[mountain_soul]

I took an oil sample at last my oil change after ~5,600 miles on Mobil 1 0W-20 and a Mobil 1 oil filter and sent it to Blackstone Labs for testing. I plan on changing the oil around 5K, but because of an out of town trip, this run went a little longer. The engine now has 20K miles on it and my typical driving is usually a two lane road commute with hardly any city driving. There is some trip mileage on this run, so ~1,500 miles of interstate cruising.

I did mess up slightly and took the sample at the end of the oil drain. I forgot to get the sample bottle ready and I had already pulled the oil plug when I realized it, so it caught the last bit of the oil that drained which Blackstone tells you not to do. That may account for the slightly higher silicon they noted, but I'll check the air filter anyway. The air filter is just a standard paper filter, by the way.

2012 Soul 2.0L Oil Testing Results

 

[Lakeman]

Don't know what a lot of this means, what is the overall feeling, good, bad or average? Is there mileage information, 5000 good or bad or how much longer can you run it?

 

[jdmartin]

You can see that information on the bottom. It shows what the tolerances of the oil should be (fuel content, viscosity, etc). You can see on this oil sample that every category is still good - in fact, good enough that there's probably at least another 3-4k miles on this oil. The upper categories just show metals load from engine wear.

 

[mountain_soul]

Yes, these are good results and the TBN testing shows that it should be able to go 7,500 miles without any real problems. The caveat being that this applies to my driving environment/style and the oil/filter combo being used and can't be universally applied. However, I do think "most" people could easily do 5K oil changes and many could go longer if they wanted.

If your Soul does pizza delivery in Phoenix (hot, dusty, city traffic, etc.), you might want to stick with a shorter change interval.

 

[dmwagner]

KIA says 7500 miles on the oil changes per warranty so I would hope that oil could at least make it to 7500 miles let alone 5000 miles.

Sent from AutoGuide.com Free App

 

[jdc111]

Question. Why 0w-20 instead of 5w-20? I go 7,500 on Mobil 1 5W-20.

 

[mountain_soul]

Question. Why 0w-20 instead of 5w-20? I go 7,500 on Mobil 1 5W-20.

Winter can get a bit cold here and you can't beat a 0W for cold starts, so there's no reason not to use it.

 

[jdmartin]

Yes, these are good results and the TBN testing shows that it should be able to go 7,500 miles without any real problems. The caveat being that this applies to my driving environment/style and the oil/filter combo being used and can't be universally applied. However, I do think "most" people could easily do 5K oil changes and many could go longer if they wanted.

If your Soul does pizza delivery in Phoenix (hot, dusty, city traffic, etc.), you might want to stick with a shorter change interval.

Exactly. This is why I don't buy anyone's "gut feeling" oil change schedule. Either go by the manufacturer's recommendations, or do the analysis as you have done, but recommending made-up intervals like some have done on here just causes novices to waste money changing their oil too early. Anyone who wants to really learn this stuff should spend a couple months on bobistheoilguy.com - there are some hardcore analysts over there.