Mobil 1 5w-30 5.2k miles; Toyota 4.0L v-6

[teenee]

Quoting Indiana Jones: "It's not the years, honey. It's the mileage."
I hope to help infrequent/short trip vehicle owners users to save some money.
I've attached a Blackstone analysis of a 2 year/5000 mile oil change.
Oil type: Normal Mobil 1 5W-30 with the recommended dosage of Liqui-Moly Mo-SO additive to minimize wear from weekly cold starts, (I live in central New England). Note: I have not noticed any increase of mileage with this additive, however the wear metals detected may have been decreased.
The OEM cellulose filter was changed at 3217 miles since oil change. Easy for 4th gen V6 4runner! If synthetic media, that might not be required.
Blackstone comments refer to my 20 miles weekly trip to buy groceries and rare recreational trips concerns.
I'm not promoting Mobil 1...I.m sure any top tier synthetic oil would do.

 

[loneryder]

I'm in my second or third year on syn oil in my MB CLK which sits all summer every year. It's a FL car. I'm guessing 1-1500 miles. Just recently had the valve covers off for cleaning the PCV system and new gaskets. Think I should change the oil filter? It's easy. What about the oil?

 

[Kira]

The lab describes teenee's TBN of 2.2 as "...showing a bit of active additive". A bit? Is that all you get for your money?
I'd love to see the numbers after pushing it to the 7,000 miles mentioned.

I'm really glad oils today can handle 2 years of reduced driving but scraping the sand bar is one thing I wouldn't want to do with my engine.

"Scraping the sand bar", is a metaphor. In this case it refers to depleting an oil's qualities to some minimum.
When is the OP going to change his oil? .....when the TBN reaches 1.001? The paper says ">1" is what you need.

Waiting a few months (or the additional 2,000 miles) then doing another analysis is sure interesting. However, the money it costs might be better spent towards an oil change. The data has a fleeting useful life as people change vehicles.

Were I in the OP's situation, I'd likely do some more local driving but I'd be sure to change my oil before the chance of a long, hot drive occurs.

Speaking for myself.

 

[JohnnyJohnson]

I'm in my second or third year on syn oil in my MB CLK which sits all summer every year. It's a FL car. I'm guessing 1-1500 miles. Just recently had the valve covers off for cleaning the PCV system and new gaskets. Think I should change the oil filter? It's easy. What about the oil?

I'm in my second or third year LOL. So what was the condition when you had the valve covers off sludge? What kind of oil and the year, make and model of the car.

 

[DavidJones]

The wifes 2012 Highlander lived a life on the freeway and received it's oil changes on a 10,000 mile schedule before Covid. I used 0W-20 Mobil1 (XP or whatever it's been called over the years) until the 100,000 mile mark and switched to 5W-20 Mobil1XP at that time. With Covid, the wifes job switched from an office 20 something miles away to working from home. (she loves it.....) Currently the odometer is showing about 132,000 miles, so this change is a little over 2 years old and has about 2000 miles on it. I have the oil and filter (Baldwin) and plan on changing it in the next week or so, well.....because.

 

[DGXR]

Aside from the good report, and this may be stating the obvious... with low mileage, usage matters a lot. Say a vehicle is driven ~1000 miles over 2 years' time. The oil will have one analysis if the vehicle is driven 1.4 miles every day, and a much different analysis if the vehicle is driven 42 miles in one trip per month.

 

[Silver]

I wonder if driving it less would be better or worse for the vehicle.

I have a Ford that only sees about 500 miles per year from about 20 trips ranging from a few miles to 25 in one trip.

 

[dlundblad]

Am I reading right that the oil filter was changed at 3200 miles, but the oil was changed at 5000 miles?

 

[ecotourist]

Quoting Indiana Jones: "It's not the years, honey. It's the mileage."
I hope to help infrequent/short trip vehicle owners users to save some money.
I've attached a Blackstone analysis of a 2 year/5000 mile oil change.
Oil type: Normal Mobil 1 5W-30 with the recommended dosage of Liqui-Moly Mo-SO additive to minimize wear from weekly cold starts, (I live in central New England). Note: I have not noticed any increase of mileage with this additive, however the wear metals detected may have been decreased.
The OEM cellulose filter was changed at 3217 miles since oil change. Easy for 4th gen V6 4runner! If synthetic media, that might not be required.
Blackstone comments refer to my 20 miles weekly trip to buy groceries and rare recreational trips concerns.
I'm not promoting Mobil 1...I.m sure any top tier synthetic oil would do.

There has been a lot of opinion that an extended time period can work fine. Nice to see some evidence.

 

[Gene K]

The lab describes teenee's TBN of 2.2 as "...showing a bit of active additive". A bit? Is that all you get for your money?
I'd love to see the numbers after pushing it to the 7,000 miles mentioned.

I'm really glad oils today can handle 2 years of reduced driving but scraping the sand bar is one thing I wouldn't want to do with my engine.

"Scraping the sand bar", is a metaphor. In this case it refers to depleting an oil's qualities to some minimum.
When is the OP going to change his oil? .....when the TBN reaches 1.001? The paper says ">1" is what you need.

Waiting a few months (or the additional 2,000 miles) then doing another analysis is sure interesting. However, the money it costs might be better spent towards an oil change. The data has a fleeting useful life as people change vehicles.

Were I in the OP's situation, I'd likely do some more local driving but I'd be sure to change my oil before the chance of a long, hot drive occurs.

Speaking for myself.

D4739 TBN simply isn't all.thst indicative anymore. It can be as much as 3.0 off a D2896 test. It doesn't seem to pick up the newer nonmetallic organic additives.
You can often go thousands of miles after it bottoms before acids start to tick up. Many major engine manufacturers don't even have a condemnation limit for it anymore. With the extrenely low sulfur fuel the hard base simple isn't that important. As long as you have it you know your safe but if you are trying to avoid discarding lubricant early monitoring oxidation and nitration seems more useful.

 

[ZeeOSix]

Aside from the good report, and this may be stating the obvious... with low mileage, usage matters a lot. Say a vehicle is driven ~1000 miles over 2 years' time. The oil will have one analysis if the vehicle is driven 1.4 miles every day, and a much different analysis if the vehicle is driven 42 miles in one trip per month.

Fore sure ... anyone doing long time frame OCIs but with low mileage should really try to keep the short trips to a minimum. My low mile use vehicle goes 2 years on an oil change, but every time I drive it the trip is at least 30 miles or over an hour, so the oil gets to full operating temperature for most of the drive.

 

[ProbeGT]

I ran SB oil for 3 years and ~5,500 miles in my Jag 3.0 V6 twice, when I wasn't using the car much. Still came out nice and clean. Top end of engine is clean as a whistle. I do annual oil changes now that I drive the car more. 126K on the clock, no engine issues, runs smooth, uses less than 1qt between oil changes. 6.5 qt fill.

 

[Koainn]

Ever since the lockdowns and now that I work from home all my trips are short. Ive probably been on the hiway 3 times in 2 years. I just looked at my MID display in my Infiniti and says ive had 85 hours of operation and driven 550 miles LOL

 

[loneryder]

The lab describes teenee's TBN of 2.2 as "...showing a bit of active additive". A bit? Is that all you get for your money?
I'd love to see the numbers after pushing it to the 7,000 miles mentioned.

I'm really glad oils today can handle 2 years of reduced driving but scraping the sand bar is one thing I wouldn't want to do with my engine.

"Scraping the sand bar", is a metaphor. In this case it refers to depleting an oil's qualities to some minimum.
When is the OP going to change his oil? .....when the TBN reaches 1.001? The paper says ">1" is what you need.

Waiting a few months (or the additional 2,000 miles) then doing another analysis is sure interesting. However, the money it costs might be better spent towards an oil change. The data has a fleeting useful life as people change vehicles.

Were I in the OP's situation, I'd likely do some more local driving but I'd be sure to change my oil before the chance of a long, hot drive occurs.

Speaking for myself.

If you get an oil analysis from ASL (NAPA or WIX) They alert on TBN's of 2-3. I've always thought BS's recommendation of >1 is suspect.

 

[teenee]

The lab describes teenee's TBN of 2.2 as "...showing a bit of active additive". A bit? Is that all you get for your money?
I'd love to see the numbers after pushing it to the 7,000 miles mentioned.

I'm really glad oils today can handle 2 years of reduced driving but scraping the sand bar is one thing I wouldn't want to do with my engine.

"Scraping the sand bar", is a metaphor. In this case it refers to depleting an oil's qualities to some minimum.
When is the OP going to change his oil? .....when the TBN reaches 1.001? The paper says ">1" is what you need.

Waiting a few months (or the additional 2,000 miles) then doing another analysis is sure interesting. However, the money it costs might be better spent towards an oil change. The data has a fleeting useful life as people change vehicles.

Were I in the OP's situation, I'd likely do some more local driving but I'd be sure to change my oil before the chance of a long, hot drive occurs.

Speaking for myself.

Thanks for your feedback. The only concern I had with the report was the TBN number. If TBN depletion is linear, then I would be consider maybe stretching the OCI. However after reviewing your comments about the possible inaccuracy of TBN data, I'll probably cut back oil changes to 1.5 yrs.
I'm not taking the chance of running aground on a "sand bar"!
The purpose of my experiment was to refute some of the oil company's and vehicle maker's oil changing interval requirements. Many of us are driving alot less. With the increasing gas prices, COVID, more retired baby boomers like myself, and people working at home, we need to know the truth.
Of course those who still have warrenty coverage, or like you said, expose the engine to stressful conditions should act accordingly.
Some of the responses to my experiment were those owning very low use vehicles. I believe the worst wear and tear on any vehicle, (and the human body), is lack of use. But that's for another thread!

 

[teenee]

Am I reading right that the oil filter was changed at 3200 miles, but the oil was changed at 5000 miles?

I made a mid-oil change filter replacement. Cheap insurance against possible paper filter failure. The spin-off filter is located on top of the engine.

 

[teenee]

I'm in my second or third year on syn oil in my MB CLK which sits all summer every year. It's a FL car. I'm guessing 1-1500 miles. Just recently had the valve covers off for cleaning the PCV system and new gaskets. Think I should change the oil filter? It's easy. What about the oil?

 

[teenee]

Your situation is different from mine.
You could do what I did and send in a sample. They will send you a free kit and charge $30.00 ($10 additional for TBN) including shipping.
Please don't let your MB sit for so long. One day you will turn the key and the clutch will be frozen or a brake will stick. Like us, cars need at least some excercise!

 

[Linctex]

There was a dude on here with a 454 in a Chevy Suburban that had 6-7 years on an oil change, the oil was still perfectly fine.

I have an old Farmall H that has had the same 15W-40 oil in the sump for over 15 years.
It gets used 1-2 hours per year, twice a year up to full operating temp. I see no good reason to change it.

 

[Kira]

Have you sent in a sample of this 15 year old oil? The inexpensive WIX test from RockAuto could be all you need.