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Having followed the oil change / VAG long life service threads here for a while now I have to say I'm torn between sticking to the long life regime on my Audi Tdi which is saying that the first service will be due at 19,000 and getting intermediate oil changes at a cost of £100 ish (it needs 8+ litres). I was wondering if anyone had any experience of getting their oil analysed to check how it was wearing. I found 'theoillab.co.uk" on google who seem to offer a full analysis for possibly as little as £22.95 which seems good value if it saves an extra oil change.
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Being ever so slightly cycnical, I have to wonder how much expensive equipment they need to buy to do the job and, with labour at £50 an hour (in a garage at least), what sort of a job you are going to get for £22.95?
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I used them for the same reason and got a report that seemed to cover all the bases.
Out of curiosity which TDI do you have that requires 8+ litres ?
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Its the 3.0 Tdi.
On their website they say their report is written in plain english - did you find that to be the case? What I'm after is either a "yes its ok for another 10k miles" or "no get it changed now". They probably won't be as definitive as that though!
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Some thoughts:
Does your car use any oil? If so, then you're effectively changing it anyway as you add more.
Buy an oil extractor and change it anyway.
Get a local gargage to change it (you supply the oil and filter so you know the right stuff's been used).
Oil analysis seems a big thing in the US, and they seem to change their oil at remarkably frequent intervals. I think it's just a cultural thing in the US - and oil used to be very cheap there.
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Interesting.
You pays your money and takes your choice.
For someone to analyze my engine oil they will require:
Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy or something similar to determine (metallic) contaminants.
FTIR or possibly GC-MS or even ICP-MS to establish differences between what you started with and what you have now (requires sample of original oil to be meaningful)
Viscometry to establish viscosity of oil across temperature ranges (requires sample of original oil to be meaningful).
If they can do all that for less than 25 quid then I would be tempted. Otherwise my money is better spend in a pub!
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There plenty of places in other countries (USA & Canada) doing this for a damn sight less than £25.
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Well if they are it could be worth the costs of air mailing an oil sample and getting reply by e-mail!
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It used about a litre in the first 10k miles, rather than top it up I had it changed (at a local VW specialist having supplied the filter myself) as per HJ's recommendations.
But there's still that doubt - would the long life oil have lasted through to 19k for the first service and I thought some analysis might give me a clue!
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getting intermediate oil changes at a cost of £100 ish (it needs 8+ litres).
try www.national.co.uk/showoil.asp ; quote for a diesel 3000cc engine:
OIL7 Oil & Filter change - Visco 7000 0w-40 ) £40.00
Book fitting on-line now to receive 10% off the price
(note: i believe visco 7000 0w-40 is a bp brand "fully" synthetic oil)
in case someone says, yes but, no but, its an audi tdi and needs special oil; my response is to quote from audi, that since you want to avoid the long service interval, it is quite ok to use "ordinary oil":
"Using ordinary high quality multigrade oil will not cause any engine damage but it will defeat the object of the new AVS technology and will mean that a service will be needed at fixed 10,000 mile intervals.
as for long life oil and how long that lasts, audi say:
" .... Depending on how ? and where - the individual drives, the interval can be up to 19,000 miles/24 months for petrol engines, up to 22,000 miles/24 months for the V6 TDI diesel and up to 30,000 miles/24 months for 3 and 4 cylinder TDI diesel engines. ....... Typically, petrol engines are achieving an average of at least 17,500 miles and diesel engines over 20,000 between services, ..... "
so you believe audi, and accept the long interval. or if you want, tehy say it is ok to change at 10k miles and using ordinary high quality multigrade is fine in that event.
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oh yes, and in addition to national, you may find that kwik-fit will do a filter+oil change for around £40 using mobil1 fully synthetic (and i believe thay do not limit the quantity you need for that all in price).
mobil1, jus as visco7000, should more than satisfy the audi criteria for "ordinary high quality multigrade " !
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VAG say that a diesel on longlife servicing will not want a service until up to 25,000 mile but the service indicator on my Volkswagen Golf 1.9TDi has come on just after 14,000 miles. My car has had quite a few short distance runs as well as some long distance runs so at the moment i'm happy for the sensors to decide but after the first service it will get a oil change at even 12months or 12,500 miles at a VW dependant garage.
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Meanwhile, back to the original question...
Perhaps someone would like to volunteer to use services of theoillab.co.uk to get their oil analysed every, say 4000 miles (so that there would be 4 or 5 tests in 20000 miles) and report back the findings. Then at least we would have real independant data to discuss.
I think that we will find, though, that the manufacturers recommendations as to the oil change interval are reasonably accurate. This sort of testing is precisely what the manufacturer and the oil companies will have done, except on a more accurate and scientific basis.
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I think I'd put the £22 towards having the oil & filter changed and be done with it.
As pointed out oil changes are conditional upon the type of driving done and some manuafacturers provide dynamic analysis to assist the driver in this area, whilst other manufacturers provide fixed intervals based on average driving conditions (whatever they are) and also advise additional oil & filter changes for stop/start driving etc.
The moto "If in doubt drain it out" seems to work well in my experience.
If anyone wants to provide ongoing data about their cars oil analysis then it would be useful in helping people form a more objective view for future oil & filter changes and no doubt provide for lots of discussion.
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There's a possibly interesting thread here tinyurl.com/ngbxp One of the firms (towards the end of the thread) only charges £6.75!
There's no comment though about oil life? They just seem to tell you if the oil is contaminated etc. In fact one of the sites that I looked at specifically says to only change the oil when the manufacturer recommends it.
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Ah, OK, I see theoillab do provide lifetime analysis. The other thing from them that looks useful is a report in English. Some of the firms just provide a set of figures which you'd need to be able to interpret.
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Thanks to all those who replied.
I think I might give the oil lab a try when I get close to the 19k, which should give an indication of the condition after the last 9k miles. Will post anything useful here in a few months.
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