i put about 200 to 300 miles a month on my car. i know the rule of thumb is 3 months or 3,000 miles. can you go longer then 3 months? what is the max untill oil starts to break down. the oil i use is 5w30 and i'm pretty hard on the car when i drive it. thanks in advance and i'm sorry if i postd in the wrong area.

 

I would go up to 6 months.

 

that is what i was thinking.

 

If you really value your car, I think you should go by what Nissan suggests you do - which is 3,000 or 3mo. Since dino oil is cheap, you could do an oil change for less than $15. Why take the risk of damaging your engine?

 

the miles i can understand. but oil sits on a shelf for months at a time before it is ever even purchesed. i know i should just suck it up and change it every 3 months.

 

check the top 100 questions thread for info about oil, filters, and changes. link is in my signature

 

best thing to do is 3 months of 3000 miles. maybe even less if you drive it hard and have dino oil.

my last oil changed i went to full synthetic 10w30 royal purple and the guy told me that if i continued to drive the way i do, i could probably get 5,000 miles out of it.

but i think ill probaly do it before that.

spend the extra 15 bucks every three months and get it changed properly, thats 5 dollars a month. if you cant handle that, then you shouldnt be driving a Z.

 

Another factor to consider is the kind of conditions you're operating your Z in. It's wintertime and cold temperatures, junk on the roads and in the air increase. All that contamination does have an effect on your oil (and more importantly) the oil additive package. The detergents in that package can encapsulate some of the grime that makes it into your oil, but only for a limited time.

Bottom line: you could stretch your oil/filter intervals to as much as 5K, but as many of the other posters here have already said, it's simply not worth it. Your VQ deserves better!

David Muramoto
Senior Editor
Nissan Sport Magazine

 

Hyrdo carbons still break dino oil down over time even if ur not putting miles on it, that's why they say 3,000 or 3 months. I'd change it, so the next guy that buys ur car won't have to do an engine swap for his first mod. If nothing else, it's just cheap insurance. :-)