Originally Posted By: Bryan K. Walton
I've got about 130,000 miles on my 2000 Honda Insight. For the last 110,000 miles, I've been using Pennzoil Platinum 0w20. The car has never consumed any oil during the 7,500 mile oil change intervals -- at least not anything that I can detect. I've got enough PP 0w20 remaining for one more oil change and I'm thinking of trying a different 0w20 after that.
I'm considering switching to Mobil1 EP 0w20 and stretching the OCI to 15,000 miles. My question is this:
Having never consumed any detectable amounts of oil during the 7,500 mile OCI, if I went to 15,000 mile OCIs, what might cause consumption IF my car did start consuming oil? For the sake of this discussion, I'd like to rule out the possibility of any mechanical problems emerging in the car. Would consumption during an extended OCI point to a depleted TBN, only? Would there be other reasons for consumption to start during an extended OCI?
My reason for asking this question is that while I'm considering switching to M1 EP 0w20; and I'd like to go 15,000 miles per OCI, I'm not interested in doing so if it means that I'll have to start adding top-up oil during the OCI.
Thanks for your thoughts,
Bryan
The only thing that will cause increased oil consumption will be oil thinning.
You're already using very thin oil now.
If your contemplating longer OCI's then you would be well advised to validate the longer period through UOA's. Regardless of what brand/type of oil your using or contemplating using.
If extending the OCI's is your ultimate goal, then you possibly need to look at oils which are well known to go the distance.