Originally Posted by Railrust
People are all over the map on this topic, and the way one should drive the vehicle during "break in", is also debatable.
I changed my oil at 1,200 miles during break in, then again at 5,000 miles. Now I just do 5,000 oil changes.
Shortly after I did that I talked to a shop Forman at a dealer, he said not to change the oil until at least 3,000 miles because all the "good stuff" is in that factory fill and it needs to be embedded into the cam lobes and stuff.
The foreman is in myth land. There is nothing special that is going to magically stick to the cam lobes. Factory fills are whatever they got a good price on. Whatever is different is whatever assembly lube was used to protect the engine on it's first few seconds of run. That can stay in there until the oil is changed.
Cars these days have change algorithms that use various in-use parameters and predict when the oil is due. The algorithms are conservative and will tell you (usually) a lot more than 5000 miles (unless it's extremely hot, or you drive the car very hard, etc...) And even then, when they say: "Change it!" - there is a lot of life left in that oil. (2000 miles per some tests that Edmunds did).
People are all over the map on this topic, and the way one should drive the vehicle during "break in", is also debatable.
I changed my oil at 1,200 miles during break in, then again at 5,000 miles. Now I just do 5,000 oil changes.
Shortly after I did that I talked to a shop Forman at a dealer, he said not to change the oil until at least 3,000 miles because all the "good stuff" is in that factory fill and it needs to be embedded into the cam lobes and stuff.
The foreman is in myth land. There is nothing special that is going to magically stick to the cam lobes. Factory fills are whatever they got a good price on. Whatever is different is whatever assembly lube was used to protect the engine on it's first few seconds of run. That can stay in there until the oil is changed.
Cars these days have change algorithms that use various in-use parameters and predict when the oil is due. The algorithms are conservative and will tell you (usually) a lot more than 5000 miles (unless it's extremely hot, or you drive the car very hard, etc...) And even then, when they say: "Change it!" - there is a lot of life left in that oil. (2000 miles per some tests that Edmunds did).