Why mess around with non-recommended oils?

[Ross]

Some threads here start with things like "I used blah, blah super duper oil and now I have XX problem" or "By the way I'm using snake oil-100/500 with Seafoam" I take back the Seafoam part, that seems to be the domain of E39 owners.

Something tells me BMW's engineers put some effort into what they recommend and it doesn't make sense to mess with success. Me, I'll stick to the book.

Perhaps some is because of new owners who never had an owners book to referrence and are swayed by ads or the nit-wits at Greasy Lube.

[repenttokyo]

Seafoam has always worked great in my cars, especially vehicles with secondary intake runners that often clog bc they are not always in use.

I would think the basic reason that people use non-bmw oils is bc with 400,000 km's on my engine, it's not really in the same spec it was when it left the factory. If I use anything other than 5w50 syntec, it clicks like a bitch.

I do have all of the paperwork back to the date of purchase, all of the books stamped by bmw, etc. I am second owner.

[bad_manners_god]

I don't think this thread applies to Royal Purple, does it?

[632 Regal]

0w30 is good in my V8 mobil one... but I still have the old stock that is full synthetic... dont know what I will change to. 0wt is great here year round except its getting a tad colder now. -6F

[bubba966]

0w30 is good in my V8 mobil one... but I still have the old stock that is full synthetic... dont know what I will change to. 0wt is great here year round except its getting a tad colder now. -6F

Use 0w30 Amsoil as it's still full synthetic. Runs better than the mobil one I had in my M60 when I bought it. And the PO was nice and changed the oil for me right before I bought it as I was going on a 3,750 mile drive back home. Told him it wasn't needed as the oil had around 1,000 miles on it before he changed it. But he changed it anyways.

[winfred]

cause i don't really give a **** what bmw says the company that brought you the 9k mile oil change that upped it to 15k miles when the changes became free under warranty, and converted all other fluids to lifetime fill at the same time, the same company that brought you the wonderful plastic dissolving blue coolant and my favorite the cyclonic pcv system

[632 Regal]

but remember our cars were invented before they wanted catastrophic damage. So I would stick to the "old" book here

cause i don't really give a **** what bmw says the company that brought you the 9k mile oil change that upped it to 15k miles when the changes became free under warranty, and converted all other fluids to lifetime fill at the same time, the same company that brought you the wonderful plastic dissolving blue coolant and my favorite the cyclonic pcv system

[Paul in NZ]

because when they published the owners manual for my car in 1988 synthetic oils were far from mainstream.....

[Zeuk in Oz]

because when they published the owners manual for my car in 1988 synthetic oils were far from mainstream.....

+1

I use Mobil 1 0W-40 every 8,000 km (5,000 miles) in all my cars. Cheap insurance.

[Ross]

I didn't consider intervals. Yeah those are far too long. Perhaps I change too frequently but I'd rather err on the side of caution.
Do you think the intervals being extended have anything to do with BMW being on the hook for oil changes with new cars??