How often should full synthetic oil be changed if you only drive a few thousand miles a year.
At least once a year.
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@Bears54 - Thanks! I usually have it done twice a year.
The issue with not driving your car much is moisture in the oil. This happens from condensation. Synthetic oil can and will last for over 10K miles. I had a propane Toyota Camry and I frequently did 15-18K mile oil changes and the oil was sent of for testing and still tested good. The key to oil life is clean and free of moisture. To keep the moisture out, you need to take it out for long drives that gets the engine hot and the moisture will evaporate. On my 1964 John Deere tractor, I typically only change the oil every 5 years or so.
Most mechanics will recommend annual oil changes. It is hard to argue with that. A good quality filter is just as important as the oil itself. Some filters are junk. If the engine has a turbo, Iād change it annually if it was my vehicle. If it is non turbo, I would probably do it every other year.
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For just a few thousand and an annual change I would think it not worth the expense to use synthetic.
Once I had a special oil filter installed that would really clean it so the recommendation was to change the filter element itself but keep running the oil. I was doing near 100k a year as I recall. For a long haul truck this might make sense. These days with a 10K interval on Toyota, I am not messing with synthetic.
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