Decided to get a UOA on my 2011 WRX at ~15k miles (fourth fill, I did the first at around 1500 miles, the second at around 5000, and around 5000 mile OCIs since). My goals here were to establish a baseline for future UOAs and to gauge how well the oil holds up to 5000 miles OCIs -- the new factory recommendation is 7500 miles on synthetic but that seems too long to me and I wanted to see whether 5000 miles would be conservative or not. Looks somewhat conservative I'd say, but I still don't think I'd want to do 7500.
The car has had Subaru branded 5w30 syn with OEM filters (Honeywell) every OCI. At my dealership, this oil is essentially the same price as the normal price for a decent synthetic at local stores. That, combined with the fact that the OEM filter tends to be recommended (high bypass valve spec) and dealership receipts are probably convenient if I need warranty work made me decide to stick w/ the Subaru oil. After this analysis I'd say I'm comfortable with that choice!
My commute is mostly highway so the car generally gets good and warm, but I'm not shy about the throttle after it's warmed up, and the turbo gets a decent workout on a long steep grade every day. I've gotta say this is better than I was expecting for a turbo engine at only 15k miles. There's a lot of talk on Subaru forums about how 5w30 energy conserving oil isn't good enough for these cars and lots of talk about running Rotella T6 5w-40 (which is not technically allowed by the owners manual anymore) but it looks like this oil is doing fine for my situation.
The car has had Subaru branded 5w30 syn with OEM filters (Honeywell) every OCI. At my dealership, this oil is essentially the same price as the normal price for a decent synthetic at local stores. That, combined with the fact that the OEM filter tends to be recommended (high bypass valve spec) and dealership receipts are probably convenient if I need warranty work made me decide to stick w/ the Subaru oil. After this analysis I'd say I'm comfortable with that choice!
My commute is mostly highway so the car generally gets good and warm, but I'm not shy about the throttle after it's warmed up, and the turbo gets a decent workout on a long steep grade every day. I've gotta say this is better than I was expecting for a turbo engine at only 15k miles. There's a lot of talk on Subaru forums about how 5w30 energy conserving oil isn't good enough for these cars and lots of talk about running Rotella T6 5w-40 (which is not technically allowed by the owners manual anymore) but it looks like this oil is doing fine for my situation.