JIM5.0

I change mine at 10K miles. I sent in and I drive my car daily. Some spirited driving too, but nothing as hard as a car on the track or strip would see.
I sent in a sample of my oil after my last change and the analysis showed that I could have gone a bit longer, possibly even to 12K miles before the oil started to break down/become contaminated such that it needs to be changed.

My owner's manual says I could go with 7500 mi interval for typical driving, but using Ford's maintenance scheduler on-line, it says I can go 10K miles.
This of course is assuming the Mortorcraft blended synth or equivalent SAE rated blended synth from another oil company (Mobile, etc.).

If you straight dino oil, just about the cheapest crap out there, then yes, something less than the recommended mileage interval is necessary because it can break down more quickly and could lack detergents to fight off contaminants of blowby, etc.

And as already said, if you drive the **** out of your car and/or you track it a lot, then yes, your oil needs changing more frequently.

Norm Peterson

Not until you think a little deeper anyway.

Keep in mind that longer oil change intervals can lead to letting the oil level run a little lower.

Ignoring that, your oil change interval is dependent on how you use your car, not some specific number like 3000 miles, 15,000 miles, or whatever other number Cali might think is appropriate.

Ford and most other mfrs already identify "normal use" and "severe duty", with separate maintenance requirements for each. That's the proper starting point - defining your use category - which could conceivably be either more severe than "severe duty" (a weekend drag race car, for example) or less demanding than "normal" (90+% highway use).


FWIW, I was going 5000 or so against Ford's 5000 severe duty recommendation on the synthetic blend but will run up about half again that number having switched to full synthetic. One of my other cars (turbocharged) specifies 3750 (I think, didn't run out in the cold to check). My driving falls well within the definition of "severe duty", and I'd still rather buy a little more oil over the course of my lifetime than another engine or two.


Norm

Lethaldosage423

[QUOTE=MustangFirstCar;7781216]Hey just for clarification I change my oil at 3000-4000 miles, but I'm just sayin', if I want to change it earlier I have every right to, and how dare anyone suggest different.

If anything the gov't should be telling people to change their brake pads and have their lines flushed every once in a while. Any of you that have ever driven a 2002 Honda van owned by a soccer mom know what I am talking about. You have to brake from a half a mile away.[/QUOTE]


This made me lol
i am driving a 2001 Chrysler town and country and the brakes are S**TTY!
The rear brakes are origional with 120k miles on them. lol theres a problem somewhere.
I cant stop worth of s**t

JimC

Severe duty -- so I guess mine qualifies as a daily driver that sees severe duty since at least every other weekend I take it to the drag strip and get at least 10 passes on it.

And I have my oil analyzed and Blackstone Labs has been saying I could go further, even with severe duty on it. So I moved from 5,000 up to 6,000, and now up to 7,500 and the oil still shows it could go further.

Again, remember that the oil companies and oil change places are in the business of SELLING YOU MORE OIL AND SERVICES. So don't you think that they have a vested interest in assuring that you THINK you need more frequent oil changes than the manufacturer recommends?

wcgman

You apparently don't know how to drive a minivan. You're supposed to leverage your environment around you. By that I mean run over orange cones, hit bushes, ram shopping carts, swerve wildly across all lanes of traffic, have kids and dogs creating wind shear with their heads and other appendages out the windows. This will greatly increase the drag coefficient of you CTAC thereby lowering your braking distances significantly.

up_yours_7

I do my oil change when the oil starts to look or smell bad

wcgman

also - don't underestimate priuses or smart cars for stopping power. they will slide right under your front bumper and make stopping a breeze.

legendlime05

5k miles on my 4 uhoh and its still strong at 83k miles.

aero86

i see a lot of oil changes at our shop. we just use a base carquest oil for ours. after 3-4k miles, it starts looking dirty. could be the crappy filters, but with regular dino juice, i wouldnt go much longer than 5k. but, i change mine every 5k with synthetic anyways. figures out to be once every 3 or 4 months.

HxCGuitars

I change my oil twice a year. Or at least, that's the plan. Might be a waste but this is just how I've been planning it out, since I just bought my Mustang this year. After driving 4k this year, I changed my oil to the MC synthetic blend with a MC filter in preparation for storage. When she comes out in the spring, I'll be running Mobil 1 oil with a Mobil 1 filter until the winter when I store her again, where I'll do another oil change.