Oil changes… how often???  Suppose one day you’re driving to work and your car starts running a little rough. Then the Check Engine light comes on. Naturally you’re not happy about this so you call your dealer, who has provided the regular “Free Maintenance” provided as part of the car purchase or lease. They tell you to bring the car in and you set an appointment. After a couple of hours sitting in their waiting room (or maybe they gave you a ride back to work) they tell you the repairs will cost close to a thousand dollars.

Now you’re A) Perplexed, B) Angry and C) Disappointed… After all, the car only has 40,000 (or 50,000 or 70,000 or whatever) miles on it and you’ve been faithful to their “Free Maintenance” program!

Take a look at the photos below. The first, ugly one is the inside of an engine that has gone about 40,000 miles and has had two oil changes. The car manufacturer said the Free Oil Changes were to be done every 15,000 miles, so that’s what was done.

When get oil change

The second, clean engine below has more miles on it, but oil changes were done (paid for) more often – REGARDLESS of what the salesperson said about the “Free Maintenance” included with the car.

 

How often oil change

We see similar things frequently. While it is usually no longer necessary to follow the ancient “Change the oil every 3,000 miles” rule, the modern tendency towards infrequent servicing can cause serious (expensive) problems. So the “Free Maintenance” – or lack of maintenance – can come with a HIGH PRICE.

Here at InSite OilChange we recommend getting an oil change every 5,000 miles for most vehicles. The oil will not be performing as well, lubricating, cooling and protecting the engine, as it gets old. Modern lubricants have definite advantages over the old types – they work better and last longer…

… BUT it makes little sense to save a few dollars by doing oil changes too seldom, when that can cause the engine to have problems down the road and/or simply not last as long.

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InSite Oil Change