Do You Know How Often Should You Have An Oil Change?

For many years, the accepted oil change interval has been accepted at every 3 months or 3 thousand miles, whichever comes first. 

Image by Robert Couse-Baker via Flickr

Why, do you ask? Well, because the engine oils of yesterday were not formulated like today’s engine lubricants and fairly quickly became degraded and broke down when used and left sitting in the engine environment for a period of time.

The combination of heat, friction, causes the oil to start oxidizing which results in creating a condition which deteriorates your engine’s vital internal parts, called sludge.

Sludge is an engine killer.

Sludge takes on a greasy, oily form, and plugs the oil return passages, and then acts like a sponge and continues to soak up the good oil to continue to expand grow while depleting the engine of the vital oil lubricant.

Once it gain hold, the engine heat crystallizes it to a rock of.. hardened sludge. When a machinist performs a machineing operation on an engine cylinder head, a crankshaft, an engine block or…, they must clean the surface meticulously before performing the prescribed operation. If the sludge is not cleaned properly, the end result will be a failed engine, and all that time, effort, as well as money is wasted.

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Nothing in your engine workers harder than your oil. With hundreds of moving parts, and thousands of explosions every minute, it’s no wonder that engine oil needs to be changed frequently!

You’ve probably heard the old rule of thumb: Have an oil change every 3,000 miles/ 5,000 kilometers or 3 months, whichever comes first. But some car manufacturers have introduced extended oil change intervals. They figure that a modern vehicle driven under the right conditions can go for 5,000 miles/8000 kilometers or more between an oil change.

The key phrase here is “under the right conditions”. If you look at your owner’s manual, you’ll see two different maintenance schedules: one for “normal” driving conditions and one for “Severe Service”. Severe service driving conditions include stop and go, short trips, towing, hauling, hot, cold, and dusty driving.

Recently, four of the largest auto manufacturers in the world have extended engine warranty coverage for engine damage caused by oil sludge resulting from longer oil change intervals. They found that real-world conditions require more frequent oil changes than the 7,500mi/12,000 km interval they were recommending.

They subsequently recommended more frequent oil change intervals and proof of timely oil changes in order to qualify for the extended warranty.

Oil sludge is…

More at… Risk of Extended Oil Change Intervals

More Reading… Fuel Saving Tip: Auto Myths Around

Oil is the life blood of your vehicle’s motor and is not the place to try and save a few bucks.

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Portland, OR 97212

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