3 Months Or 3000 Miles? Which One Should I Go With?

[DuaneG]

I am about 1500 miles left for an oil change, but it has been 3 months. Should I go ahead and get it done? And I don't it has synthetic in it, but should I go to synthetic anyway? Is there a significant benefit to it?

D

[TA in KC]

Neither, if you ask me. 3000 miles/3 months is too often.

I use synthetic oil in my car, and change the oil every 4000-5000 miles/every 6 months.

Even that is probably excessive, but because of the kind of driving I do, I follow the "severe" maintenance schdule.

[Will B.]

Agreed, 6mo/5000mi is the recommended schedule.

[AZ Mike]

My owner's manual supplement states that the oil change intervals are either 5,000 miles or 4 months (if you drive under the "special operating conditions"), or 7,500 miles or 6 months if you drive "under light, non-commercial duty for distances greater than 5 miles in temperate climates".

The manual does not state this, but if I personally were to use the 7,500 mile interval, I would use synthetic oil, as its primary advantage is that it does not break down as fast as dino oil. Dino oil should be fine for 5,000 mile intervals.

Some say that synthetic oil decreases engine wear over time and possibly leads to a slight increase in mileage, though evidence of this is arguable. For example, there are a lot of vehicles out there with several hundred thousand miles that have used nothing but conventional dino oil. Like in many aspects of life, there is a "placebo effect" wherein we believe there is an improvement because we are using a better/more expensive alternative.

As best I can tell, there are two proven reasons to use synthetic oil:

1) for extended oil change intervals; and

2) to make you feel warm and fuzzy that you are using synthetic oil.

[jcrome04]

I use Mobil1 Full Synth 5W-30 and change it about every 4k miles.

[DuaneG]

I will wait 6 months or 5k miles and go synthetic.

I like this forum.

[jcrome04]

It likes you back DuaneG ;) lol!