Service Schedule

[Mark]

I did oil changes at:

• 437 miles,
• 1,044 miles,
• 2,235 miles,
• 5,250 miles,
• 7,480 miles,

From 7,480 miles I will stick to the vehicle's recommended maintenance schedule from the LCD information screen.

I've done similar oil changes on all my (new) vehicles.

That seems a bit extreme, but surely no harm is done (outside of using more oil) in doing that.

If I was leasing a car or trade them quite often, I would do whatever the dealer suggests. If I plan on keeping my car for a long time, I wouldn't listen to the dealer. I listen to trusted mechanics and what other owners have done.

Steve's cheap plastic car (Mirage) went 300,000+ miles with 5W-30 conventional oil changed every 5,000 miles by a Cadillac dealership. He didn't encounter any type of engine issues during that time. Since most of all these oil changes were free, I highly doubt they were giving him a high quality oil filter.

After reading Steve's Mirage saga, I feel pretty comfortable using Super Tech full synthetic oil & a quality oil filter changed every 5,000 miles. It's a step up from what he was using in my mind.

I still wouldn't hesitate suggesting doing the first oil change early. Even 2,500 miles for the first two changes sounds good to me. I like 5,000 mile oil changes, because it's easy to remember, too!

[7milesout]

I used to work as an automotive design engineer (for Toyota & Hyundai-Kia). I worked side by side with engine engineers. These guys ate up engines doing testing and research like I eat up M&M's. I paid attention to their data and what they had to say (at least the Toyota guys, and just laughed and laughed and laughed at the Hyundai-Kia guys). I think that's "nuff said."

If I were planning to drive it for a while then dump it, I might not do anything to it. But I plan on keeping it for a while. It's a valuable tool. I like valuable tools. I'd like it to be making the maximum amount of compression possible when it reaches 100k miles.

On a side note, the car has 10k miles on it now. And I normally creepy crawl around trying to hit 45 mpg. But today, I got out of whack with where all I had to go and went to the wrong place first. Then I had to scurry back to the other place I had intended to go first in a hurry to get there on time. That little car zips along real nice, and the 3-Tapper sounds kind of cute doing it. 78 hp in this car gets the job done well. All I can say is, the engine seems to be good n healthy so far.