Home Forums Gear Hunting Trucks and Four-Wheel Drives Which oil for Toyota Tacoma ?

Id stick with Yota filters too as they are bigger than any of the aftermarket varieties I have seen.

I'm on my 2nd Toyota Tacoma. Sold the 1st one with 270,000 miles on it and it is still running great. The 2004 my wife is driving now has 90K on it. Both trucks get Valvoline 5-20 and the Fram Extra Guard filter.

I have never used any synthetic oil in any vehicle and the only engine I trashed out was a Subaru that had the crank misaligned from the original factory machining.

The rest of the vehicle wears out before the engine.
Of course,I'm one of the stupid ones that still change my oil/filter every 3000 miles.

People can bad mouth what ever oil or filter they choose or recommend any of them, but the proof of the pudding is how long the engine last. Pick any one you want that meets the mfgr's requirement and use it.

Mobil 1, 0 to-30 synthetic is excellent gun oil though.

Color me stoopid too.

I'm running dino oil (Valvoline 5w-30w) in my chevy just to prove my theory that it doesn't make that big a difference what type of oil you use. 135k and it uses about 1/3 of a quart after 4000 miles.

It's got a couple of very minor oil leaks that I need to take to care of which should reduce the oil consumption even further.

Dino oil is pretty refined these days and of course works fine. The only reason I run a synthetic in my Taco is the engine sounds a hell of alot better cranking over/firing when its below zero out, which it is on a regular basis here in balmy upper MI. If I lived somewhere warm like Colorado, I wouldnt bother,lol.

Do you have any heaters on the motor for the cold days?

Even though I run Mobil 1 in all of our vehicles, I think you'll find dino oils will protect your engine just as well. The caveat is you have to change dino more frequently. Do you want to crawl under your truck once a year or twice a year? The increased cost of synthetic is balanced out by being able to run it longer between changes. Which makes it less expensive when you place a value on your time.

Yes, but when I am at work I cant use them due to no place to plug in.

Crawling under a vehicle to change the oil in the winter is a pain in the ass. Either you freeze your hands off doing it outside or you have to deal with metling slush, road salt and gunk dripping on you if you pull it into the shop. Another plus with synthetic oil.

When it's -20 or colder and you can't plug in I find firing up the rig at lunch time makes for a happier engine when firing it up at the end of the day.

Mobil 1 it is, and the 2011 Taco is the easiest thing to change the oil in of any car/truck I have ever done. Oil filter on top where you can get to it and it sits up high enough that I can slide under. I am 6'4" and weigh 285 lbs.

I'm retired. All I have is time. My 2004 is a bugger to change oil. You have to drop two skid plates and the oil filter is located up on the side of the block that takes a contortionist to get to.
However, it only takes me 45 minutes to do it all.

No problem in the winter as my trucks are garaged in the garage/barn combo.
Still ,doing it myself gives me a chance to inspect everything under there. Instill do my own grease jobs

Forgot to add, if you want to make a toyota oil change even easier, get a piece of plastic tubing, can't remember the diameter off hand.

Pull that black plastic plug off the bottom where the filter mounts and put the tube on it. Put the tube in your used oil catch or an old can,crack the filter and let the oil drain down and into the tube, and into the catch basin.

I let my 2011 Taco sit for a while draining and there was very little oil left in the filter. I put a plastic water bottle under the filter drain but could have crumpled up a paper towel and done just as well. miles

If you would like to add filter capacity to your V6 Toyota I run a Purolator PL20195 filter It�s about 40% larger than a stock Toyota filter.

If a filter is that hard to get to, why not put in a remote filter mount? I installed one for a friends early 80s GM X Body vehicle back in the late 80s...he was severely handicapped, didn't have a lot of money living on assistance.. and GM couldn't have buried that filter any deeper.. plus it was a shotglass sized filter anyway...

he had room on one side of the engine bay, so he wanted to go extreme to where he didn't have to give the oil much attention yet not worry about it...

so I plumbed in a filter off a Peterbilt for him...

raised his oil capacity from 4 qts to like 10.... filled it with Mobil ONE....

I moved from Seattle back to MN, but I really wonder if he ever changed any of it after I left... ever...

my 88 4 Runner, that I bought new in Sept 1987, has a 2200 RE engine...

I run Mobil One, after the first 10K or so.... took a cross country trip with it last year towing a heavy trailer to New England...

I change the oil every 20 to 25,000 miles in that truck....

She is sitting in the driveway with 521,000 miles on it now...

here is the odometer when she rolled over 500K....



( for those NON believers)

here is Seafire Jr in front of it when it turned over 500K on the way home from Scout Camp....

Blocking off the radiator with card board helps the engine warm up sooner too.

Most of the (synthetic) oil now and days is nothing but highly refined dino oil. The true synthetics are generally pricey. Mobil one is good stuff but if it isn't their extended performance line its the same stuff as all the others (highly refined dino). So if your gonna use dino you could use the cheaper synthetic and change your oil less often. That's what I do. I use rotella T6 synthetic and change it every 5 thousand miles. The only reason I use rotella is cause I can run it in my bikes too. One oil for most of everything I drive.