time. I drive it for all my city trips that are almost all 1-2 miles each way. And this is every single day. I of course drive it on the highway to work 35mi round trip once every other week. Anyway would this warrant changing sooner than the manuals recommended 5k OCI? I currently am using a stash of VWB 5-20 in the car. Im changing the oil in the car today at 4k. Just want to have a good idea for the next one.

Advice please and thank you.

 

[kr_bitog]

5k is good enough even for very short tripper. I have the same pattern and the borderline of noticeably deteriorating oil symptom is around 6k-7k

 

[skyship]

Do you shut down for long enough for the engine to cool off in between short trips?
If you do, that means the mixture will always be too rich and some degree of carbon and fuel contamination of the oil and cylinders is inevitable. In general terms a severe service OCI should be half of the normal one, but there is no need to change the oil filter until the full OCI figure, so just change the oil every 2.5K miles.
A real good blast along the highway every Sunday will help clean carbon out of the cylinders and using good quality fuel will help. If you use cheap supermarket grade fuel think about using a major brand fuel additive.

 

[JHZR2]

Run UOA. For all the discussion of severe service, we found that normal OCIs were fine for my mother's really short trips when running a decent syn oil... So thats what er have been going for the last 150k.

 

[Falken]

I have worried about the same thing.

In a small, high revving tight Japanese engine that is made from aluminum (warms up very fast) I really don't think short tripping matters, especially if you take it down the highway once a month.

I inspect my oil all the time, smell it for fuel, and look for mayonnaise under the oil fill cap and can't say it bothers my Fit much (similar sized car).

These tiny cars are designed to be city runabouts. So the engine size and weight scales well to the road use they were designed for.

A huge steel blocked V-8 to go half a mile and back in -25C weather, then I'd be concerned.

 

[Indydriver]

I have the same problem in spades. I drive my DI turbo Mazdaspeed3 4 miles each way to work and I drive home for lunch. So that's four 4 mile trips each day. Three are from stone cold. I have been using PP at the specified viscosity.

My UOAs at 3500 miles show about 2.8 fuel but still 5+ TBN. The oil is black with diminished lubricity and you can sure smell that level of fuel. I don't think there's any way around the short OCIs but I'm going to experiment with M1 5W-30 + a quart or two of 0W-40. Bottom line: I won't go beyond 4000 miles with this car.

Note: I don't mind going through expensive oil. My priority is to protect this engine and turbo. This car will be 5 yo in June and has less than 30000 miles on it. Oh yeah, a six qt sump too.

 

[bigjl]

I would personally run full synthetic in any vehicle used for short trips.

From the reading I have done recently hasn't changed my opinion.

As I have said before Volvo/Ford say if you use your vehicle in severe service, such as short trips, the just ensure you use full synth.

 

[mrsilv04]

Originally Posted By: Indydriver
I have the same problem in spades. I drive my DI turbo Mazdaspeed3 4 miles each way to work and I drive home for lunch. So that's four 4 mile trips each day. Three are from stone cold. I have been using PP at the specified viscosity.


To the original poster, Is what you're doing defined as severe service? If so, if you are staying within what your owner's manual defines as severe service, I would think that you are safe in that. Outside of that, run an analysis of the oil to verify and be sure.

Same problem here. My commute in cold weather barely allows enough run time to get heat before I pull it into the parking lot at work... or into the garage at home.

However, this is why I'm glad that I have the "smart" version of the GM OLM on my Silverado. It keeps track of all my short cold trips....so I don't have to.

It counts down much quicker with cold short trips, than it does on a long interstate trip (very slowly)... which shows it IS doing its job, and it isn't just a mileage meter.

 

[skyship]

Originally Posted By: bigjl
I would personally run full synthetic in any vehicle used for short trips.

From the reading I have done recently hasn't changed my opinion.

As I have said before Volvo/Ford say if you use your vehicle in severe service, such as short trips, the just ensure you use full synth.



It depends which engine you are thinking of and you also have to take into account the economics of using a more expensive oil. If the engine manufacturer does not insist on full synthetic then I would just use a major brand conventional or part synthetic, because fuel contamination will effect both types of oil in the same way, so the important thing is to dump the oil before it gets contaminated.
There would be a slightly better case for using a full synthetic if you are short tripping in extreme temperatures or have a turbo subject to the use of a big right boot.
If you used Castrol Edge 5/40 and dumped it every 2.5K miles, then over a 250K miles life engine that would cost you about about about 2500 dollars more than using Castrol GTX 10/40. That might be a rather extreme example, but using a real good synthetic as apposed to a basic conventional is interesting if you have to do short OCI's and for most engines it won't make a big difference in main block life expectancy.

 

[Kuato]

Originally Posted By: JHZR2
Run UOA....


This. Perfect opportunity since you're changing it.

 

[daman]

For a very short triper and the oil contaminates that goes along with it i would do 3,000 miles oci and use a good name brand conventional oil the cheapest you can find.

 

[jimbrewer]

This is why we pay the long bucks for a UOA, no? I have a twice a day 4 mile commute. Oil minder meter was clicking off 1% every sixty miles or so. Seems to have slowed down greatly. I changed the factory fill early, but had I not, oil minder would have me changing now, at about the 7500 mile mark.

I'm a little skeptical how the OLM works with such an outlier usage pattern. Sure its easy to create an algorithm that happens to tell us to change at about the time the manual would tell us to change anyway. The test is whether it can successfully predict oil life in a usage like mine. So I'm going to let it go as a kind of experiment. I'm required by warranty to change before one year anniversary date, but short of that, I'll go until oil minder gets into single digits. Then I'll buy a test with TBN and TAN. If OLM is tracking my usage reasonably well, I'll mentally add back a few percentage points as my personal trip wire for an oil change as a kind of safety cushion and let her ride.

Or, you could just adopt a 5K convention. Your chances of that being too long an interval are about one out of 500.

I've come a long way in my thinking about car care. Instead of obsessing about "ROI" by squeezing the last couple of thousand miles out of an oil change, or buying some high dollar high-tech marvelous oil, I've come to realize through experience that the best thing I can do is attend to the cosmetic issues that are what really chases us out of our cars. I'm not one to spend hours polishing a car on a sunny weekend, but I'm learning.

 

[GSCJR]

5k is just fine.

 

[KitaCam]

If it were me...and it is actually, as I drive 3.5 mi./10 minutes to work in the AM (though more after work)....

...I'd drive THE LONGER WAY TO WORK to make sure the car got to operating temperature...not just for the oil issue you're raising here but for all the other issues that can occur if the car doesn't get hot enough....

Just drive for another 5 minutes or so (10 min. minimum) and you don't have to worry about ANYthing...well, worry less at least.

 

[Falken]

If your oil filter is easy to reach maybe feel if it is uncomfortably warm to the touch when you get to work.

The metal of the can is very thin, so this can give you an idea of what you are dealing with.

If you grab it and it is luke warm, maybe lower your OCI drastically.

If it is really hot, that would be good to know.

On my Fit I can lay on my side and grab the filter as it is right up front, or I can carefully reach down through the engine bay and touch the backs of my fingers to it to see how hot it is.

This may be a good test. Or maybe get a UOA done if you are that type of person.