Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Oil Change Chicanery.............

That's a lot of driving, hell if I know.


Couple weeks ago I did a loader tractor and my pickup and went with 5W-40 T6 Rotella(for the cold weather).
Figure 5-6k miles on the pickup and maybe 250-300 hours on the tractor before changing.


It was $25/gallon for the synthetic compared to $15/gallon for regular 15W-40. Basically another $40 per change but guessing it will be worth it.

According to some guys here things should start a little easier when it's 20 or 30 below. We shall see in a month or two.

Solved that long ago on one vehicle ( Honda Prelude)... put a big metal Oil Leak pan ( like a big baking sheet) that I picked up for $10.. was well worth it and solved a lot of problems ending the need to clean up the mess...

just pull out the floor pan and let it drain into the fire barrel...

I can have my oil changed and be drinking coffee in less time than I can go to town and back. miles

Well I when to Jiffy Lube just once, at the time I was driving a 1984 Jetta turbo diesel, the clowns put in the wrong sized oil filter, it was for a gas engine, I bought the right part and showed the manager, what he had done, he didn't believe me, then he just said it would be another 30 to do an oil change, I sued him, in small claims, I got a judgment, he had to refund the money for the oil change, the filter I bought, court costs and lawyer bill and 3500 for being a fool! The judge didn't say anything till I ran into him trout fishing, a couple of years later, turned out he drives the same car and that jiffy lube did the same thing, he just waited for somebody with that same car and complaint to well you know the rest of it! I do my own oil changes pretty much, with the little driving I actually do, it comes to three changes a year, I do air filters every other oil change and fuel filter once a year, before winter! My current car is a 1996 Subaru Outback, not a hard car to work on, I did a starter the other day, two mounting bolts, one ground wire bolt and the ignition connector took longer for the engine to cool down enough from the right to NAPA !

LOL, I do too, but the wifes toyota came with free lifetime changes... can't hardly turn that down...but I do all other maintenance on hers and all of ours

I have no problem paying a mechanic a decent wage to do work like this for me. I recognize that even on stuff I can do, the pro mechanic is more talented than I am doing work like this, not to mention doing the same stuff over and over again every day whereas I do it once in awhile. I have had to do a lot of mechanical work in my life, out of necessity. If I enjoyed it, that's what I'd do for a career.

All that said, I still end up doing a lot of it myself because there is just too much drama involved in getting anything done to not just do it yourself. I still change my own oil about 95% of the time. I use plain Phillips 66 Dino juice just like I have for years along with usually a Motorcraft or Delco filter depending on whether I'm working on a Ford or GM product.

I change it myself for less than half that and use 5W30.

I change my own. Enjoy it too. My dodge truck is a breeze to change. Merc Mountaineer is ok, once you learn where to put your hands/wrench to get the filter off. My wifes old Saturn we use for running around is a pia with the filter. No room at all. Always good for a good cussing.

I figure to each his own

i'm happy to pay someone to do stuff I don't want to do


but sometimes luck gets in the way


starter went out on my GMC pickup couple of weeks ago, called a pard that owns a service station to have them do it, was gonna be a week as they were going hucklety buck to change people's tires since we got some snow.

dang it, coulda waited and just drove my Toyota for a week, but needed the big truck for a project, so I just grabbed a starter when I was in town and changed it myself.

I like having the $ to pay folks to do stuff I don't want to do or enjoy, but sometimes you just need to get er done and crawl under the truck yourself

heck no...I save mine and use it burn the garbage in the backyard.

I change my oil when I change my underwear.
Once a year, whether needed or not

If you filter the oil through the old underwear, you can reuse the oil as well.

Same here, but with 4 vehicles...

Isn't that basically how a Fram filter works?

Catches the big chunks but does a chitty job with the rest.

It's funny to hear about oil change shacks that still employ air-impact wrenches and cross-thread the oil-pan drain plug at 600 ft/lbs.....OP got lucky it was only $$$ and not a mechanical screwing.

I have a 2011 Audi A4 2.0Turbo in the shop right now that has a stripped oil pan. Last oil change was done by the local dealer . About $700.00 to replace the pan. Customer is somewhat irritated since he spent about $3200.00 with them for a turbo replacement and oil change, among other things.........

Have a 99 mbz e320 wagon with 220k on the odo that runs mobil 1 and oil changes are at 10k, still runs like a champ. On my '06 cummins 5.9 I run mobil 1 diesel, change the filter at 7.5, and oil at 15k, 115k on the odo and it runs great.

Mobil 1 is good oil, and Germans generally know how to design and build a good engine. I wouldn't have a problem sticking with the factory recommended oil change interval.

I would. I recommend 7500 mile intervals to my BMW customers. Unless of course, you plan on getting out of the car before 100k miles. (That's what BMW is banking on). The 15k recommendation occurred at the very same time BMW launched their 4 year 50k mile "free" maintenance program. Doesn't take a genius for figure out why. The dealer serviced BMW's that we see with 80-90k miles on them often have issues with VANOS solenoids sticking, oil leaks from front crank seals, and some oil consumption complaints. Most of these issues can be traced back to sludge buildup and contaminated oil. Our enlightened customers that change the oil more frequently from new (halfway oil changes on their dime) drive cars that don't have these issues. YMMV.

Most of the time you get what you pay for.

Yes as it uses synthetic. My wife's Porsche goes 12K per Porsche with Mobil One. I just read where BMW is now hooked up with us (Shell) and will use our new GTL oil.