Change your damn oil!!

Really, $6 each? Maybe I should stop looking into the spiffy lightweight ones used in the 12v 2.8 which seem to go for $20-25 a pop.

OTOH, my 8v VW had over 200k on it when I pulled the valve cover, and I noted lots of lifter to bore play. I'd imagine that the current mill, which is a 10v and has roughly 350k on it, is even worse. Especially since my 8v lived at about 2200-2500 on the highway, and the current one lives at 3500-4000, so there's a lot more cumulative revs in those miles too.

An aside - The engine holds less than 4 quarts of oil with filter. WTF VWAG?

I change mine every 3500. I figure it is cheap and easy so why not?

Curmudgeon wrote: There's been a movement since the early '90's to stretch or eliminate service intervals because the consumer has told the marketing weenies the last thing they want to do is have their car serviced.

also, BMW doubled their service intervals when they started paying for the basic maintenance on the cars. Before that, they were 7500 iirc, they changed nothing other than who was footing the bill, and doubled the interval. lol
People (in general) don't keep cars outside of warranty anymore.

People ask me why I put mobil 1 in a kia every 5k miles, I plan on keeping my car forever.

Or at least until 12-21-2012, when the world ends =]

Hey Knurled !

Can you tell us the grade and type of oil without spilling the beans ?

My DD, an 06 Malibu v6, has the fancy little oil life meter on it. I've had it read as low as 3000 miles and as high as 7500 miles until it says to change the oil. I take it with a grain of salt and still check my oil every time I put gas in the car. Once I see the oil start to get dark, I go ahead and change the oil, regardless of what the life meter says.

My s2000 is a slightly different story. It gets Mobil1 oil and filter before the first autocross event of the year. Since it doesn't get much street use, that usually lasts me all season. Then I'll change it again in the fall before the annual trip to DealsGap. I still check it at every fill up and before every event just to be safe.

My stuff varies. Most of my personal cars get oil changes twice a year with dead dinosaurs and NAPA filters. That works out to every 2000-3000 miles because they sit most of the time. My work vans get changed every 5000-8000 miles with whatever is on sale. That works out to every other month most of the time. Those engines hold 7 quarts and usually run at least 2-3 hours a day, so I don't mind pushing them a little long.

The wife's Venture gets changed whenever she remembers to stop at the quick lube. Probably every 7000-9000 miles. I've been waiting on that car to die for years, from neglect and abuse. At 220K it's still going strong. I'm reasonably certain it's got a layer of sludge in it, but I don't care enough to do anything about it. The rest of the car is falling apart fast enough that the engine will be the least of my worries.

I once was working on an Olds full size car, probably an early 80's V8(307). I forgot why I was working on it but when I removed the intake the whole complete lifter valley was a hard black mass of carbon, lol. Not soft sludge, this was like coal. The only openings in it were from the pushrods and thats it. Lots of chipping away with chisels and a shop vac it came clean. This was on a car that ran nothing but Quacker State oil from new. The car was only maybe 5 years old at the most at the time. I never used Quaker State or Pennzoil after that. The guy actually did maintain the car well also. Another guy brought in a early 80's Ranger with the German designed V6. Had over 300K on it and ran nothing but Castrol in it. He would change the oil every 2K. He would replace stuff just becuase of the miles. He wanted to replace the timing chain so when we removed the cover the inside looked brand new, hardly any wear on the chain or gears either.