Oil Changes ...... can your oil be too clean, too fresh? For 30 years and many cars I've been changing oil every 2500 & filter every 5k. Have had several (VW, Toyota, & Mercedes) go over 200k w/ this regiment. My CL-s gets the same treatment.

Recently had a Mercedes dealer mechanic tell me that 2500 mile oil changes are not only not required, but are actually "not good" for "late" model cars, foreign & domestic. Contention is that a "slight" amount of wear is desirable over no abrasion. And current metallurgy and lubricant technology allows 7K to 10K oil change intervals.

Has anyone in the forum found good research and/or reference on this topic? To my simple brain, clean is better than contaminated and wear leads to failure ...... both, every time.

 

I stick to the tried and true 3000 mile interval.

 

Mobil 1 , 5000 miles... due to be changed in the next 2 weeks.

 

Outside of breaking-in the bores, etc during "the break-in period" WEAR is not a good thing, perhaps your mechanic had a visit to the following site and believed it:

http://www.jardine-engineering.com/w...oilsecret.html

(If anyone believes this story, please let me know…)

If you feel comfortable using your 3000-mile change interval, just do it...

You probably would do well to follow the factory manual as a minimum requirement and if there are some "issues" like:

1. Putting only 2000 miles on your car in a year (as in lots of time going by between oil changes)
2. Doing a ton of cold starts with local drives (where the engine never really warms up)
3. A ton of stop-and-go driving combined with short hops and extended idling


THEN, you "might" want to consider the "time to change interval" and/or oil condition...

No rules, just some thoughts...

BTW -- you really don't want the wear (I am still shaking my head about that one...as I hear that from some people and can't ever get them to "explain" where they got that info)

 

My acura service manager told me don't bother with 3000 mile changes; recent oil upgrades make them unnecessary--7500 or 6 months is his recommendation!

 

STRICTLY 4500 and STRICTLY MOBIL 1.

 

i do oil and filter at 3750mi. Its 1/2 of 7500 (tire rotation) and thats 1/2 of 15,000 (minor service). Keeps the schedule nice and neat.

 

I go by the manual. If the manual said 3K miles then fine. But the Acura manual says for normal driving it's 7500 miles. Now my 94 Explorer is every 3K miles. My 96 Impala is the only car that gets Mobil 1 every 3 months. Basically because I don't drive it. It's a collector car with only 12K miles.

 

EricL, Thanks for the LDL/HDL letter ........ now I understand from whence the Mercedes tech drew his opinion.