What is the best kind of 5w-50 oil to use in my 2008 Chevy Uplander? It has over 100k miles on it. Should I get high mileage or what?
What is the reason for Valvoline Maxlife semisynthetic?
Well’ you have gotten 100k miles by doing something right. Why do you think you need to make any changes? Keep using the oil that got you here
Any brand of 5W-30 oil will work fine. If the vehicle leaks or burns oil, you might try high mileage oil to see if it gets any better, but if you don’t have any problems, just use what is on sale. The brand doesn’t matter.
Only reason for a ‘Maxlife’ type of oil is if you have leaking seals, the oil might swell them a bit, reducing the leak. No other benefit. All correctly graded oils ‘protect’ your engine just fine.
Any time I had a car that would burn oil, it would burn twice as much with Valvoline.
Me wonders about financial interests of posters.
In any case, I agree with texases, as usual.
An '08 Uplander isn’t very “old” and 100K isn’t “high mileage” IMO. Just use whatever 5W-30 oil you choose or get for the best price. If you need to add a quart between 5000 mile oil changes that’s no big deal. Personally I think a lot of the you need this kind of oil is just marketing hype. The extra prices are needed to pay for the ad campaigns. NAPA 5W-30 would be fine with me.
+1 @Texases Your car can use any off the shelf oil available for gasoline auto engines. Unless it leaks oil, don’t use these special oils formulated for older cars.
Unless you live in the arctic or tow a trailer across the Mojave desert in July, just stay with your 5W30 regular oil.
Mr. McGee, why do you seem to be repeating Valvoline’s advertising talking points verbatim? I’m beginning to suspect your advice isn’t completely objective. The way you added the little trademark symbol to your post is also extremely suspicious.
@cdaquila, I think you might want to scrutinize Mr. McGee’s profile to see if his e-mail address ends in “valvoline.com.” Normally, I would assume guerilla marketers are savvy enough to use a generic gmail, yahoo, or hotmail address, but Mr. McGee doesn’t seem to be subtle enough to be that cunning.
As a matter of fact, Mr. McGee’s responses in this thread don’t match his writing style in other threads at all. http://community.cartalk.com/profile/comments/2531487/Poopyhead%20McGee
If he’s not a guerilla marketer, I’m not sure what is.
I owned a 2006 Chevrolet Uplander and it did just fine on 5W-30 oil. I think the brand used at the Chevrolet dealer and my independent shop was Valvoline. It never used oil between changes. I sold the Uplander to my son and it has now gone about 120,000 miles. It doesn’t use any oil between changes. My son’s shop thought he should use high mileage oil, so that is what he put in. I didn’t see any reason for it as it wasn’t using oil. However, I don’t suppose it hurts anything.
By the way, I really liked the Uplander and would have purchased another one after we sold our 2006 to our son who needed a better vehicle. However, GM, it its wisdom, decided not to make a minivan any more.
Does anyone else feel that McGees full screen name is in really bad taste?
Yes
In fact, the user name is appropriate, considering the kind of comments he leaves
We have several Uplanders in our fleet. I feel they are pretty decent vehicles. I feel they are comfortable enough and have a fairly peppy engine. They’ve been okay for us.
I will say, though, that the Uplander engine design was very outdated, compared to what some of the other guys were offering at the time.
Ford’s offering at the time (Freestar?) also had a similarly outdated engine design. We also have some of those in our fleet, and haven’t had too many problems with them, so far.
But in spite of that, I feel both of those vans put up a pretty good showing.
@db4690;
Sometimes this outdated designs are better than the new ones. Isn’t Ford now declining in the CR ratings due to eco-boost engine issues (and the Sync)?
Usually the better companies are slower to adopt changes. They wait until others test it and then they implement it.
The engine in the Uplander was a slight improvement over the previous generation engine. The Venture had a 3.4L with 196 HP while the Uplander had a 3.5 L with 201 HP. We still find our Silhouette satisfactory after 11 years and 146,000 miles. The Mrs did report that the ABS light is on. I’ll check it out when I get home.
So…can everyone start to post “cut & paste” advertising text for various products that we are trying to promote?
Inquiring minds want to know…
That remains to be seen. I’m waiting to see how the admins react to this thread.
Kid had oil done at rapid oil change. They talked him into high mileage oil. Bill was $50. What the bleep? Sign out front sez oil change $24.99. Total ripoff
@db4690 and @jtsanders
You both nailed it about the Chevrolet Uplander. Despite the common folklore about Toyota producing a superior product, I now have a 2011 Toyota Sienna. At 35,000 I had to replace the tires. At 45,000 miles I had new brakes all the way around and the front rotors replaced. Today, I had to replace the battery. It was outgassing so badly and kept corroding the terminals to the point that the positive clamp was almost completely eaten away on one side. The battery on a load test was just marginal, so I decided to get rid of the problem that I had been fighting for more than a year with the terminals. The Toyota service writer told me that Toyota had been having problems with the batteries outgassing. On the other hand, I think that the battery in the Uplander lasted for seven years, the tires were good for 60,000 miles as were the brake pads.
Now I realize that tires, batteries and brake linings are wear items. My point about the tires and batteries is that my Uplander came with better tires and battery. I think my upkeep costs on the Uplander were less than the Sienna.
Many of us have been keeping engines a lot longer 200k or even 300k miles LONG BEFORE these new oils for high mileage engines came out. I’ve never used it…I find no need what-so-ever. My 05 4runner has over 240k miles on it…and it runs GREAT…I’m down about 1/2 pint between my 5k oil changes. Engine runs PERFECT.
Just use any 5w-30 oil that meets the API specs of the your engine (pretty much ALL oils meet or exceed all manufacturers specs).