1st oil change: 2018 Toyota Camry

We bought 2018 Toyota Camry in October 2018.

The current mileage is 3,300. We ask the first synthetic oil change

I will give you 2 choices - 1. Go by the manual as to miles or time ( months ) - 2. Change every 6000 miles or 6 months and call it an insurance expense to possibly avoid engine wear problems.

Thank you for your answer. We bought the new car in October 2018.

It has 3,300 miles. We went to the dealer and they told us to come back

As long you follow Toyota’s oil change interval recommendations and use the proper oil spec the warranty will remain in effect. If that’s your objective, just follow what it says in the owner’s manual. For longest engine life, suggest to not extend oil & filter change intervals beyond 5,000 miles. On a newly purchased car I’d probably change the oil and filter after the first 500-1,000 miles, then every 5,000 miles. The reason to change it soon after buying the car is b/c the new car manufacturing process can leave some metal debris in the engine, and changing the oil and filter after a little driving will flush most of it out.

If that was a problem like it was years ago the manufactures would have the change at that mileage in the manual . Completely unnecessary .

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“During machining of the engine crankshaft and crankpins, metal shavings may have been left within the crankshaft oil passages, and the crankpins themselves may be too rough on the edges. As a result, oil may be blocked and cause the connecting rod bearings to wear, which would then cause them to fail and seize the whole engine. That, of course, would cause the car to stall during driving.”

When we bought our highlander new in 2013, it came with “toyotacare” - free maintenance for the first 25k miles (if I recall correctly). The dealer wouldn’t change our oil at 5k miles like I wanted. Instead, they wanted to wait and change it at 10k per the manual (time wasn’t an issue, we were driving over 10k miles per year). This may be what you’re experiencing, I’m not sure from your post. I went ahead and changed it myself at 5k miles because I felt more comfortable with that interval. Then I let the dealer change it again (no charge) at 10k miles under the toyotacare program.

The dealer told us at 3,300 miles the synthetic oil was not dirty and they did

multi point check and tires check. We prepaid the maintenance service for

Is the issue that you want the oil and filter changed, and the dealership won’t change as part of the pre-paid maintenance fee? If I had that problem I’d just ask them to change it anyway, and bill me what they thought was a reasonable fee. Replacing a failed engine bearing is gonna cost way more than any oil change fee.

It sounds like you are on the right track. The first service is at 5,000 miles/6 months, tire rotation and inspection. The second service is at 10,000 miles/12 months, oil and filter change, tire rotation and inspection.

There is no need to change the oil more frequently like those with old cars do. I see customers that are in for their first oil change at 15,000 miles, the engines are not failing and we are not canceling their warranty.

Disregard the post about the defective Hyundai crankshafts, that has nothing to do with your Toyota.

They bought it in October though and its now April, so if it has been 6 months which it looks like it has, I would guess it should be changed. Even though it only has 3300 miles it still is 6 months. Really they should just drive the new car more and enjoy it.

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This is not your fathers Oldsmobile, the first oil change is at 10,000 miles/12 months.

I interpreted this to mean 5000 or 6 months usually whichever comes first.

The Toyota maintenance manual recommends replacing the oil at 5000 miles/6 months for severe service or 10,000 miles/1 year for normal service. They even define severe service in detail. If your husband drives mostly highway miles and isn’t stopped in traffic for much of it, that is definitely not severe service. Toyota became the best seller of automobiles in the world in part by providing vehicles that are reliable and last a long time. When they provide a maintenance schedule it is meant to retain this opinion among their customers. Follow their program and you should have many years of excellent service from your Camry.

It is not a problem. They told me the synthetic oil is not dirty and come back to change the oil

at 5,000 miles. We will come back in April.

Although the transmission in our Toyota is, per Toyota, sealed for life and doesn’t require service, if I’m not mistaken. I did a drain and fill at 100k on ours anyway (with Toyota WS fluid). Will probably do it again at 150k.

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I wonder how they determined that? Contaminants are only part of it though. There is also the additives being used up. No big deal I guess either way.

Here’s the thing though as people argue about whether to use mileage or OLM or time, etc. I have a couple cars, snow blowers, lawn mowers, generator, pressure washer, and not to mention all the house things like filters, water softener and detector batteries. Maybe I just need a computer, but it is hard to try and remember the proper time frame for all the services that are periodically required. When did I rotate tires, and when is it due again? So it just becomes easier to do things on a 5000 mile interval. Maybe a little waste, but as time slips away faster and faster every year, it’s just easier.

Maybe one of you software gurus can do a simple maintenance program to plug in next service or something. But not just cars, but everything else a normal person needs to keep track of. Yeah I keep a notebook with all that stuff in it but still have to go back and look at when I did a particular item and calculate again when it is due.

I bought a new 2010 Prius. They had just changed their standard to synthetic oil, changed at 10000 miles. As I’ve used synthetic oil my last 4 vehicles all of which will over 100k miles with no compression problems, I’d go to synthetic immediately. Also ask if the factory has a synthetic recommendation.
The caution would be there is no doubt it should be changed yearly, regardless of mileage. As another pointed out, low yearly mileage likely means short trips where the engine doesn’t get warmed up. This is actually more harmful than high mileage. Synthetic oil will help but a yearly change is a necessity.

That’s a pretty low standard.

I didn’t start using synthetic oil on my car until it had about 275,000 miles on it, and it had no compression problems in that time.

I don’t subscribe to the view that 100,000 miles is a lot, like it was 30 years ago. Nor do I subscribe to the belief that synthetic oil will prevent compression problems better than conventional oil; any modern car that doesn’t require synthetic oil and gets its oil changed on time should last at least 200,000 miles before encountering any major malfunctions.

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Back to oil changes. FYI it’s Mobil rebate time again. $12 off a jug of Mobil 1 and $7 off dino. So I figure a syn oil change is about $20 with the filter and $10 for dino. On through September but got mine already. Hard to beat a little over $3 a quart for syn and about $1.30 for dino, with tax. Cars are expensive. Maintenance is cheap in comparison.