How Often Should I Change My Motor Oil?

Exploring the Myth That You Need to Change Your Motor Oil Every Three Months or 3000 Miles

My wife is a stickler for scheduled oil changes. She changes the motor oil in our cars every 3000 miles without fail. She does this because her grandfather is a car salesman, and he tries to promote proper car maintenance. But is this really how often I should change my motor oil?

Recently, I was told that it wasn't necessary to change my motor oil so often. Advances in motor oil quality, and durability have made it so I don't have to change my motor oil every three months or 3000 miles.

I told my wife that we might not have to change the motor oil so often and maybe we could save a little money. Her reaction was skeptical at best. I decided to explore the owner's manual of my 2007 Chrysler Town & Country to find out how often my car manufacturer recommended I should wait to change the motor oil.

The manual for my Chrysler Town & Country had two different recommendations for how often I should change my motor oil. The first recommendation was to change the motor oil every three months or 3000 miles, but only under the following conditions listed in the manual:

- Day or night temperatures are below 32 degrees F.
- Stop and Go driving
- Extensive engine idling.
- Driving in dusty conditions.
- Short trips of less than 10 miles.
- More than 50% of your driving is at a sustained high speeds during hot weather, above 90 degrees.
- Trailer towing.
- Taxi, Police or delivery service (commercial service)
- Off-Road or desert operation.

If you don't drive in any of the aforementioned conditions the recommendation of the 2007 Chrysler Town & Country owner's manual is to change your motor oil every six months or 6,000 miles.

So from what I can gather if you drive primarily on the highway in a moderate climate, without dusty conditions you should be able to go up to six months or 6000 before you have to change your motor oil. Unfortunately for me, we rarely take our vehicles more than ten miles, so I guess we are stuck changing the oil every three months or 3000 miles.