My private LR mechanic wants to move to synthetic oil. Shall I?

[paula]

I am planning on moving to a new LR mechanic after getting some great referrals. This shop only does LRs and seems to be great at it.

The main mechanic told me two things:

1. He recommends doing car service every 3,500 miles given that city driving is ******* the car with frequent stop and go and traffic. I checked the manual and it does mention that

2. He uses synthetic oil during oil changes. So far I have been using only regular Castrol 5w-30.

Do you folks agree with the recommendations? Thanks in advance

 

[jwest]

I don't recall what is "best" for the LR3 but you could also call a few different LR dealers and ask their service people what is normally used in the year you have. Synthetic would definitely not need to be changed every 3500 though. At most maybe the filter would get changed every 5000.

 

[Quijote]

I don't recall what is "best" for the LR3 but you could also call a few different LR dealers and ask their service people what is normally used in the year you have. Synthetic would definitely not need to be changed every 3500 though. At most maybe the filter would get changed every 5000.

Agreed. (Good) Synthetics should be good for over 10k miles. I've always changed my synthetics every 7500 miles.

Most manufacturers recommend synthetic oil changes every 15k miles. At one time, Porsche was recommending an oil change every 20k miles.

3500 miles is a short interval even for (good) regular oil.

 

[uoflcardfan77]

Count me as a fan of synthetic oils. I've been using it in all my vehicles for probably the past 15 or more years. They won't "sludge up" like regular oil. 99% of the time I use Mobil1 or Quaker State.

 

[roverman]

Not a fan, nothing against them, but regular oil is fine if changed regularly. But not 3500 miles regularly - way too often, city driving or not. 5000-6000 imo

 

[schwaggy]

The Jaguar engine in the LR3 was designed to take regular dinosaur oil and that's what I feed it. Castrol GTX 5W30
No way I'd change it every 3K though. More like 5K with city driving, longer if highway.

 

[whydahdvr]

Jumping into the discussion: The independent LR mechanic I've begun using says to only run European grade synthetic oil for oil changes. Looking over the oil changes done by my LR dealership I saw no difference between that and the oil used at my local Jiffy Lube. And as I write this I do recall it a type recommended for European cars. And I have gone with a synthetic version at my local Jiffy Lube.
Regardless, just checking to see what is best. I've got 98k on my OD. My independent shop says that regular oil builds up too much in the fine meshed areas of the oil pan, pick-up, and I guess the oil filter, clogging the fine oil ports inside the engine. That's how I recall their explanation - a new one for me.
DiscoMike may have some good input on this too.
Thanks.

 

[cmb6s]

I personally think that synthetic oil is fantastic and I will never use conventional again. Not only do I think it's better for the engine, but I think it's actually cheaper and less of hassle in the long run since you end up doing fewer oil changes.

Conventional motor oils start to break down in the 3,000-5,000 mile range, which is why the conventional wisdom was to do oil changes every 3,000 miles. The newer synthetics will go anywhere between 7,500 and 15,000 miles before they break down enough that their protection is degraded.

Of course, there are many other factors such as how long your oil filters last as well, but if you buy a quality oil filter with a large media surface area, then they should typically last at least 10,000 miles.

There are tons of oil analyses peppered all over the internet, so if you care enough (I used to, but not so much any more) you can look up how long each oil lasts and how much engine wear typically results from it (estimated by the amount of metal found in the oil). Of course, everybody has an opinion on which oil is the best and how much more magical one is than another.

I personally just try to go with what is reasonably affordable and universally available. For me, that's been Mobil 1. There are plenty of magic oils made from unobtanium that cost uber amounts and are only available direct from Narnia via internet ordering, but I think the jump from conventional to synthetic is far better than any particular jump from one synthetic to another.

I've used synthetics on all my vehicles and am topping 182,000 miles on the Audi, 212,000 miles on the Accord when we sold it, 90k on the LR3, and 107k on the Range Rover with no major mechanical issues.

 

[thorgal]

IIRC , her LR3 is way over 70 000 miles.I was at that exact point many years a go, wanted to switch to syntethic , but after a lot of research and lot of questions pointed to a professionals in the auto industry, i decided NOT to .All the resources told me , that it is sort of too late for a switch at that mileage and could lead to potential problems down the road.
Our 4.4 engine are designed to run specifically on conventional oil , so I heard from Master mechanics ,over the pond.Do I regret that I did not switched early enough ? Not at all. My engine runs on mineral 5W30 since new and at 175 000 miles still purrs like a kitten and does not eat oil at all, between fluid changes.

 

[thorgal]

DiscoMike may have some good input on this too.
.

BTW , DiscoMike does not know Sh*t about our LR3 , which he proved on many boards many times . Cheers