FAQ: Engine Oil - What type and change intervals?

Where do you live? Your winter season low temps really ought to be factored in to whether you run 10W or 5W. The oil cap itself says 10W30, but the manual clarifies it with temp considerations.

connecticut

The Riviera owners manual has a chart showing oil recommendations per expected low temp ranges. For reference, at 60deg F and below, it recommends running 5W30. I don't expect you see too many 60deg days in the winter in CT, and would think 5W30 is a better choice for a few months of winter.

I'm also not saying that you'll hurt your engine with 10W30 in the winter, but I expect the engineers recommended 5W30 below 60deg for good reasons.

yeah it dosent say anythinga bout it in the aurora manuals i dont really care being as they arnt my cars if it should be 5w30 in the winter then ill get mine changed in a month or 2 when it gets cold hear also have to get it changed to royal purple from whatever the ppl i bought it off were useing

GothicVash wrote:

yeah it dosent say anythinga bout it in the aurora manuals

You didn't mention anything about Auroras... they do not have the 3800 engines. Follow whatever the Aurora manual recommends for cold weather operating conditions.

yeah i did i said the auroras use the same 10w30 in winter as summer lol that was in my first post but its a good thing i talked about it cuz they deffinatly dont have the 3800 n it dose need the 5w30 in winter ? so good thing i read this

What I mean is, your initial post asks about oil in your car, no mention of Auroras until this 2nd page of the thread. If the Aurora manual doesn't spec out 5W30 in winter months, then don't run it, go with the factory recommended oil. Different mfgr engines have different lubrication requirements. Not all need the same weight oil in cold weather. Newer engines tend to have much tighter engine tolerances, requiring lighter weight oil year-round. Not the case with the 3800's, which were designed in the 70's.

oh we had a missunderstanding i didnt make the first post just chimed in with the auroras and how i thought it was interesting how they didnt need it


thank you though is verry helpfull
and i did not know 3800s have been around that long thats really cool surprized there arnt more aftermarket parts for the serries one then

Geez, I'm a moron... I thought you started the thread, didn't look back to page 1 to confirm... feel free to kick me.

1998 Riv wrote:

Geez, I'm a moron... I thought you started the thread, didn't look back to page 1 to confirm... feel free to kick me.

::KICK::

lol its all good not a big deal

Picked up 5 quarts of castrol syntec blend instead of full by accident. The receipt's long gone so I'm stuck with this stuff. I've got 3 quarts of full syn syntec from last time. Any problem mixing this stuff? It doesn't sound like there would be, but better safe than sorry.

BTW, Rivi takes 7.5 quarts right?

I personally wouldn't mix them in significant quantities, but you could always email Castrol and see what they say. Since you have 3 qts, why not just pick up 2 more sometime, and use the 5 qts of blend first?

Pardon my logic, but if a synth "blend" is a mixture of synthetic and natural, what could be the harm in mixing the blend with more synth?

Using gut instinct, it seems the safest thing would be to use the new stuff for now, save the old type for next oil change.

Although I'm sure you just fat-fingered the keypad, just to be safe the crankcase capacity of the riv is 4.5 quarts with a std pf-47 filter.

A little more with the pf-52.

do NOT put 7.5 quarts of oil in your engine.

mixing those is harmless. You could mix half conventional 10w30 with fully synthetic 5w30 oil and be fine. I'd only suggest to use the lower grade oil longevity as a guide for your next oil change rather than the longer lasting one.

Jason wrote:

Although I'm sure you just fat-fingered the keypad, just to be safe the crankcase capacity of the riv is 4.5 quarts with a std pf-47 filter.

A little more with the pf-52.

do NOT put 7.5 quarts of oil in your engine.

Thanks guys!

When I was young the rule for oil change intervals was 3000 miles or 3 months and change the filter every other time.
I have always changed the filter every time I changed the oil.

On the newer vehicles the recommended oil change intervals has increased.
For instance on my 03 Silverado the recommendation is every 12 months or whenever the oil life monitor indicates an oil change is needed.
I have been changing the oil on the 03 Silverado every 5000 miles. I just can not force myself to trust the oil life monitor. Its hard enough to wait until 5000 miles instead of 3000 miles. This truck never pulls a trailer or a heavy load and is pretty much what I consider highway miles.
On the other three daily drivers,(00 Regal LS. 99 Riviera, 95 PA) I change the oil every 3000 miles.

Does anyone wait until the vehicle alerts them that an oil change is needed before they change the oil?

Bert

i use mobil 1 full synthetic, and it can seriously go 5000 miles before it ends up like conventional oil. It all depends on the way you drive though. After i went down to carbondale and back, my oil was shot to shit. 100-130 mph each way for 3 hours straight....

Mobil 1 is good oil though, but expensive. but if ur gonna drive like a pshyco...then opt for the better oil.

I use Mobile One Full-synthetic 15,000 mile guarentee with a Mobile One oil filter, 5w-30 and Mobile-101. I change my oil and filter every 5,000miles because even though its guareented for 15,000 I highly doubt mobile will buy me a new engine if I damege it by going the full 15,000 miles. My oil is never black when I change it though, it is always still light, like the color of honey, and I drive my car HARD

I use Mobile One Full-Synth, 10W-30 on my car, and still change it every 3,000 miles. Is that overkill?

I dont think thats overkill, I think its just good to take care of your car, but hey why do you use 10w-30? I was told to use 5w-30 when I got the car and thats what I ALWAYS USE. Is this ok?

I thought I was supposed to use 10W-30. Uh... am I wrong?