german castrol

[kkat]

After reading all about GC 0w30 Ive decided to use it in my wife's toyota avalon, it has 17'000 on it now and will change to GC at 20'000. Is GC 0w30 ok to use year round, toyota reccomends 5w30 which I have been using in a dino oil,also this car makes many short trips, as well as a couple of 20+ mile trips a week, (moms taxi) so do you think it would be alright to extend OCI's to around 5000 miles, now change at 3000 oci's. Any imput is greatly appreciated, thanx

 

[WeyounDS9]

1)Yes.
2) dont worry 'bout toyota tehre are no Dina 0w-30's so they cant account for it in their guidance
3) Depends. Which Toyota do you drive? If one of teh infamous sludgeones I'd not exent too far.

Fred..

 

[Hirev]

What Motor? If it is a toyota Sludge motor I also don't think it would be a good idea to go very long when it does a lot of short trips as you stated.

 

[ekpolk]

Since it's an Avalon, it IS powered by the 1MZ-FE V-6, as no other engines have been available with this car. The 1MZ is the one that had the potential for sludging, but only during certain model years. I don't have the info handy, but I believe the window was from 97 or 98 to the end of the 01 or 02 MY. Later versions were upgraded so as to reduce or eliminate the vulnerability to sludging.

So, what MY Avalon are we talking about?

 

[ekpolk]

Oh yeah, I forgot to add: I had fantastic results with GC over a 5,000 mile OCI on my post-sludge era V-6 Camry. See the Blackstone report here: Blackstone UOA from V-6 Camry

Since this Camry is a "2003.5" model, it has exactly the same engine as the Avalon, the VVT-i variant of the 1MZ-FE.

 

[kkat]

Thank's ekpolk, The avalon is a 2003 model, very nice car, dont know much about them though, we made a step up from a dodge caravan to this car and we plan on keeping it for a long time so Im going to start a really good PM schedule on it and from what Ive been reading the GC 0w30 is a good step towards longivity at least motor wise,

 

[Bruce T]

Here is Toyota's official list of affected vehicles (taken from an April 8, 2002 story in "Automotive News"):

These are the vehicles equipped with 1MZ V-6 and 5SFE inline-4 engines produced between July 1996 and July 2001.

Camry, built August 1996 to July 2001

Camry Solara, built June 1998 to May 2001

Sienna, built July 1997 to May 2001

Avalon, built July 1996 to May 2001

Celica, 4-cylinder, built August 1996 to April 1999

Highlander, built November 2000 to July 2001

Lexus ES 300, built August 1998 to July 2001

Lexus RX 300, built January 1998 to July 2001
Source: Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A.