Oil for a car that sees Uber use?

I told him Arco, Costco, Chevron or Shell are top tier. The local Safeway is cheaper and moves a lot of gas per day - I’m adding in a bottle of Gumout Regaine or Techron every 10K.

I’m switching the car to 5W-30 once all the M1EP 0W-20 is used up.
Those are all good fuels. Safeway is cheaper ... not around here, though. They're not a Top Tier fuel so, if it had to be used, Techron is probably a good choice. Not familiar with the Gumout product, are you?
 
Those are all good fuels. Safeway is cheaper ... not around here, though. They're not a Top Tier fuel so, if it had to be used, Techron is probably a good choice. Not familiar with the Gumout product, are you?
Regaine is a darling on the forums here. Recently was reformulated with PEA and PIBA.

Safeway and Costco move a lot of gas - so the risk of a bad tank is low from those places.
 
Depends on what trips you take as an uber driver.
This.

My sister has a friend who does runs for community residents (55 and older community) to / from the airport. About 45-55 minute drive, 40 minutes of the drive is on the highway. So, I think in this case, assuming owners manual allows it, 7500 mile OCI would probably be okay.
 
Uber driving isn't any worse on a car than normal driving. It isn't the racetrack. Whatever was good enough for regular driving is good enough for Uber.

5k OCIs is absolutely silly as well.
Actually that is incorrect. Uber driving would fall under severe service recommendations. Same as a taxie cab or law enforcement. I would run a 5w-30 to say the least. Or 0-40
 
Actually that is incorrect. Uber driving would fall under severe service recommendations. Same as a taxie cab or law enforcement. I would run a 5w-30 to say the least. Or 0-40
Can you explain why Uber is severe service? They're driving the same roads we are.

And why thicker oil would be better?
 
Can you explain why Uber is severe service? They're driving the same roads we are.

And why thicker oil would be better?
For Toyota, one of the qualifiers for "Special Operating Conditions" is:

"Extensive idling and/or low-speed driving for long distances, such as police, taxi or door-to-door delivery use."

Uber falls under the taxi or door-to-delivery use buckets.

Thicker oil can be beneficial in applications where the engine idles for extensive periods of time. During a time of high engine vacuum, oil consumption can increase and going up a grade may help.
 
For Toyota, one of the qualifiers for "Special Operating Conditions" is:

"Extensive idling and/or low-speed driving for long distances, such as police, taxi or door-to-door delivery use."

Uber falls under the taxi or door-to-delivery use buckets.

Thicker oil can be beneficial in applications where the engine idles for extensive periods of time. During a time of high engine vacuum, oil consumption can increase and going up a grade may help.
Keep in mind, the car in question is a hybrid. So there is less idle time(but it’ll still idle to charge the HV battery or maintain HVAC use).

So far, this car is seeing a lot of freeway and stop & go. I’m still keeping the Lexus-defined maintenance intervals. I’ll say this, I’m doing a better job maintaining this car - many of the cars I’ve been in as a passenger for Lyft and Uber are showing signs of a hard life.
 
Can you explain why Uber is severe service? They're driving the same roads we are.

And why thicker oil would be better?
For one, doing Uber 8+ hours a day, stop and go, on off the freeway, the majority of people drive to and from work. Vehicle only running maybe an hour for daily commute each way. I run 5W-40 in every car. As the oil shears down, end of life, still a 30wt, I much rather have more oil film strength than not. A 20wt sheers down to almost nothing. I would prefer to also have a heavier weight under those hot pistons. You can think of sheer a piece of Scotch tape versus a piece of duct tape. Which one's going to have much for strength if you are pulling on it from each direction. Duct tape for win. Will you lose fuel economy? One or two miles a gallon at the most are you going to see that at the end of the day at the end of the tank not really.
 
Castrol Edge Extended Performance (or whatever the gold bottle is called) meets Mercedes specifications. Thats why I use it in my moms Subaru. I couldnt find any north American varieties of 0w20 that meet that spec.
 
A lot of responsed keep forgetting...the car is a Hybrid...the engine is not running much...perhaps 50%-60% of the time. It would be foolish to run 0w-40 or other heavy oils in a HYBRID. When I drive one way to work, 9 miles, my 2021 Rav4 Hybrid's gas engine is on only 50% of the time going and 60% of the time coming back home. And this is in high traffic areas too.

It would be best if the oil intended by Toyota be used, and severity depending, go 5k or 10k between drains.

This is not so complicated, folks!
 
A lot of responsed keep forgetting...the car is a Hybrid...the engine is not running much...perhaps 50%-60% of the time. It would be foolish to run 0w-40 or other heavy oils in a HYBRID. When I drive one way to work, 9 miles, my 2021 Rav4 Hybrid's gas engine is on only 50% of the time going and 60% of the time coming back home. And this is in high traffic areas too.

It would be best if the oil intended by Toyota be used, and severity depending, go 5k or 10k between drains.

This is not so complicated, folks!
Toyota would probably tell you 5/30, but because of CAFE, they want the lowest available so they can earn government fuel economy standards credit and bragging rights. Basically if you make 300,000 cars times 1% better fuel economy that makes them look awesome but how much does it save you and I not a **** penny. So I'd rather have more protection for them pistons and rings. I guess not running all the time but what difference does it make I'd rather have a little more protection so I would at least go with a 5/30. You know back in the '90s all small 4 cylinder engines the manufacturer recommended 5/30 or 10/30
 
Toyota would probably tell you 5/30, but because of CAFE, they want the lowest available so they can earn government fuel economy standards credit and bragging rights. Basically if you make 300,000 cars times 1% better fuel economy that makes them look awesome but how much does it save you and I not a **** penny. So I'd rather have more protection for them pistons and rings. I guess not running all the time but what difference does it make I'd rather have a little more protection so I would at least go with a 5/30. You know back in the '90s all small 4 cylinder engines the manufacturer recommended 5/30 or 10/30
I don't buy that argument. My ride uses 0w-16 and I live in Las Vegas, so no, I use it with 100% confidence. I believe my 2021 Rav4 Hybrid will easily reach 200,000+ miles running on 0w-16 with 5,000 mile drains, and without burning oil.

I've heard the same lame excuses about "more protection" with heavier oils, but I put over 246,000 miles on a 2007 Toyota Yaris running only 0w-20 and when I sold it, it burned NO oil, and it had the same pep, and vigor of when I bought it with 4 miles on the odo.

What a lot of people do not understand is that today's best engines have very thin tolerances between metal parts, and only a thinner oil will protect those parts better than a thicker one. For my SUV, 5w30 offers LESS protection than 0w16. There are just too many taxi companies the world over that run Toyota hybrids with ow-20 and 0w-16 that show no problems over millions of miles.
 
What a lot of people do not understand is that today's best engines have very thin tolerances between metal parts, and only a thinner oil will protect those parts better than a thicker one. For my SUV, 5w30 offers LESS protection than 0w16. There are just too many taxi companies the world over that run Toyota hybrids with ow-20 and 0w-16 that show no problems over millions of miles.
I love it when somebody attempts a lecture and then doesn't even understand the difference between tolerance and clearance.

And no, that premise is complete nonsense. Adequate protection, with a properly designed bearing/journal is absolutely possible with a thinner oil, but that doesn't mean a higher MOFT is going to perform worse.

@kschachn and @ZeeOSix we've got a live one! :ROFLMAO:
 
What a lot of people do not understand is that today's best engines have very thin tolerances between metal parts, and only a thinner oil will protect those parts better than a thicker one.
What some people don't understand is the difference between " tolerances" and clearances.

Which parts of the engine have tighter clearances? Rod and main bearing clearances are not tighter than they used to be.
 
I don't buy that argument. My ride uses 0w-16 and I live in Las Vegas, so no, I use it with 100% confidence. I believe my 2021 Rav4 Hybrid will easily reach 200,000+ miles running on 0w-16 with 5,000 mile drains, and without burning oil.

I've heard the same lame excuses about "more protection" with heavier oils, but I put over 246,000 miles on a 2007 Toyota Yaris running only 0w-20 and when I sold it, it burned NO oil, and it had the same pep, and vigor of when I bought it with 4 miles on the odo.

What a lot of people do not understand is that today's best engines have very thin tolerances between metal parts, and only a thinner oil will protect those parts better than a thicker one. For my SUV, 5w30 offers LESS protection than 0w16. There are just too many taxi companies the world over that run Toyota hybrids with ow-20 and 0w-16 that show no problems over millions of miles.
The tolerance argument is ********. Engine tolerances are not any tighter than they were in the 90s with a 4 cyl engine the engine is only concerned at cold temp if you so choose to run a 5/50 you can all day long won't hurt anything except a little gas mileage Go find the manuals for other models used overseas. Like my Accord. 0/20 for best fuel economy, but we recommend ACEA A5/B5 API SL or choose any 5/10 30/40 wt. What that tells me Honda recommends high levels of ZDDP, which API SL is
 
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