Oil Change Intervals 3k vs Longer with full synthetic

[Lockasiam]

What's the deal with that engine? I've had two neighbors with it that had an amazing amount of oil usage. Seems like a good candidate for Valvoline R&P, but maybe it goes beyond that.

Rings wear out, PCV system fails, valve guides wear out, it’s a cheap 100k mile poor people engine. It’s beyond any oil, it’s just a GM problem

 

[Lockasiam]

A better rule of thumb is change the after burning 200x the oil pan capacity in fuel.

How’d you come to figure this out? My car would probably be equal to 12/13 fill ups if I did the math right

5qt sump, 80qt fuel tank,
Burn 1000qt which is 12.5 full F to E cycles which at 5 miles per quart is about 5000 miles

 

[OVERKILL]

A better rule of thumb is change the after burning 200x the oil pan capacity in fuel. This accounts for two of the three critical variables, but is usually sufficient even with petroleum oils.

I agree that fuel used (like engine hours) is a better metric for oil age. My Jeep has a 7 quart sump, so 200x would be 1,400 quarts. I average about 11mpg in the winter months, so that's 2.75 miles per quart, or 3,850 miles (6,196km). The iOLM had me changing it most recently at 12,104km (7,521 miles).

 

[Hohn]

How’d you come to figure this out? My car would probably be equal to 12/13 fill ups if I did the math right

I wish I could claim credit.

When I started at the big C, I had the incredible blessing to sit next to an older gentleman who had not only done 25 years at Cummins in a prior life, but had been a lab manager at SWRI for 15 years before returning to Cummins as a part-time contract employee. Jim had seen thousands of oil analysis results from both SWRI lab tests as well as field trials and was returned to Cummins to consult on CES development and other random problem solving projects where his wealth of knowledge was essential.

I call the 200x oil pan capacity RoT the "Jim Wells Rule." Jim Wells worked closely with another gentleman at Cummins at the time-- Roger England. You may remember Roger from the Valvoline Restore and Protect video. He's now the Chief Technical Officer of valvoline global.

 

[Sberry]

I mention old cars not in the sense they are simply older but service work and comparing the speculation found on forums with the reality.
On forums we see anxiety attacks at engines at 5k oil changes which isn't the way most of the world operates
. I see thousands of cars manage to roll down the road that are not maintained and in the end not sure it's worth the worry.

 

[tired]

I wish I could claim credit.

When I started at the big C, I had the incredible blessing to sit next to an older gentleman who had not only done 25 years at Cummins in a prior life, but had been a lab manager at SWRI for 15 years before returning to Cummins as a part-time contract employee. Jim had seen thousands of oil analysis results from both SWRI lab tests as well as field trials and was returned to Cummins to consult on CES development and other random problem solving projects where his wealth of knowledge was essential.

I call the 200x oil pan capacity RoT the "Jim Wells Rule." Jim Wells worked closely with another gentleman at Cummins at the time-- Roger England. You may remember Roger from the Valvoline Restore and Protect video. He's now the Chief Technical Officer of valvoline global.

This is brilliant. Thanks for sharing.

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

It surprises me when I hear about members here who have one of these Kia/Hyundai GDI vehicles that are so failure prone unless you change the oil at such low intervals. Didn’t they do any research before buying? There’s so many other choices they could have gone with that aren’t so sensitive to oil choice/interval.

10 yr factory warranty is a big seller.

 

[Lockasiam]

When I started at the big C

You work at the cummins in columbus?

 

[Bullwinkle007]

Curious, were you using top tier fuel?

I throw in a bottle of Amsoil fuel injector cleaner every 4000 miles.

Redline SPL something like that, their fuel cleaner has the highest PEA on the market. Seems to work awesome

 

[thetricky]

Honestly probably a lot of reasons. People buy before they know a lot about engines or maintenance.

You can also buy a lot of oil and oil filters for the cost of car depreciation on a newer, more expensive car.

It’s even stranger to see on this site though. One would think if someone is obsessive enough to be on a site dedicated to lubricants then they would avoid questionable engine models!

 

[Sberry]

Some extreme changes I have done were due to expecting the car to die of other means or rust in half, kept going and soon realized we had seen 30k on oil. I had one in an 05 Freestar that at 15 looked like just poured it from the jug.