Oil changes - how often

[Sam_100]

I do my oil changes every 7500km. I have noticed the oil comes out darker than my old VXII V6. Is there any reason the oil comes out darker on the 3.6l.

 

[Skylarking]

I do mine every year because it doesn’t do much, due in September and under 800km travelled since last September.

Curious what the oil look like 12 months and 800 kms old?
Ever done an oil analysis?

 

[vr304]

I do mine every year because it doesn’t do much, due in September and under 800km travelled since last September.

Same here, my ve has only done 2000km since oil change a year ago I’m still changing it anyway

 

[Ginger Beer]

Curious what the oil look like 12 months and 800 kms old?
Ever done an oil analysis?

And this is the elephant in the room, looking at oil with your calibrated eyeballs, or sniffing away for fuel contamination will not give you a breakdown on what is actually happening inside your engine wear wise, or the actually condition of your oil and its additives

Oil analysis is relatively cheap, $30 to 50 (variables), and there are lots of places that do them, if your work has a "workshop" they can hook you up

If you have never done an oil analysis you have no idea what is "really" going on inside your engine, transmission or diff

1 x 3 hole test, engine, transmission and diff, costs around "$100 and lets you know about contamination, wear, and breakdown of your oils

From there you either stay with the oils that you have been using, or change to something better

In the car I'm running: Engine: HPR10, Trans: Nulon Full Synth multi-vehicle, Diff: Penrite Mineral 80w90 (truetrac) which have all come in within the recommended specs

I'll be doing the same to my bike soon as I'm trialing a different oil grade in my transmission

Harley use to recommend 20w50 in the engine, transmission, and primary, but, now they brought out a full synthetic 80w140, so I'm going to send all the oils away for a test and see what pops up, and then either stay with what I have, or, go with the labs recommendations

 

[Skylarking]

And this is the elephant in the room, looking at oil with your calibrated eyeballs, or sniffing away for fuel contamination will not give you a breakdown on what is actually happening inside your engine wear wise, or the actually condition of your oil and its additives

That’s all true but if one dumps oil after 2000kms and it still is a nice clear clean light brown, does one really need to spend $30 -$50 on oil analysis?

In many cases $30 if half the cost of the new oil that one puts into their engine… so it ain’t a cost optimised process for the most part.

Now of the aim was to streach service intervals from 15,000 (where the oil is black) to 20,000 (when the oil is black black - a techcal term for non techies) then analysis may be warranted.

Analysis may even be warranted if the oil still looks ok at 2000 kms (again clear clean light brown) and one just wants confirmation that stretching the time interval for oil change for another 6 months… But I’m sure oil companies and manufacturers know all this stuff and just want profits via set oil changes (it’s almost like a subscription service).

After all, oil is engineered to work for 15,000/7500 kms and we are talking of 2000 km oil changes at 6 months, 12 months or longer.

 

[Forg]

And this is the elephant in the room, looking at oil with your calibrated eyeballs, or sniffing away for fuel contamination will not give you a breakdown on what is actually happening inside your engine wear wise, or the actually condition of your oil and its additives

I'm of the opinion that if you can see or smell anything out of the ordinary, as was mentioned earlier in this thread (and apologies to whoever said it 'cos I've forgotten who that was ), that analysis is probably pointless because something probably IS wrong so I don't know what value an analysis has? Like if you can smell fuel, if it looks watered-down, if it's got sediments (or worse - shiny bits!), if it looks more dirty than you'd expect ...

 

[Anthony121]

I remember where I worked there were cars that were made available to "rent" and a few of them went past their service interval of 15,000 kms up to around 21,000 kms. The oil was black black. I used to advise the operations people the cars were over due for service. These ranged from Commodores up to Colorado's. The Diesel engine oil was worse than black and some of them missed service too. I would hate to think who purchased these vehicles after we used them in the rental fleet. I still have some of the rego numbers too. Be interesting where they went.... Some were redlines and SS variants....

 

[Ginger Beer]

I'm of the opinion that if you can see or smell anything out of the ordinary, as was mentioned earlier in this thread (and apologies to whoever said it 'cos I've forgotten who that was ), that analysis is probably pointless because something probably IS wrong so I don't know what value an analysis has? Like if you can smell fuel, if it looks watered-down, if it's got sediments (or worse - shiny bits!), if it looks more dirty than you'd expect ...

The analysis will tell you what is breaking down, is it bearings, is it brights, is it because of the oil has lost its shear strength

Back in my track day days my oil would be toast after a weekend of racing, which was easily less than 500km, the oil "looked" OK, but smelt fuelly, the issue was the heat and pressure would kill the additives and the oil would lose its shear strength

I went thru a few gearboxes as well due to incorrect oil in the transmission, it was what Nissan recommended, but, with all the added torque from modifications it would strip the case hardening of the gears, after changing the gear oil to Redline Lightweight Shock Proof I stopped eating transmissions

 

[RevNev]

if one dumps oil after 2000kms and it still is a nice clear clean light brown, does one really need to spend $30 -$50 on oil analysis?

I just changed the oil in my SSVR Ute after 9 months and 155km's. Oil looked practically brand new but I'm thinking is an oil change really necessary at 9 month intervals when the car isn't driven much? An oil analysis in these circumstances would likely confirm if the oil change intervals could be extended. I'll start my Ute up 2 or 3 times a week and move it between sheds and take it for a spin around the block sometimes, with a few cold start and condensation factors at play that I'm not sure how relevant that is to oil deterioration.

My SV6 Ute did 3300km's in 9 months and the oil was starting to discolour a bit and worthy of changing I thought.

 

[hademall]

I still have some of the rego numbers too.

Don’t dare put those rego numbers on here!