An easy first post- What oil should I use?

[moviedave]

I am new to these boards so I thought I would ask a safe question for my first post. Which oil should I use for my car?

I drive a 4-cyl, 5 speed manual 2002 Civic coupe with 127,000 miles on it.

I run 5w-20 as instructed by my owners manual. I live in Minnesota, and even though it gets wicked cold here in the winter, my drives are almost always long freeway drives, so I don't qualify for severe driving conditions. As a result, my manual recommends changing my oil every 10,000 miles and my filter every 20,000. I have been changing it every 5.000 miles anyway because that seems like an awful long OCI.

I drive like an old man (I am 27) as I am a real gas millage. I am proud to say I can average around 42-43 MPG during the summer months. The hundreds of dollars I save every year is totally worth all the middle fingers I get when driving.

My car has no known problems. Are there any recommendations for what oil and/or filters would be best for my car.

PS. Love these forums!

 

[dgee]

Mobil 1 EP with a Mobil 1 or Fram XG filter. 10k miles

 

[Quattro Pete]

Welcome to BITOG!

What oil are you using in it now?

I'd probably stick with a brand name synthetic, such as M1 or Pennzoil Platinum/Pennzoil Ultra and run it up to the recommended 10K mile OCI.

 

[Lowcountry]

Originally Posted By: moviedave
I am new to these boards so I thought I would ask a safe question for my first post. Which oil should I use for my car?

I drive a 4-cyl, 5 speed manual 2002 Civic coupe with 127,000 miles on it.

I run 5w-20 as instructed by my owners manual. I live in Minnesota, and even though it gets wicked cold here in the winter, my drives are almost always long freeway drives, so I don't qualify for severe driving conditions. As a result, my manual recommends changing my oil every 10,000 miles and my filter every 20,000. I have been changing it every 5.000 miles anyway because that seems like an awful long OCI.

I drive like an old man (I am 27) as I am a real gas millage [censored]. I am proud to say I can average around 42-43 MPG during the summer months. The hundreds of dollars I save every year is totally worth all the middle fingers I get when driving.

My car has no known problems. Are there any recommendations for what oil and/or filters would be best for my car.

PS. Love these forums!


What oil and filter have you been using?

 

[brentalan]

I recommend Mobil 1 0W-20 with the green cap for a slight fuel economy improvement and longevity

 

[HTSS_TR]

Mostly long highway driving and 40+ MPG means you're very easy driver, I would use any brand name dino with 7-8k OCI or syn with 10-12k OCI, if you like to go with M1 EP you can extend OCI to 15-16k. I stick with xW20 for whatever oil choice.

 

[bryceban]

I have same car and run mobil1, pennzoil plat, etc. These cars are extremely easy on oil and the OEM recommended OCI is for conventional oil. I also drive 95% highway and find my oil to look great at 10K miles. I have to fill up with gas 2-4 times a week and average 38 mpg and I drive 65-70 mph. I had an 02 civic before this one and could get 43-45 mpg on a regular basis with ethanol free gas. You are doing good...

 

[moviedave]

I have been running maxlife 5w-20 with a purolator classic filter.

 

[Steve S]

The same oil you have been using all along.

 

[dparm]

That motor will run forever on just about any oil.

Mobil 1 with an extended drain interval should be great. You can push the interval to 7500 miles easily, maybe 10000. Any quality filter will be fine. The OEM Honda filters are actually very good.

 

[tig1]

I am using M1 5-20EP in both Duratech 4s with great results. Engines are clean as new through the oil fill hole, and both run very quite and smooth even with 10-11K on the oil. At presant I have almost 11K on the Focus with plans to change next week.

 

[garlicbreadman]

stick with what you're using and extend the drain to 8-9k. it'll do it easy. synthetic is a waste if you don't intend to run it past 10k on that car.

to be confident maxlife is capable of 8-9k oil changes, do an Oil analysis with TBN. TBN tells you roughly how many more miles you can go on the oil.


I drive like a grandpa too on the highway, 60-65 all the way, no one gives me the finger tho! HA!

 

[roadrunner1]

i'm sure what you are using is fine, but my wife and kids garage almost mirrors yours and we use the motorcraft blend 5w-20 with john deere filters, deere dealership is close and it seems like i'm always there picking up parts, so i use them out of convienence

 

[rclint]

I would never recommend any extended drain oil to anyone who already cuts their drain time short by being paranoid about an awful long OCI !! Now I'm in no way cutting you for this, however you have already spoken on being wise for saving gas which I fully agree with, but don't be foolish by using an extended drain oil that is worthless to you as you are not nearing the capability of conventional oil much less a whooped up version of Mobil 1 with the big extended drain words on the end !!

Choose a conventional oil, and do try stretching your OCI up to 10k.. if you can start changing your oil at 10k then you could move up to the most famous reason for choosing a "synthetic oil" which is extending your drain time (really your not by manufactures terms, but by your terms) or just stick with conventional which will easily handle the 10k OCI.. I would run Pennzoil, Castrol, or Mobil drive clean ( I think that's it the 5000 version at walmart) the best bang might be Motorcraft 5w-20 semi synthetic... Whatever you choose it seems most people who are a conciseness of the maintenance of their cars, OCI length stated in the manual, and you even know the recommended oil viscosity... it's people like you that will need to worry very little about their engine having a lubrication related problem !!

 

[JimPghPA]

At some time as the engine wears the slop in clearance will increase and the oil will flow too easily to maintain good oil pressure. You will notice valve noise. That is your clue to change to a thicker oil like GC (Castrol 0W-30) or Shell T5 or T6. When you do this you will loose some MPG. But the engine will still run for a long time. The loss of a few MPG with a thicker oil when required is much less costly than rebuilding the engine.

 

[moviedave]

I was actually thinking of switching to either Mobil Clean 5000 or PYB, and keeping the 5000 mile OCI and the Purolator classic (which for my money has offers the best combination of solid construction and filtering capabilities with good oil flow and price). Plus, it should be noted that my wife does occasionally drive my car, and she doesn't share my respect for fuel economy, or brake life, or clutch wear, or car upkeep...

Ok, off topic, but why on earth would someone spend thousands of dollars on a car, and then not pay a few dollars occasionally to keep it up? When I met my wife, I thought her 99 Saturn SW2 was a piece of junk. Little did I know that, best case scenario, she might get an oil change every six months, and that was it. I doubt she ever even looked at the maintenance schedule. Then when something went wrong due to lack of upkeep, she walked out with a several hundred dollar repair bill that could have easily been avoided.

Ok, back on topic. What do you think, Mobil Clean 5000 or PYB?

 

[rclint]

I also drive a Honda Accord a 2002 which states a 7500 mile OCI on non severe service (2.3 L) I extend my drain to 10k as I drive mostly freeway like you, and I also use synthetic oil, however I have also driven conventional oils out to 10k.. My previous accord I also drove 10k OCI's most of it's life, and used 5w-20 up to around 270k before selling the car with no consumption between changes, mileage will not cause the need for a thicker oil in my experience.

A few dollars keeping a car up can be just as effective as paying top dollar... many people think conventional oils are inferior which is just wrong, and in fact if your car does not call for synthetic or a specific oil spec then a synthetic oil is really wasting money as all teh extra protection is worthless if you can in no way obtain it !!

I also run my oil filters for two consecutive OCI's when running conventional oil (7500 mile oci) as stated in the owners manual by Honda, I purchase a well constructed oil filter such a Pure One, Fram XG, Napa Gold, etc etc and run my filter out twice... Many here will have a wet willy over this, however I in the past thought the same way, my thinking has changed, I trust the owners manual documentation and assume Honda spent many hours testing this.

 

[jstutz]

PYB and m5000 are very good dinos. If i had to pick a top three, they would be in it. The M5000 looks really good. TBN is a little higher than most of the other players and a good dose of Moly to go with it. This is for the 5w30 so im not sure if the 5w20 has the same add pack but i would bet its close. I also run the purilator classics and have had great luck with them. If you go to Advance auto and ask them if they carry the power flow filters , they are cheaper and are the same filter as the purilator classic. I bought a case of twelve of them for 2 dollars a piece, then used the 10 dollars off a 25 dollar purchace so i got them for a little over a dollar. Take a look at this if you havnt seen it.

http://www.pqiamerica.com/indexmain.html