Pontiac G8 Forum banner

Oil your using? Duration you use?

10K views 97 replies 61 participants last post by  09REDGT 
#1 ·
Reading GM's manual for the car, it appears 5W30 API approved oil is recommended. What brands are you using? Motul? Mobil 1? etc....What duration are you changing it?

PLEASE DON'T tell me you follow the dummy oil change light. :driving:
 
#2 ·
Reading GM's manual for the car, it appears 5W30 API approved oil is recommended. What brands are you using? Motul? Mobil 1? etc....What duration are you changing it?

PLEASE DON'T tell me you follow the dummy oil change light. :driving:
The search function has more than enough oil thread results for you to research off of.
 
#3 ·
I use the supertech 20w 50 and I just change it when my light tells me to.

lol...ok not really

I have only changed my oil once since I got the car and I used penzoil ultra 5W20 and have gone about 4k miles on it so far. Ill probly change it at around 8k or so. Not to say you should base your decisions off of anything I do though. I dont claim to be an oil god by any means.
 
#4 ·
Why did you adjust your duration? Curious.....

I adjusted my specs on the previous car to 5w30 from 0w20 and duration to 5K miles +
 
#5 ·
I have been seeing where good synthetic oils are lasting 7-10k between changes. Plus our engines hold right at 9 quarts and I would assume the more oil the longer it takes for it to be broken down. 8 just seems like a safe place to change it out.
 
#6 ·
Pennzoil 5w30 conventional, i change the oil whenever the OLM says "service oil", which can be anywhere from 7k-10k miles in my case, once i get the cam i'm thinking to get, i'll switch to GC 0w30(syn oil), much better oil pressure from 6000rpm and up, which the bearings always love.
There, change the oil whenever the dummy oil light says so :), really, or whenever you like to change it., either way.
 
#7 ·
Have used Mobil1 5w30 Dexos-approved, changed when the dash tells me. But I will be changing to Quaker State Ultimate Durability 5w30 next time. Why? There is a site you can find by searching "Bobistheoilguy" that has a ton of information that leads me to believe that the QS is at least equal to the Mobil1 and it is also Dexos approved. Oh, and it is $6 cheaper than Mobil1 per 5 quart container at Wal-Mart.
 
#13 ·
Mobil1 is Dexos approved.
http://www.gmdexos.com/licensedbrands/dexos1licensedbrands.html

penzoil platinum 5w30. I usually change it when the OLM is around 50% which is usually around 5K miles.
Where can I view my OLM? Just got the car on Monday.......

Mobil 1 0W-30

I wait until the Oil Life Meter gets to under 10-2% remaining.

Once I use up the Mobil1 I have left, I'll use either the Castrol Edge or the Fram Full Synthetic I got. I'm not too picky/choosy about oil.
Huh.....

Amsoil 5W-30. Change around 12k with their filter. Soon will be the trans and diff to since I just hit 50k miles.
Yeah.....I will be there next year. 35K now.
 
#14 ·
Where can I view my OLM? Just got the car on Monday.......

Hold down the left steering wheel scroll bar (enter key function) when cranking. Instead of the usual DIC LCD screen that you're used to, you will find "Engineering mode".

Use the same scroll wheel up and down to cycle through the extended information that it supplies. Throttle Position Percentage is a fun one! :) But Engine Oil Life in % is there in one of those options. Don't trust the battery percentage one, people have found it to vary widely.

If you press the road button on the steering wheel, you exit out of engineering mode, and can't get back in until another ignition-start cycle with the enter key pressed.

Hope this helps.

--zepcom
 
#15 ·
Hold down the left steering wheel scroll bar (enter key function) when cranking. Instead of the usual DIC LCD screen that you're used to, you will find "Engineering mode".

Use the same scroll wheel up and down to cycle through the extended information that it supplies. Throttle Position Percentage is a fun one! :) But Engine Oil Life in % is there in one of those options. Don't trust the battery percentage one, people have found it to vary widely.

If you press the road button on the steering wheel, you exit out of engineering mode, and can't get back in until another ignition-start cycle with the enter key pressed.

Hope this helps.

--zepcom
Just tried. It didn't work for me. I am gonna try again.
 
#12 ·
Amsoil 5W-30. Change around 12k with their filter. Soon will be the trans and diff to since I just hit 50k miles.
 
#21 ·
LOL!


I read a few on the search AFTER posting this. :wink2:
 
#20 ·
Got it after about 4 tries just now! NICE. Thanks.
 
#23 ·
I use Castrol Edge with SPT 0W-30 from Germany.
& a NAPA Gold oil filter.

OCI = when the OLM system tells me to.

My other choices would be:
Mobil 1 0W-40
Mobil 1 5W-30
Pennzoil Ultra 5W-30
Pennzoil Platinum 5W-30
 
#24 ·
Mobil 1 Synth 5w30, every 10-12k miles or when the oil monitor has 10-15%.
 
#25 ·
Mobil 1 5W-30 every 5 or 6k miles. 74k miles later, she runs as smooth as ever.
 
#26 ·
Lots of variance I see.
 
#27 ·
Not a lot of variance on the weight. Seems like everyone is using 5w30 except me and the only reason I am running the 5w20 is because that was my first oil change on this car and thats all they had in the penzoil ultra that day.
 
#29 ·
Reading GM's manual for the car, it appears 5W30 API approved oil is recommended. What brands are you using? Motul? Mobil 1? etc....What duration are you changing it? PLEASE DON'T tell me you follow the dummy oil change light. :driving:
The Oil Life Monitor (OLM) is a multi-purpose tool; it's no dummy. It serves GM to measure how you drive the vehicle in various environmental/physical conditions so that the owner does minimum oil changes while preserving the life of the engine under extended warranty conditions. It also should serve the owner to not perform unnecessary oil changes. For my former 09 GT I ran about 6K O&F changes because it's cheap to be a DIY guy and get a good supply when ANY major brand oil & filters go on sale.

Out of curosity, I did a one-time 'how long can I go' before OLM or the one year required change factor would occur for me. One year and 8200mi of mixed driving (with almost no rush hour stop& go crap) showed 23% life remaining per the OLM.

Think it's a good time to resurrect this interesting G8GT, factual oil life exam for your read. Note that to keep everything above board, Edmunds gets all necessary service work done on their test cars at dealer service facilities. It's not identified, but likely this was AC Delco's 'dino' oil in the car in the 13K run:
http://blogs.insideline.com/roadtes...t-lab-results-on-13000-mile-oil.html#comments
 
#31 ·
Same oil I use but only get 3500 or so miles out of it.
 
#32 ·
Mobil 1 Extended Performance... 15k miles.
My miles are about 80-90% highway miles.
 
#33 ·
Me too I using the Mobil one 5w-30 extend performance with the Mobil one filter for long oil interval.
 
#36 ·
I use Mobil-1 5w30. Change it every 5000. my car has 114xxx on the clock and doesn't use a drop of oil. I bought it at 100k and have no idea what happened before me but they must have taken care of it somewhat.
 
#37 ·
Hard-to-find: Mobil 1 Extended Performance

They must have been having a sale on at Walmart because no store within 50 miles of me has a 5 qt of Mobil 1 5W-30 Extended Performance left in stock! There is, however, plenty of regular synthetic Mobil 1 5W-30. But because I was mad, I picked up two 5qt containers of Castrol Edge 5W-30 and took em home. This will be my first oil change since picking up the car in July. I don't drive a ton of miles, but two oil changes per year is easy and financially won't break the bank.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top