I think most race cars use a thinner oil to develope more HP. The thinner oil (with less viscosity)has less drag on the spinning parts. This lets the revolving parts spin easier and make more HP. The down side is they have to rebuild their motors more often due to high operating temps and more wear from the thinner oil. The last thing we want is more motor repairs,right ! Cheers Derek
My Audi could go 50.000 or two years between oilchanges. And not only in the manual. It service indicator made me go to the garage regulary between 45.000 and 50.000 km depending on driving.
Hi deheld, My Audi A6 also recommends extended service intervals just like my B200 but I don't trust them. The really best way to know the condition of your oil(and your motor) is to keep a sample of the old oil at changout time and take it to a lab that can accurately evaluate the minerals and deposits in the old oil. These labs are easily available in North America and I suspect the same for Europe and the cost of such a test is very low. If you test your oil after 50,000 kms, you might not be happy with what they show you is in that old oil. I find the B200 OE filter with it's single fine membrane lacking, so I change it more often than recommended along with the oil. It's a lot cheaper than rebuilding the motor. Cheers, Derek
So has anyone else purchased an OE oil filter for their petrol B class or done their own oil change besides myself? I'm asking because I don't think that the oil filter is good enough for approx. 23,000 kms as indicated on my B. Cheers, Derek
Haven't done it my myself, but I took it into the dealer at around 12,000km and they were surprised. I think they called it an "in between service". Regardless, changing the oil came to around $120.00 CAD with taxes if I remember correctly.
Remember, you can't hurt your motor by changing the oil more often. I would like some of you to buy an OE oil filter at the dealer( approx: 11$ CAD) and tell me what you think of its quality compared to many of the other oil filters we've seen in the past 20 years at auto parts stores. You can always give it back to the dealer for your next oil change. Cheers, Derek
When I first started motoring some 40 years ago we couldn't afford new cars (ooh) so we were constantly rebuilding old cars and engines. It was recommended that after a rebuild (or on a new engine) that the engine oil was drained (and flushed) after about 500 miles. It was amazing the amount of metallic fillings and stuff that came out in these oil changes. They don't seem to bother now. I think I will have my filter & oil changed at about 6,000 miles as a precaution.
About 20 years ago I had bought a second hand VW Passat with low mileage on & as part of the warranty conditions you had to have the oil & filter changed every 3,000 miles that engine did many tens of thousands of trouble free miles.
In the UK apparently you can have the car serviced at a non Mercedes garage and you would not lose your warranty, provided that you use Mercedes parts and oil to recommended standards. (You will ,however, more than likely lose the mobolife recovery warranty as I think that is dependant on the car being serviced by Mercedes).
The trouble in the UK is that the recommended oil costs a fortune about £ 10 a litre which makes you wonder if it is worth changing it every few thousand miles.
Hi Keith, My first car was an old 59 Beetle (Bug) and yes Keith, I think we are older than the 'parents' of most of the people in these B forums and I glad they still let us post considering our ages! But the oils are a lot better now but not "that" good(23,000 kms between changes,I don't think so). You do pay too much for oil( and everything else unfortunately). I do still think Mobil 1 full synthetic is the best that's locally available and as the MB dealer uses it on there better models. It's 27$ CAD for a 4.4 liter jug at our super stores when on special. For oil, we really have it good. Cheers, Derek ps: we've both been driving for 40 years!
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