High Mileage Oil Switch

[Oliver]

I'm pushing 140K and I want to know if y'all think its worthwhile to switch to synthetic or just keep up with the standard goods.

[Precise1]

I've heard plenty of mechanics say running dino oil is fine, just change it regularly. Others swear by the synthetics, but differ with the change frequency. Filtration influences this the most; if you have dual filters, you can run oil longer, but not double as gas blowby contaminates and helps break down the oil.

Who is right, I don't know... Synthetics in an older motor can cause leaks (it's generally thinner)

Blend is probably the most cost effective while hopefully extending the motor's life. As I understand, the trick is to buy a new car, run dino for the first few oil changes, then switch to synthetic. That doesn't apply here, but figured I'd mention it. My pathy gets dino oil that never runs more than 3k miles with a filter change every oil change. That alone has helped these motors run 250k+...

 

B

[94extreme]

what's your oil color at 3k mi?

[zonianbrat]

I agree with Precise. I have heard switching whenyou already have high miles can cause leaks or make small leaks worse. I also heard that now synthetic oils are not even true synthetic any more. I think it was some thread on this forum about the different grades etc.Try doing a search on synthetics. I did switch to castrol syntec blend for the same reason precise stated, it seems like it is the best of both worlds. I switched at 118,000 miles. So far I have no leaks and the oil always seems pretty clean when I change it. (I still change it every 3-4 thousand miles because it makes me feel better)

[wheel366]

Synthetic does not cause leaks. Now with that said, I heard from a friend who races older camaro's and vette's that becase the engine is older, the clearances are larger and you should run something thicker. My engine is a factory reman which only has about 12.5k miles on it. I ran dino for the first 1200 miles then switched to 5W-30 amsoil. I still use the same oil but I have a dual mount filter relocation kit with a bypass filter. Oh and I change every 5k even though it says I can go up to 25k miles on the oil and filter and 60k on the bypass filter. I won't take that chance.

[mattd123]

after 3k my oil from the 97 was really dark, i used full synthetic but my car was porrly maintaned before i had it and i pushed it fairly hard on the trail and highway (admittingly harder than i should have) it had like 120,000 miles on it because i drove it back and forth from Rhode island to mass. i found that the engine generally ran alittle smoother with the synthetic then the dino but that might have just been me. aslong as you keep up with it i think dino is fine for your truck

[nige]

synth costs twice as much as regular oil, but I don't think it protects your engine twice as good as regular oil. I'll stick with the plain kind until the price on synth comes down. I've never had a problem with my oil and sometimes i leave it in there for 4k miles.

[M in KC]

Not to pile onto a debate that will be around as long as there are competitors in either the oil or filter markets but ....

 

Staying with Benards's comments regarding filteration here are some uncomissioned oil fliter analysiss. They may be reposted inforamtion and if so I'm sorry for that. But they are interesting to read if that's all that you do with it. All oil will eventually breakdown but I'm a believer in filtering out as much of the cack out as you can along the way.

 

 

http://people.msoe.edu/~yoderw/oilfilterst...ilterstudy.html

 

And for peeps who shelf the cage every now and again where is one for MC filters.

 

http://www.tobycreek.org/oil_filters/mychoices.shtml

[empathy]

I have 244, 460 kms on my 95 xe. I use synthetic. I put the last 30,000 km myself so not sure what previous owner used. It does not leak and synthectic makes for easier starting in Northern Alberta winter.