How many miles should I go on this oil change?

[Nick1994]

I've been wondering how many miles I should go on this oil change on the Beetle. I changed the oil August 19th (1 1/2 months ago) and about 2,300 miles ago. It's coming up on 161k miles. My commute is 50 miles round trip per day, sometimes more not counting what I drive on the weekends, occasionally out of town too. No short tripping, 20 miles of highway in the morning and 20 miles in the afternoon wits 5 miles of city driving in the morning and afternoon. Stop and go traffic is only in the morning for ~10 miles.

I've got Pentosin High Performance II Synthetic 5w40 oil in it that meets VW's 505.01 spec and a VW dealer filter. It's always done 10-12k on dealer bulk synthetic it's entire life. But I usually get the itch to change oil sooner rather than later. I'm thinking 7,500 miles but I might be able to let it stretch to 10k. I'll do a UOA afterwards and see the TBN too.

How long do you guys think I should go?

 

[supton]

I've run Total or Quartz for most of my miles. Not Pentosin. But the shortest I've done is 10k. Often 12k past 200k or so. At least once 14k, but I think I had some soot fallout and staining from that (pulled the valve cover and found that).

 

[Hollow]

Pull sample for UOA, it'll probably do 10K under your conditions.

 

[Bud_One]

Originally Posted By: Hollow
Pull sample for UOA, it'll probably do 10K under your conditions.


+1

 

[AKhan87]

Originally Posted By: Bud_One
Originally Posted By: Hollow
Pull sample for UOA, it'll probably do 10K under your conditions.


+1

+2

 

[AKhan87]

Originally Posted By: Nick1994
I've got Pentosin High Performance II Synthetic 5w40 oil in it that meets VW's 505.01 spec

is that cheaper then M1 0w40? and also meets more certifications and has better specs then M1 0w40?

Just curious as to why you would use Pentosin(I saw it once on the AAP website) instead.

 

[EA82]

You drive a beetle ??? Come on man

 

[AKhan87]

Originally Posted By: laserred96gt
You drive a beetle ??? Come on man

Lmao

 

[Nick1994]

Originally Posted By: 01_celica_gt
Originally Posted By: laserred96gt
You drive a beetle ??? Come on man

Lmao
Lol hey it was my aunt's car. It's black on black and diesel, and gets me 40 mpg. I say it's definately better than driving around in a Miata

 

[Nick1994]

Originally Posted By: 01_celica_gt
Originally Posted By: Nick1994
I've got Pentosin High Performance II Synthetic 5w40 oil in it that meets VW's 505.01 spec

is that cheaper then M1 0w40? and also meets more certifications and has better specs then M1 0w40?

Just curious as to why you would use Pentosin(I saw it once on the AAP website) instead.
Pentosin isn't cheap at all. I'd love to use Mobil 1 0w40 but it doesn't meet VW's 505.01 spec which is probably obsolete now but I just want to make sure I've got the right stuff in there.

 

[dlundblad]

If money is a concern, cant you just get away with running T6 or something of the sort?

The girlfriends dad put well over 200,000 on his TDI using nothing but Rotella 15w40. Not saying it right or wrong, but I would think if something bad was going to happen, it would have by now.. Lol.

 

[Nick1994]

Originally Posted By: dlundblad
If money is a concern, cant you just get away with running T6 or something of the sort?

The girlfriends dad put well over 200,000 on his TDI using nothing but Rotella 15w40. Not saying it right or wrong, but I would think if something bad was going to happen, it would have by now.. Lol.
Money isn't really a concern. Parts Authority is the only store that sells an oil that meets VW's 505.01 which is the Pentosin. I paid $11 a quart for it and it didn't even cross my mind that I could order it online for $42 for a 5 liter jug with free shipping. Oh well maybe next time.

 

[supton]

Bora parts is on your coast; maybe this would work for you. I usually order from idparts.com as they are on my coast; right now their website isn't coming up for me otherwise I'd post a link there.

To the unitiated: In 200-something VW introduced their PD diesel in Europe, and it came over here in 2004 to deal with US emissions. One of the things they did was to radically narrow the cam lobes so that a third one to drive the unit injector could be added. More narrow lobes and a high pressure camshaft lobe driven fuel pump (I've read 27,000psi, 29,000psi or thereabouts) was hard on the oil, and VW stated that the engine oil had to meet their 505.01 specification. Hence the hand-wringing. Nick's 2004 is *not* like the '03 and earlier TDI's. There is an untold amount of electrons spent debating 505.01 vs anything else. There are those that think Rotella (something or another) is good enough. There are those that got good life out of their camshafts using Rotella--and those who wore a lobe using "proper" 505.01. As they say, YMMV. All I know is, I've mailed ordered oil for mine for every change, running 505.01 the most, but a couple of times I ran 506.01 and I think 507 once; and the cam is still good at nearly 300k.

 

[wemay]

Never used the oil, but their Dual Clutch fluid worked great for me.
I would have no issue driving one of the newer Beetles
just saying.