First off go back and read post #19 where I explained that the oils used in Europe are different than the oils used here in the US. Those little cryptic letters like A1, A3, or A5 mean a whole bunch when it comes to quality.
Secondly, the 3,000 miles lube it or lose it is what Iffy Lube uses for an oil change recommendations, not what the people that built the engine say when it should be changed. (Yeah I know that some dealers also push this, but Iffy Lube is by far the largest offender, and the only one that advertises nationally) Iffy Lube is in the business of selling oil changes. They employ under trained induhviduals who will try to upsell you anything and everything, needed or not.
So why doesn’t the USA change over to the same sort of oil that is used in Europe?
Demand would be a big part of it. ACEA is a European outfit From my link in post #19
Of those makers listed the following don’t sell cars in the US:
DAF, Fiat, MAN, PSA, Renault, Scania
The listing of Ford and GM are for the European divisions of those companies, not the American arms. Either those engines are not sold over here, or if they are it is easier just to adopt the US intervals.
So we are left with BMW, Mercedes, Porche, Rolls Royce, VW and Volvo. Of these only VW is really a volume seller of cars in the US.
Now you get into a chicken / egg problem. Nobody sells ACEA A5 rated oil in bulk (the only way a dealer or service department will sell oil), since none of the car makers require it in this market.* None of the car makers require it, becasue it is unavailable in bulk.
*I believe BMW does require ACEA A5 oil, but they pay for the services for the first 50,000 miles or so as part of the cost of the car. I do not know where they source their oil.
BMW has a long-standing relationship with Castrol. If you get a synthetic oil change at a BMW dealer, you’ll get Castrol Syntec. Or else your dealer is annoying someone in Munich.
As to the issue that’s been raised of “WTF don’t we do the European thing” I really think it’s a freaking cultural artifact. For some reason they got it and we didn’t, and now we’re being lazy about switching over since it’s basically a break-even decision.
Short intervals on cheap oil or long intervals on expensive oil wind up being a near-wash financially.
The biggest pluses for long oil change intervals are reduced hassle (don’t go in for service as often…) and environmental bonuses (less waste oil when it gets changed once per year rather than once per season.)
One theory I’ve seen posited is that cars have a different social meaning in Europe, and that expensive infrequent oil changes make more sense to upper-class consumers than they do to lower-middle-class consumers. Perhaps mass transit actually works in much of Europe (unlike 96% of the USA) and cars seem to be less affordable to lower classes there than here, they may make some sense. Rich folk are stingy with their time, and might be willing to pay a premium to NOT have to waste time fooling with taking their cars in for service.
Are passenger cars on the continent like they are in the middle of big cities in the US? Only near-rich guys bothering to operate 'em?
Rick, I’m betting that if any of the big three decided their service fills for all future passenger cars were going to be A5/B5, then the next month we’d have 55-gallon drums of A5-rated oil available at your local bulk lubricant distributor.
Coincidentally, I’d also bet that it’d take you folks a decade of beating the consumer upside his head about not putting non-A5 oil in his car before he started listening.
The UK is a first-world country you know! Out of population of 60 million there are 30 million cars in the country . These are the figures for some other European countries :-
France: 29 160 000 cars
Germany: 44 657 300 cars
Italy: 38 476 479 cars
Spain: 25 169 400 cars
Scandinavia combined: 11 619 187 cars
France , Spain and Germany all have populations of between 50 and 70 million.
So car ownership is not confined to the privileged upper classes.
Hmmm.
“According to the BTS, at the end of 1999, there were 132.4 million
passenger cars, 75.4 million light trucks (minivans, SUVs, pickup
trucks, etc.) for a total of 207.8 million vehicles. There were
another 4.2 million motorcycles.”
The US has about 298 million in population.
I don’t think the facts refute my theory, nor do they prove it.
I don’t think Mr. Slant was trying to slam the UK or any other European country. I know I was not. But the fact remains that in the year 2000 the US had a population of about 275,000,000 and 225,821,841 registered highway vehicles.
Mr. Slant is entirely correct to state that different countries have different attitudes about cars, and philosophy about how a car should run / work etc.
The very first book I ever read on auto repair How to Repair your foreign Car by Dick O’kane talked about this.
On a more recent note, working for a European car maker I can tell you that cultural differences sometimes make for huge problems.
Mr. Slant you are entirely correct IMHO about what would happen if General Motors or Toyota all of a sudden required A5/B5 oil.
Hey, uh, in case you thought I was slamming the UK or any other EU member state, I wasn’t. I was just remarking that your public transportation is better and guessing that it’s more expensive to own a car where you are than where I am, especially with the way public policy is slanted in most of the EuroZone. High general taxes and high gas prices don’t make for low-cost motoring. I know vehicle operator licensing is way less casual over there than in most US states.
I don’t have a lot of problem in the way of nationalism/racism bias.
Now if you were accusing me of being biased in matters of religion, social class or IQ, I would plead no contest…
2003 Dodge Neon SXT, lots of city driving. Owner’s manual says 3k/3mo oil changes for severe driving conditions, and I do love to abuse my cheapass compact sedan.
In theory if I were doing the “light duty” maintenance track, with lots of highway driving, it’d be a 6k interval.
I meant to ask about this on here as well. I’ve got an '05 Accord and when I saw that in the owner’s manual it seemed really weird to me too. Last I heard it’s supposed to be 3,000 miles. Period.
But then again, most of what I know about oil comes from commercials starring Denis Leary.
Due to a fuckup on my old car (they stripped out the plug, then stuffed something in there so I had no way of noticing until my NEXT oil change somewhere else - I did wonder why it took like 2 hours to changed the damned oil!) I always just stand there and watch them the whole time…
-Joe
Heard from where? Consider the source. Most auto repair facilities, especially the quick lube places, stick with a 3 month/3,000 interval. This was correct for most cars a couple of decades ago, and for a few cars now (for severe service). However, it’s largely obsolete.
With a few rare exceptions, the schedule in the owner’s manual is the correct and authoritative one to follow. Through most of the 80’s and 90’s, virtually all Japanese cars had a 7500/3750 mile (normal/severe) recommendation. For the last ten or so years, the majority of cars have had severe service recommendations of over 3,000 miles. The fact that most auto service facilities are still saying 3,000 miles for all cars isn’t because the factory schedule in owner’s manuals are wrong, it’s because those facilities have chosen to ignore the factory schedule. The reasons may greed, laziness, or ignorance, but in the overwhelming majority of cases they don’t have any sound technical reason to hold onto the out-of-date 3,000 mile interval – only greed, laziness, or ignorance.
In other words, what you’ve heard, though a popularly held and widespread notion, is for most cars simply wrong.