The old rule of thumb says to change a vehicle’s engine oil every three months of 3,000 miles, but California has launched a new initiative calling for drivers to wait longer between oil changes.
The majority of drivers have been instilled with the notion that a vehicle needs an oil change every three months or 3,000 miles, but most modern engines have been design for much longer intervals – sometimes as much as 10,000 miles. As a result of that discrepancy, California says most drivers are wasting time, money and resources on unnecessary oil changes.
In order to change that, the state has launched a new Web site called CheckYourNumber.org that allows drivers to look up maintenance intervals for their specific vehicle.
“Our survey data found that nearly half of California drivers are still changing their oil at 3,000 miles or even sooner,” said Mark Oldfield, a spokesman for the California Department of Resources, Recycling and Recovery, which launched the Check Your Number campaign.
California estimates that adhering to proper oil change intervals would reduce the state’s oil consumption by 10 million gallons per year.
Although some drivers might be skeptical of tripling the amount of time between oil changes, the world’s automakers largely support the campaign.
“Our new generation of engines have tighter internal tolerances, which reduces the amount of carbon and other products from combustion that gets into the oil,” said Richard Truett, a Ford spokesman.
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1.’Drivers change oil…’ view
