Oil changes.

Gearheads and grease-monkeys, this one’s for you.

For a low mileage car, typically driven 2,000 miles per year and running on synthetic oil, how often should the oil be changed?

I know that manufacturer recommends oil changes at 10,000mile or 1 year intervals. It’s the latter that I have a question about. Does oil break down while it sits in the oil pan in a garaged car? The car doesn’t spend any time idling.

I believe all oil does degrades over time, even synthetic oil, and 1 year sounds like a reasonable amount of time to wait to change it. You could probably wait longer, but why push it for a $29 oil change?

Once a year is a good choice here IMO. Even with such low milage, the oil will pick up bits that can settle out and cause a buildup of sludge over time.

I’d second the yearly oil changes and question whether or not you really needed synthetic oil unless recommended/required by the manufacturer. Like my wife’s Subaru does.

I think once a year should be fine. Is the low mileage due to a lot of small mileage trips or just being garaged and only driven a couple times a year?

Moisture can condense out of the air and into the oil. It is usual seen as a sort of milky emulsification on the inside of the cap where you add the oil. Short trips might not get every thing up to full temperature and lead to moisture condensing, and even with a few long drives unless the car is stored in a temperature controlled environment you could get the same sort of condensation due to the seasonal temperature changes with it just sitting there.

That is the only concern I might have, and it is just me being really, really picky.

On a side note, why own that car at all, if you drive it that little?

The problem is that if you barely drive your car, or more specifically if it’s lots of little trips, the condensation that forms inside the engine will never have a chance to burn/evaporate back out. You’ll find that the oil will turn milky white and you’ll run the risk of rusting the engine from the inside.

Any time we get the oil changed on our forklift it’s always full of water since it’s nearly always run for just a few minutes at a time and just a few times a day.

Something you can do to help to avoid this is after a short drive, let it run for a little while just to get the engine warm and burn off any moisture.

You’ll not that your manual considers lots of short trips to be ‘extreme driving’ because it’s terrible for the engine.

The car is driven weekly but relatively short trips. 5-10 miles. Weekly totals are 25-50 miles. The engine always comes up to operating temp so I’m not sure there is cause for worry about condensation buildup.

Oil/filter changes run $125. Not prohibitive and certainly not something worth skimping on. I simply was wondering if actual breakdown of the oil occurs or not for a car operating under relatively regular intervals but low mileage use.

No down side to changing it yearly. I’ll just continue to do that.

Where are you going that charges $125 for an oil and filter change?

probably one of those quick lube places which screw you by convincing you that you need their $10/qt synthetic oils.

That would explain it. I went to Valvoline’s version of a Jiffy-Lube the other week because I was in a huge hurry and they wanted $80 or something for a three minute oil/fluid change. It was kind of worth it for how fast it was but I was quietly shocked at the price.

If you go long enough between oil changes you can convert a lot of the engine oil to buckyballs. You can think of buckyballs as molecule-sized ballbearings nearly as hard as diamonds. So if you’re willing to wait, you can get something better than engine oil to slippery up your engine bits. Trust me on this, I am a physicist.

  • checks forum *
    Oh. Alright then, I am a crackpot and the above is a horrible misrepresentation of some semi-truths. But still, it’s totally worth giving it a shot.

<sigh>

~ $20 for oil filter
~ $50 for Mobile1 synthetic oil (7qt +)
~ $5 disposal fee
~ $50 labour, ‘free’ loaner & Mercedes Benz prefered client ass kissing.

This is the part that surprises me: the oil change takes long enough that you need a loaner?

My question is, for a car that is driven so little, why bother with synthetic oil?

My understanding is that synthetic is good for high performance engines, or vehicles that are driven in extreme conditions of temperature, etc. Which is why I use synth in my car in the desert of Las Vegas.

But ISTM that in this case, using synth is just a waste.

Mercedes oil filters are $20?!?

If it’s a drop-off service and not an appointment, you go to the end of the line. Someone above mentioned $29 for an oil change. I’d like to know where you can get a synth oil change that cheap.

The Tire Kingdom by me does full synthetic for $50. I don’t really understand why the OP needs synthetic oil given how little he drives, though.

If it’s a Mercedes it requires European spec oil, and if it’s a later model Mercedes it probably requires synthetic oil. That may seem unnecessary from a common-sense standpoint, but it is necessary to preserve the engine warranty. Saving a hundred bucks a year may not be the wisest approach here.

My question is, where are you going that only charges $125 for a Mercedes oil and filter change? :wink:

To get synthetic for my Volvo, the change is $75 at my trusted local mechanic.

a lot of cars are moving to lower viscosity oils like 0W-20, which pretty much have to be synthetic.