Extended Mileage Oil Filters

[Scott M]

Changed the oil and I see my wife bought the extended guard oil filter...Claims to be able to cover 10,000 miles. So theoretically this means it will clean the oil well enough to use the oil for 10K? Or keep changing the oil regularly but switch out the filter at the recommended 9-10K range?

[Eric Wettschreck]

I'm old school. There is no magic pill in my mind. Oils and filters have come a long long way but, the oil is constatly being contaminated. Filters remove suspended solids only. The dissolved solids in the oil, from the contamination, are in there doing their damage.

I go 2000 on oil and filter. That's just me, tho. I'd be interested in hearing from others more in the know than I am.

[Flooringuy]

I feel the same as boilerguy. The oil and filter get changed every 2000.

Even with all the new fangled oil and stuff. In my mind oil is oil and it gets dirty and breaks down.

[Macgyver55]

I'm about as old school as they come, but even I have bumped up my intervals to 3000 to 3500. Todays engines run so much cleaner just due to the fuel injection systems alone that oil is good well beyond that. I've worked in a fleet setting for many years where we did oil analysis and believe me, its safe to go well beyond that with the use of quality oils and filters. Even so, I still can't get myself to go any longer than 4000.

[Eric Wettschreck]

I can buy that. With electronic ignitions and fuel injection motors run cleaner, and flat out last longer. Remember when 100,000 miles was taboo? My son just totaled my car a few weeks ago and it had 250,000 miles on it and still going strong!!!!

I can see going 4k miles, but I can't go 10k and expect things to last long.

I should add that I don't buy and sell and trade vehicles often. I buy em and drive em until the doors fall off, weld the doors back on and keep on driving them until they flat out die. So, getting motors and transmissions to last as long as possible is pretty important to me.

[Dozer]

There is a guy I work with that has a mid 90's Buick Lesabre with a 3800 that has 220,000 on it that he drives to work. He bought it for $100 dollars last summer and said he wasnt going to put one dollar into it. He has 38,000 miles on it and never changed the oil! He adds a quart every month or two but never changes it!

[Big Buck Buster]

There is a guy I work with that has a mid 90's Buick Lesabre with a 3800 that has 220,000 on it that he drives to work. He bought it for $100 dollars last summer and said he wasnt going to put one dollar into it. He has 38,000 miles on it and never changed the oil! He adds a quart every month or two but never changes it!

That's pretty funny. I bet the filter will be as heavy as lead when he does change it.

[crothmeier]

I run amsoil synthetic in my car. filter only change every 10,000 miles, and full oil & filter change at 20,000.

In my truck i run the Napa oil and filter, and that gets changed every 5,000 miles. (mostly highway miles) thats a '97 chevy with 235,000 miles. Uses about 1/2 to 3/4 quart of oil every 5,000 miles.

[Jeremy airjer W]

As far as I know filters have a bypass mechanism that allows oil to bypass them in the event they become plugged. This is done to save the engine from oil starvation.

The average filter will easily go 10k miles. I see it at least 3 or 4 times month!

For the couple bucks it costs for the filter change it when you change the oil. Clean oil, clean filter, happy car!

[Jaspernuts]

These newer vehicle run much cleaner. A lot of the fleets I work with go 6k or even 6500 on intervals. On the newer GM's the oil life monitor will sometimes go 8-9k before it turns on!

[theoilman]

You should always change the filter when you change your oil. Check the fine print concerning that filter, it probably has some fine print either on the box or the company's product data sheet (which you will be lucky to ever find) that probably says, "Always change oil filter at the time of oil change."

There are 3 general groups of oil filter capabilities available today for today's cars and light trucks with gasoline engines:

1. The cheap filters, generally around $2.00 to $3.00 discount store priced. They 'Meet manufacturer's specs' and nothing better. That spec for most is to remove around 50% of 40 micron particles from the oil. They are a paper only filter media. The CarQuest Red box, the NAPA 'Pro-select' and almost all store branded fall into this category. They remove "The big birds and small children."

2. A good, quality "blended" media filter (most call it a synthetic blended media) - uses a paper base with potentially fiber-glass, and additional enhancements added. These do a much better job: from 75% removal at 25 microns and some up to 80% at 15 microns. These include the CarQuest blue box, NAPA Gold, WIX, Purolator Pure1, Mobil1, and many more. They run a typical price of $8.00 to $12.00

3. The newest "next generation" oil filters. These do not use a paper base, but use a full synthetic spun fiber nano-fiber media. AMSOIL introduced these a couple of years ago in the AMSOIL EaO series of oil filters. They are also available in the Donaldson truck ELF series. I would not be surprised that other companies are starting to introduce them, but I haven't seen or heard specifically of any yet. These will remove 98.7% of 15 micron particles. These are going to cost $15.00 to $20.00.

What size of dirt really needs to be removed? Particles smaller than 5 microns are too small to scratch surfaces and cause wear, as between bearings and the crank shaft, etc. - are totally suspended in the oil. The nano-fiber media filters will remove some of these smaller particles. But to build a filter tight enough to remove all, would not allow adequate flow to lubricate the engine.

[Phred52]

I nearly 2nd boilerguy. Differing only in the fact that I change oil and filter every 1500 miles. In that milage in the average V-8 engine, in excess of 3 railroad train tankers worth of oil go through that filter! That's why. Phred52

[jeffreyd]

I run full synthetic in my truck and do a new filter at 5k and oil at 10k. I was running 70 miles a day and have not used a drop. My dodge dealer will drain and fill with mobil one and schedule it back in 10k miles under warranty. My benz suv was factory filled with mobil one and had lifetime oil changes on it. they would not do an oil change until it hit 10k regardless of the age. Being from a gov fleet setting, we did test after test on oil. We would run comparison tests from 5-6 different oils and types from regular oil to full syn amsoil. We ended up converting everything except diesels to amsoil, including police cars and doing service at 6k. We would bring them in at 3k for the safety check but would not dump oil until 6k.

We ran extended drain oil filters on all diesels, and did a full dump at 10k or 250 hrs which ever came first except fire and sanitation. Those ran ext drain filters but would still cycle through at 5k due to idle times.

Lots of info out there, I have used amsoil, (not a dealer just fan) for years and believe in it 100%.