Quality, easy to find 0w-20 options?

[Phone]

I'll get one done when I do my oil at 10k with OEM filter (yay Miata filters) and OEM oil. Woo.

 

[shaowq]

i did my first oil change at my mazda stealership for $25. My last 2 oil changes were with Mobil1 0w-20 most recently that i've purchased from Walmart, 5 quart jugs for $26.48 or something. Using Middle road not the cheapest fram filters...i need to find a mazda deal in the area that's willing to give deals on Mazda OEM 0w-20 oil and OEM filters.

Speaking of which...SoCal Inland Empire people know of any places?

 

[kcdirtbro54]

I'd stay away from Fram filters. I've seen many problems caused by them over the years. If you don't/can't go OEM, 1 good filter company to look into is Purolator. They're filters aren't very expensive and are tons better than Fram.

 

[DrWebster]

i need to find a mazda deal in the area that's willing to give deals on Mazda OEM 0w-20 oil and OEM filters.

I'd just talk to the guy at the parts counter and see if he can cut you a deal. About 6 months ago I did that, and they basically gave me buy-9-get-one-free (aka 10% off if I bought ten) on the OEM filters. I have enough filters to last me until 50k now. And like Phone mentioned, one of the two compatible OEM filters is for Miatas, so dealers should be selling enough of them to be willing to work on the price.

And I agree with kcdirtbro54, I've heard not-so-good things about Fram too. Purolator and Wix are both good aftermarket brands.

 

[Phone]

You know when you order stuff from Amazon and it comes in a cardboard box? Yeah, that would cardboard box filter your oil better than a Fram filter.

 

[Max Archer]

Anybody got any impressions of the Chevron stuff? My usual oil change place is somehow affiliated with Chevron so the Chevron synthetic is like $20 cheaper than Castrol or Mobil for the change. Google seems to indicate that it's ok.

 

[gtwk18]

Speaking of oils. I just bought my mazda2, and I read a lot of stuff about break-in period. I am about at 300 miles, and I was wondering when I should do my oil change. A lot of people seem to think that it is best to change the engine oil around 600 miles due to metal shavings from the break-in period. Can anyone comment on that? I spoke to the service department in my dealership, and they say that I shouldn't have to worry about it and just follow the instruction from the manual. Also, if anyone can comment on the change of transmission fluid (I have manual), I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks a bunch.

 

[kcdirtbro54]

I don't have my manual near me for a service schedule, but I was looking and found driverside.com has a maintenance schedule for our cars. Basically there's a service every 7500 miles. 60k looks to be the first MTF change.
As far as break in period. I changed my oil around 3800 miles. Most dealers will tell you to bring the car in when it's due and not to bring it in early unless you really want to waste your money. I'm at bmw now and the only cars that we do a really early oil change on are the M cars that come in at 1200 for their first service. You've got good quality oil in the car now and a good filter. If there are any shavings floating around in your oil, your filter should catch it and keep it in it, that's what it's there for. Everyone has their own opinion on break in oils and when to change it. It's your money, your car, and up to you.

 

[Max Archer]

According to our manual, our cars have two service schedules, A and B. A is for cars that see only low-stress driving, and oil changes are every 6000mi. B is for anybody who drives hard, does a lot of short trips or driving in traffic, and the oil change interval is 5000mi. I just did my first change today at 4800mi and everything seems to have been fine. The car feels like it revs easier and has a bit more power with the new oil in it, which is likely to be somewhat true. I'll be interested to see how the new oil affects my fuel economy.

 

[Phone]

All engines are broken in on an engine dyno. You can run the factory fill until your first service interval (5000 or 7500 miles).

 

[Max Archer]

So I've had the Chevron in the car for about a week. I've noticed that the car revs a little more freely, and I went a couple days longer than usual without filling the car up. I'm actually pretty impressed with the difference changing the oil made. I don't know if it's just going from dirty to clean or if it's the difference in oils, though.

 

[Joker2]

Speaking of oils. I just bought my mazda2, and I read a lot of stuff about break-in period. I am about at 300 miles, and I was wondering when I should do my oil change. A lot of people seem to think that it is best to change the engine oil around 600 miles due to metal shavings from the break-in period. Can anyone comment on that? I spoke to the service department in my dealership, and they say that I shouldn't have to worry about it and just follow the instruction from the manual. Also, if anyone can comment on the change of transmission fluid (I have manual), I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks a bunch.

About 2500 miles is fine.

 

[Joker2]

All engines are broken in on an engine dyno. You can run the factory fill until your first service interval (5000 or 7500 miles).

This is not true at all. It would be an unnecessary expense. Some engines for high end models yes, others are sampled (even for some high end cars) at 100%, dropping to 50%, 10%, 2%, etc... do validate production methods mostly.

 

[Phone]

So you seriously believe that the engines aren't run at all before they're put into the car?

 

[arcxer]

They might be run, but does that count as break-in?

 

[Max Archer]

Everything I've heard has said that the engines are broken in on a dyno at the factory and that you don't need to change the oil until the normal interval. This seems to be the case with most new cars. I still wouldn't run my car hard for the first few thousand miles, but all the metal shavings and stuff that come from the first few hundred miles are taken care of at the factory.

 

[Phone]

They might be run, but does that count as break-in?

Yeah. Then there's 600 miles of "easy" driving to make sure that the bearings are seated properly and don't s*** the bed.

 

[Joker2]

Everything I've heard has said that the engines are broken in on a dyno at the factory (not true) and that you don't need to change the oil until the normal interval (this is correct). This seems to be the case with most new cars (which ones yes and which ones not?). I still wouldn't run my car hard for the first few thousand miles (what is the data behind this?), but all the metal shavings and stuff that come from the first few hundred miles are taken care of at the factory (how is this accomplished?).

It would be very expensive for a car manufacturer to ship off thousands of engines to a facility where they would be broken in on engine test stands. What would the benefit be? I used to do some work with a facility known at that time as Environment Canada. GM would have them run some LS engines on test-stands for some hours. The test-stands were engine dynos and other. The only other engines that were run on dynos were new designs, prototypes, and QC validation units. A very expensive and labor intensive process, completely unnecessary re. the engines we are concerned with here.

My oil analysis at ~2,000 miles substantiates my statements with numbers that are completely normal for an engine breaking in: lots of silicone (sand from casting and gasket material) copper and aluminum from bearings seating or bedding in, fuel dilution of 2% from rings not bedded in and fuel blow-by at start-up, etc. Now at >20,000 miles, fuel is 0, copper is down from 55 ppm to 2 ppm, iron from 20 down to 3, aluminum from 9 to 2, silicone from 103 to 15, sodium from 16 to 4. So the engine is broken in, blow-by is minimal, rings are seated and most bearings are bedded in.

I sample the oil each 2,000 miles after change-out and at each drain or 5,000 miles on oil. I have 8 oil samples to date taken at: 2, 4.6, 8, 10, 13, 15.2, 18.4 and 20.3 thousand miles respectively. The sample at 2 showed the elevated numbers I posted so at 2.5 I drained the factory fill. I drive the car every day so I cannot be more precise than I have in sampling or changing the oil. One of the samples was taken in a hotel parking lot a few hundred miles from home.

The oil was changed at 2.6, 8, 13.1 and 18.4 thousand miles with M1 0W-20, Mazda Synthetic 0W-20, Mazda Syn 0W-20 and Mazda Syn 0W-20 respectively.

I will put it all on a slide and post for ease of understanding.

 

[eyeballs]

easy break-in (rofl)

 

[POODLES]

last week at costco, I saw 5 liters of mobil 1 for around $28.00.