Maintenance - neccesities vs. money making

I mean that before electronic maintenance monitoring, cars came with a maintenance schedule that contained an "A" schedule for 'normal' duty and a "B" schedule for severe duty. few vehicles/drivers fell under the "A' schedule. Also, as explained to me by one of Chryslers engineers (who was obviously slumming that day); The maintenance schedule was designed that if followed, the vehicle would perform and meet the emissions requirements for the duration -of- the emissions warranty, which back then was 5 years/50 thousand miles. He summarized the concept by stating that if one wanted his vehicle to last twice as long as the duration of the warranty, one would be well advised to do the maintenance twice as often as was specified.

Why "odd?" The algorithm dictates when it's time. What it doesn't take into account is whether synthetic lubricants are being used.

Good idea, price way too high.

I would wait another year or two.

Are they solid gold plugs he is putting in there? Price sounds ridiculous.

Good idea to do it. I'm not sure if this is a good price since I don't know where the filter is. On most cars, this would be very, very pricey.

Unecessary unless you are having problems.

Smart thing to do. Go by what is in the book.

On some items an inspection will not tell you much unless they are just about to break. But other items a visual inspection will tell you whether the item needs to be replaced.

Not worth it. Some of the service is too soon and other is unecessary.

I wouldn't do it.

Exactly the point. Ask your mechanic why the price is so high.

I hope I never buy a used car from you! If you look in the service schedule you will see that you need to change the oil more often than once every

Yes, it is. But I would not go by time but by mileage. Check your owners manual. My guess is it would recommend once every 7.5k miles.

------------- Alex

Is it really possible to buy inferior oil? I can see getting the wrong weight oil, but that really won't hurt anything unless you are way off.

---------------- Alex

^^^

That explains it. If the sign were ASE, then maybe he wouldn't be talking so much BS.

------------ Alex

-- For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling

Not necessarily "inferior" in general, but cars with longer oil change intervals may have specific oil requirements. For example, BMWs with variable oil change monitors that call for an oil change every 15000 miles on average are supposed to use only oil with a specific BMW rating for the longer oil changes. VW diesel engines specify diesel rated oil, and the newest ones specify oil with a specific VW rating.

You go 22500 miles on an oil change?

I know people who change their oil every 2000 miles. Overkill in my book but that's what makes them comfortable. Their track record in doing so so far includes no oil related mechanical failures, no emissions failures, increased longevity, so who am I to tell them that they're doing it wrong against their "it's cheap insurance" beliefs?

The choices of which currently available contain less or none of the anti-wear additives (ZDDP) that were available and commonly found in motor oil 9 years ago.

Alex Rodriguez wrote in rec.autos.misc

I think people are using inferior to mean the wrong oil for the application. In the above statement, what is being said is that some people buy perfectly good oil, meets all SAE standards, but is not designed for the extended oil changes. It is not inferior, it does a perfectly good job of lubricating the engine. What I think you are thinking about is an oil that does not meet the standards. And the answer to that is yes, you can buy inferior oil. Go into an autoparts store or a gas station, and look at the cheapest motor oil they sell and compare it to the name brands. You will see that it doesn't have all those strange SAE standards on it. It is good only for that old clunker that gets worse oil mileage than gas mileage.

No, I have had one oil change with a "minor" service. Minor and major services alternate, as I said in an earlier post; each of these include an oil change.

I must say that I had been used to an initial, mandated (by the manufacturer) oil change at about 900/1000 miles in a new car, and I had great trouble resisting this urge to change at that low mileage, which was no longer required in my vehicle bought in 2001. I checked with an 'old hand' at the garage of the dealer and he confirmed that (1) I wasn't the only one with doubts and (2) that I absolutely did not need to change oil before the point indicated by the trip computer.

I use the recommended oil, Mobil 1, I think. So far I haven't added oil between services.

In the old days the exceptionally early oil change was, IIRC, to deal with any 'swarf' that came out as the engine was running in.

DAS [........]

Okay...

The engine oil capacity is?

Perhaps they've improved their pre-assembly parts washing technique.

The first oil change is often set low to get any metal shavings and other junk out quickly.

After that, GM research shows that most owners can get away with 8,000 to 10,000 mile changes! But most automakers recommend every 6,000 to

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David Zatz wrote in news:2004062511445275249% noreply@allparcom:

People would have to be insane to wait over 5000 miles. I always change mine between 3000-4000 and put the receipt in the glovebox. Helps resale value to be able to pull out receipts for every oil change. Pull out receipts for oil changes every 7500 miles or more and see how much you get for your car. By the way, waiting a long time to change oil DOES wear out the engine faster. GM's study probably took into factor how long people expect an engine to last, how long they keep the car, their resistance to paying for more frequent oil changes, cost of a replacement engine versus frequent oil changes, etc.. It was probably a more economic/sociological study, than a technical one.

I don't know a single person that goes 5000 miles let alone 8000-10000 miles. Are you saying that GMs study determined that "most people" actually wait

Provided that most trips are more than 6-8 mile or so and the car is driven enough that the oil is sitting in there for months and months, changing every 5,000 miles wouldn't be insane at all. This is particularly true if a high quality oil was used, such as Mobil 1.

Why?

I always change

I've sold several cars with 5,000 mile change intervals and had no problem with resale value. Most buyers don't even ask...

By the way, waiting a long time to change oil

Proof?

GM's study probably took into factor

Again, any proof?

Matt

I've used 5,000 change intervals for 20+ years. I also use Mobil 1 oil. So, now you know at least one person that goes 5,000 miles between oil changes. :-)

I ran 10,000 mile intervals on a 1979 Chevette I owned. I started at

The buy drove it to over 140,000 before totalling it.

I'm about to go to 10,000 mile changes on my 1996 Grand Voyager that has

Matt

Finally got to look in my manual: oil capacity is 8 litres.

It also says that oil consumption should not exceed 0.8 l/1000 km under severe conditions.

BTW, in the 'old days' of the 1000-mile initial oil change the initial engine oil was extra thin (IIRC) to assist in the debris-removal process and the idea was to replace it with the 'normal' oil then.

Modern engines are much better built and bench-run so that this is no longer required.

DAS

faster.>>>any proof?

Oil does break down and get dirty and loses its ability to lubricate; this starts almost immediately and is gradual. Wouldn't you agree? And as a lubricant loses its ability to lubricate, there's proportionally higher wear on an engine. Wouldn't you agree? So it logically follows that waiting longer (5000 or more miles) results in more engine wear than if you were to change it sooner.

GM's study probably took a lot of factors into consideration. Cost/benefit analysis, how long a car will last/be owned, how long other major components last, other mitigating factors to just junk a car at a certain mileage when one of the major components breaks, etc.. So on and so forth.

Close to double the capacity of the majority of engines currently in the fleet. I'd be willing to bet that your car also has an oil cooler as standard equipment.

My metric conversion is a little rusty, but isn't that close to

There have been many different "break-in oil" schemes over the years...

Mostly it's better machining techniques, very few manufacturers run an engine until the end of the assembly line.