If you sell a car on here, remind me not to buy it :thumbdwn:

When I have finished with my car after 10 years they are crushed.

Well, blow me down!

And here's me driving along in a 13 year old car which doesn't use any oil!

I shall be off to the scrapyard forthwith

you don't need to change your oil, allow the oil to run down to minimum on the dipstick and top up with fresh. Following this cycle, old oil is replaced with new.

WTF ! :confused:

WTF ! :confused:

What's up chief, you shouldn't mock other peoples 'takes' on a subject

What's up chief, you shouldn't mock other peoples 'takes' on a subject

Even when they're idiotic and moronic? :confused:

I suppose you drive on the tyres till they burst, and wear brake pads down to the metal as well?

People like you should get the bus...

Even when they're idiotic and moronic? :confused:

I suppose you drive on the tyres till they burst, and wear brake pads down to the metal as well?

People like you should get the bus...

Sorry you don't understand the concept of the old oil being replaced with new. Your comment about tyres being driven on until they burst and the brake pads is pure inane, and quite frankly brainless.

James, I think you should take a step back and think about what's happening in your engine.

You claim that as your engine uses (x) amount of oil every month, if you replace that (x) amount of oil with new, then eventually all of the oil in your engine will have been replaced with new.

Your engine doesn't know which bits of the oil are old and which bits are new. It doesn't care - the oil it consumes is whatever is in the wrong place at the wrong time. For this reason it is a bit naive to assume that if you constantly do what you're doing, then no old oil will remain...

Also, using the cycle it will surely take much longer than 10,000/20,000 miles to replace all of the oil?

I don't know if the engine in your car is a PD version, but if it is then you need to seriously consider using regular full oil changes with your car. The pressure the oil is under the engine is massive and any old engine oil will not be doing what it's meant to be doing very well - which is lubricating the engine components.

Also if you think you are ultimately replacing all of the oil in your engine as regularly as it should be, why not just replace it at the intervals that are recommended and not let it ever get to the minimum mark on the dipstick?

If you think you're saving money using your method then you are certainly not replacing the amount of oil that needs to be replaced as often as it needs to be replaced, and if you are not saving money and think it's being replaced in it's entirity as often as it needs to be then why not just do it the 'proper' way?

For more information about engine oil changes see the following links:

Car Bibles : The Engine Oil Bible

From the link above I found the following relevant quotes:

The chemical compounds in engine oils break down over time due to prolonged exposure to high temperatures and poor maintenance habits. When the oil oxidises, the additives separate from the oil and begin to chemically break down and solidify, leading to the baked-on oil deposits turning gelatinous, and that nasty compound is what is lovingly referred to nowadays as sludge. It's like black yoghurt. What doesn't help is that modern engines, due to packaging, have smaller sumps than in the "good old days" and so hold less oil. This means that the oil that is present in the engine can't hold as much crap (for want of a better word) and can lead to earlier chemical breakdown.

You can never change your engine oil too frequently. The more you do it, the longer the engine will last. The whole debate about exactly when you change your oil is somewhat of a grey area. Manufacturers tell you every 10,000 miles or so. Your mate with a classic car tells you every 3,000 miles. Ole' Bob with the bad breath who drives a truck tells you he's never once changed the oil in his car. Fact is, large quantities of water are produced by the normal combustion process and, depending on engine wear, some of it gets into the crank case. If you have a good crank case breathing system it gets removed from there PDQ, but even so, in cold weather a lot of condensation will take place. This is bad enough in itself, since water is not noted for its lubrication qualities in an engine, but even worse, that water dissolves any nitrates formed during the combustion process. If my memory of chemistry serves me right, that leaves you with a mixture of Nitric (HNO3) and Nitrous (HNO2) acid circulating round your engine! So not only do you suffer a high rate of wear at start-up and when the engine is cold, you suffer a high rate of subsequent corrosion during normal running or even when stationary.

http://www.opieoils.co.uk/pdfs/Why-do-oils-lose-viscosity-with-use.pdf

And look what the oil in your engine actually does, do you really want the same oil to do it for 100k?

http://www.opieoils.co.uk/pdfs/What-does-an-engine-oil-do.pdf

Sorry you don't understand the concept of the old oil being replaced with new. .

do you change the oil filter occasionally , or will you let that block up completely first :confused:

do you change the oil filter occasionally , or will you let that block up completely first :confused:

nope, never change it, to avoid the expense, engine oil has advanced somewhat over the years, I am confident it will last the life of the car.

Call me paranoid, but I suspect this is a windup.... If not... Have you never considered what might be happening to the sludge which inevitably builds up in the sump? The sludge which under normal circumstances is drained off during an oil change?

Call me paranoid, but I suspect this is a windup.... If not... Have you never considered what might be happening to the sludge which inevitably builds up in the sump? The sludge which under normal circumstances is drained off during an oil change?

If there is any sludge, which I'll never know, I can imagine if it does become dislogded it will blend itself up on the crank and conrods, be dragged into the bores and eventually make its way out via the exhaust manifold.

Good luck with that

Good luck with that

Cheers, I'll give a long term report in about 7-8 yrs time, with a cost analysis of how much I have saved in oil, filters, sump plug and labour.

hi,

question - my vrs fabia is 3yrs old, serviced every 10k without fail. last service 5k ago. yesterday the service spanner plus 'oil' came up. this has never happened before. oil level is fine, i do drive it relatively hard but not horribly!!

the skoda garage suggested that the ecu can detect poor oil quality.....so it must need changing...really? clever ecu if that is true?

i'm guessing there must be a fault somewhere - anyone else experienced this?

It means that an oil service is due, it does not indicate a fault...

Sorry you don't understand the concept of the old oil being replaced with new. Your comment about tyres being driven on until they burst and the brake pads is pure inane, and quite frankly brainless.

Says the guy who doesn't perform the most basic maintenance...

The idea of changing the oil and oil filter is to remove dirt and carbon deposits, along with all the various acids and other gunk that are byproducts of the combustion process. All you're doing...actually, you know what, I couldn't be bothered. I hope your engine seizes.

It means that an oil service is due, it does not indicate a fault...

yes i understand that -hence why i said it was serviced 5k ago - when it had an oil change -it has never required an oil change after so few miles in all the 3 yrs i've owned it.

i am just checking to make sure that the main dealer is not trying to fob me off when there might some known fault amongst other experienced skoda drivers/mechanics.

Errrrrr I do hope your joking!!

Actually talking to some people in the industry that was the logic behind the long life servicing. You get through some of the 0w-30 oil and top it up with clean. It happens enough between a service that you've effectively changed it via a top up.

Not sure how true it is, but logically it's an easy way to extend the life of the oil (eg replace it with new).

Obviously that doesn't remove the need for oil/filter services, it just extends the intervals.

Cheers, I'll give a long term report in about 7-8 yrs time, with a cost analysis of how much I have saved in oil, filters, sump plug and labour.

Just out of interest what MPG do you get? Don't you think at least doing the filter would be a compromise? There only a couple of quid on trade.

I suppose I did a similar thing that James does with my old Metro. The car being 20-25 years old used to leak oil everywhere, on the road, drive etc. Every month or so I topped it up with 0.5 litres of oil (dipstick range) so it may have had a continual oil change as James suggests. However when the 5 litre top-up bottle was empty (and oil level low) I changed all the oil and filter with 5l of new oil..I used to order 4 bottles of Millers special classic oil at a time so had 2 for changes and 2 for top-ups.

My Furby does not use (or leak) any oil so I, as stated before, use Skoda's recommended oil change intervals.

The car being 20-25 years old used to leak oil everywhere, on the road, drive etc.

No, that's just because it was a metro.

Maybe you keep buying knackered cars, cause the oil shouldn't drop that much! Never had to top up my Audi, or Octavia, or Fabia, or Lupo, or G-plate Corrolla, or L-plate Vento.

:eek:

Same here, with lots of VAG cars.

yes i understand that -hence why i said it was serviced 5k ago - when it had an oil change -it has never required an oil change after so few miles in all the 3 yrs i've owned it.

i am just checking to make sure that the main dealer is not trying to fob me off when there might some known fault amongst other experienced skoda drivers/mechanics.

There's more than one service counter. There's an oil change one and at least one other. It's just that you've hit the oil change one this time.

Annually, only do about 8-11k a year