Here’s the latest reader question, along with my reply!
Bob asks: I have a 2024 Civic and bought it do to the 2.0 reliability. I don’t like 0w 20w oil idea. What is the highest safe weight I can go? I change my own because quick change places can’t differ from regulations. I Only have 9,000 mi. On it.
My reply: New/late model vehicle engines can be very finicky about oil; especially those that have variable cam/valve timing systems. That said, you’re probably fine going with a 5W-20 oil. The more important thing, in my view, is to ignore the factory oil change intervals, which are often just a sales ploy. They’ll tell you – as an example – that you can go 10,000 miles in between oil/filter changes. See how much money you’ll save! Yeah. Never mind what it will cost you – in the long run.
I change the oil in my vehicles every six months, regardless of mileage – and I always buy a high quality filter (Mobil 1, Wix, etc.) and ever the store-brand cheap ones. High quality oil is also worth its weight (ha!) and should always be the choice for a car you care about and want to keep for a while.
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Even if you go for a heavier weight, I’d stick with synthetic oil if you can.
Conventional oil I change every 2-3k miles, synthetic I change every 5k.
I once went 7k on a full synthetic that was advertised to be capable of 10k oil changes & I did not like what came out, I would not go the full 10k. 5K seems to work pretty well for me, which works out to roughly twice a year.
It’s a little hard to explain, but after you do a bunch of oil changes you can kind of tell by looking at it if you need to decrease the change interval.
With the thinner oils in new cars, there is far less ability by the engine to resist abuse and even general wear.
Especially these undersized 4 cylinder engines, there is little margin of error. My old small block Chevy V8 could take abuse that will burn up a modern engine.
So many bad trends going on lately.