"Oil Change" life monitor - what results have you

z28com · 12-20-2006, 06:56 PM

I bought a brand new 2007 Ion about 3 months ago. I did an oil change at 3,000 miles and reset the computer. I have 10,500 miles on the car. Onstar just sent me an email saying that I have 50% oil life left. That's 7,500 miles on the oil and filter and I'm only at 50%!!! WOW! When do you guys have your oil change light come on? Has anyone seen these oil change life monitor go this far? I thought at 7,500 miles I would be at 100% no matter how much highway driving I would drive.

I drive about 200 miles per day round trip to work. It's all highway speeds and maybe about 3 miles sitting in stop lights until I get to the highway and then I do 55 to 65 all the way home.

I previously owned a 2004 Ion and lived in Miami with all stop and go traffic and the oil life monitor would usually tell me to change the oil at less than 4,000 miles.

I'm using Amsoil 0W30, so I won't have to drain the oil for 35,000 miles, but Amsoil doesn't make Amsoil filters for the Ecotec engines, so I am using their Wix filters. When the oil change light comes on, that's when I change the filter. I bought a nice Snap-On 32mm socket to remove the filter cover. It takes me about 3 minutes to swap the filter out. Piece of cake.

I also have a 2007 Saturn Green Line Hybrid. The 32mm socket I bought from Sears wouldn't fit on the 2.4 Ecotec. The intake doesn't have the same clearance that the Ion has to get a 32mm socket in there. That's why I bought the Snap-On socket since it was beveled to fit better. The filter is more of a hassle to remove in the Green Line than it is in the Ion since there was radiator hoses right up against the filter that bump into it as you pull the filter out.

I also installed those Fram Sure-Drain plugs in place of the factory drain plugs. Now oil changes won't be a mess the next time I drain the oil as the oil will be able to drain straight from the sump into a used, empty milk jug for me to take it to the oil recycling place.

the Shaolin UWP · 12-20-2006, 07:47 PM

Hahaha...I don't know if I would trust that...you're probably overdue for an oilchange.

toytech2005 · 12-20-2006, 07:56 PM

going 35K on oil, whether synthetic or not is pushing it, since the lubrication of the oil declines with running time and age i would change it every 5K at least

Artificialist · 12-20-2006, 08:58 PM

I use my oil life monitor, but since I make several short trips, it never lets me go past 6000 miles. I use synthetic, but not Amsoil. I get nervous after 5000 miles on the oil.

That in mind, I have seen many cars come into where I work with 6000 miles on conventional or synblend, and I don't see any weird stuff coming out the oil drain. However, I do occasionally see an ecotec-style oil filter that is caving in.

I have read that some people had caddies with an oil-life-monitor on their northstar. They trusted it 100%, and sometimes were told to leave the oil in for 15K miles. They got stuck rings, and had to pull out their spark plugs, shoot carbon remover in the cylinders, and wait for the carbon to dissolve.

In any case, I would only trust the oil life monitor with full synthetic. That's what I do, that's what my dad does with his Pontiac G6.

toytech2005 · 12-20-2006, 09:10 PM

hell, we have an 02 tundra with 96k on it at our dealership right now with the factory oil filter on it and the engine locked up, and there is about 4 gallons of sludge in the oil pan and sub pan, so changing your oil every 5k is pretty important
that guy made a 15 thousand dollar mistake

Techun · 12-20-2006, 09:27 PM

never changed the oil?! for that many miles? holy crap im surprised it lasted that long

Artificialist · 12-20-2006, 09:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by toytech2005

hell, we have an 02 tundra with 96k on it at our dealership right now with the factory oil filter on it and the engine locked up, and there is about 4 gallons of sludge in the oil pan and sub pan, so changing your oil every 5k is pretty important
that guy made a 15 thousand dollar mistake

Yeah, my dad met a guy with a Toyota Avalon that believed the 7000 mile oil change interval, and screwed his engine bigtime. The service writer said that you can't exceed 4500 miles on conventional oil, even though the manualk says so.

How could you tell that the filter on that truck was the original from the factory? Toyota dealerships use the same type of filters that come from the Toyota factories.

toytech2005 · 12-20-2006, 09:40 PM

the factory filters have an orange gasket and a different part number and he never changed the oil

z28com · 12-20-2006, 09:52 PM

I am using Amsoil's 0W30 oil. It's guaranteed for 1 year or 35,000 miles. The oil doesn't break down. It's not a blend. Amsoil is the very first company to ever make synthetic oil for cars. I've put well over 20,000+ miles on the oil in many other cars and it works perfect every time. The additives they use are very expensive as it's a private company. Mobil and Castrol are publically traded companies and have limits on how much money they can put into the quality of the product.

I have a friend who has a Toyota Rav4 that drives 110,000 miles per year doing deliveries and he changes the 0W30 oil every 35,000 miles with no problems. There's no sludge or anything. A friend of mine had a '98 Civic with 138,000 miles on it. He switched to the 0W30. He took me for a ride in it and he told me, "Do you hear that?" I said, "What? It sounds like a normal Honda to me." He said and I quote, "It was NEVER that quiet until I put Amsoil in there."

I trust the Amsoil oil lasting long. It's the Wix filter that I don't trust to get all of the dirt out. Amsoil's filters are super effiecient. They have bypass filters you can install that clean down to 1 micron. The Wix nor Saturn's filters are not anywhere near as good. To put a bypass filter on an Ecotec, you have to tap into the oil pressure sending unit and then I think you need to put a hole in the sump where the oil can feed back down into there. I don't know if I am ready to go that far right now. I drive over 50,000 miles per year. I'll go through this GM 100,000 mile warranty in less than 2 years. Conventional oil is too dangerous to use. It breaks down too quickly plus my gas mileage would suffer. My MPG went up after putting the Amsoil in. That makes the oil free for me since the gas mileage pays for it. I saw a page out there where some 1988 Buick or some GM car went 288,000 miles on only 12 oil changes using Amsoil. It's best to put it in while the car is fairly new so that the conventional oil doesn't do any more damage with sludge and varnish.

Anyway, I'll probably put in a new filter when I get home. I have 10 of them sitting in a box in my garage. I just wanted to see what some of you guys have gotten for your oil life monitors. I've never had a job where I drove 1,000 miles per week before. It could be all of the short stop and go trips break down the oil and since I am driving 4 hours per day, it's not so bad on the oil. I'll have to stay on this forum and keep up with my progress every few months. The way it's going now, I'll do 3 oil changes every 100,000 miles. Neat, huh? The old way I would be doing about 33 oil changes. Pretty insane, but that's what people do. Do the math...

I pay about $60-70 bucks for the 0W30 to last 35,000 miles.

If I went to Jiffy Lube and paid the $25 bucks every 3,000 miles, that would be 33 x $25 = $825 in oil changes, plus my gas mileage would drop back to the way it was originally, so I would lose more money on fuel. Nobody every thinks about it this way. When I started driving 200 miles per day, I had to think of anyway I could to save money. I'd love to move closer to work, but homes are nearly 4x what I paid for my house. It's cheaper to just drive, which sort of sucks.

Artificialist · 12-20-2006, 10:02 PM

I know Amsoil products are high quality, I use their ATF all the time, especially in products that use something other than Dexron III, Mercon, or Mercon V.

I just don't trust them to live up to all of their high claims. Redline brand oil is also made from PAO (PolyAliphaticOlefin) base stocks, but they don't claim such extreme capabilities.