First post need advice.

Bigpimping

New Member
I have a 1999 Civic SI EM1 body. It has 70,000 miles on the body and I just had the engine completely rebuilt and it has a 100 mi on it. I drive it very little. Maybe 300 miles a year is planned. I've only driven it 40 miles in the last 4 months. I have it in my garage under a cover with a battery tender. How often do you think I should change the oil on this thing? Every 6 months? I'm thinking that would probably be the best thing to do and I'm not sure that synthetic oil would be necessary with those sort of oil change intervals. What do you think?
 

GlennH

New Member
I would do it once a year and drive it at least every 3 weeks. But I would NOT drive it short distance. you want the oil, engine, and exhaust system to be at full operating temperature at the end of your drive. This is for various reasons, including water condensation in the engine and exhaust. Personally, I'd take it for at least a 20 mile drive, highway if possible, every time I drove it if i were to drive it infrequently.
 


GlennH

New Member
synthetic oil is more stable for longer periods than conventional, and doesn't cost that much more. Either one works fine, that's up to you.
 

Mr.Baker

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Why did you rebuild it @ 70k miles?

Get the car on the road, drive it like it was meant to be enjoyed.
Then you can forget all this keeping it hidden away with a trickle charger going to it and figuring out when to change the oil with such infrequent driving.
 


GlennH

New Member
Your car’s oil is already 100 million years old—another year won’t kill it



Rob Siegel
22 February 2021




Hythem Zayed writes: I own a 1965 Mustang with a V-8. From March through October, I drive it about once a week. In the winter months, I start it every week and let it run for 15 minutes. At most, I put a couple hundred miles on the car each year. I have read different opinions on how often to change the oil in this kind of situation, and I cannot seem to find a definitive answer. I figure it can’t hurt to change the oil, but am I wasting money and energy by unnecessarily doing so?

This is really a judgment call based on your personal comfort level. While oil is not hygroscopic like brake fluid (which does attract and absorb water) and doesn’t spoil from sitting like gas does, a small amount of condensation can occur when a warm engine cools off. Regular drives, longer trips, and a properly functioning positive crankcase ventilation (PCV) valve give the engine a chance to cook off that moisture as well as unburned fuel that may have found its way into the oil during hard starting and overly rich warm-up.
Some of my cars have a similar usage profile to yours, and because my garage is a little humid, I’ll typically change the oil after two years, even if the cars have racked up fewer than a thousand miles. On my lightly used 1999 BMW M coupe, I may go three years, as that car starts instantly and has a more sophisticated crankcase ventilation system. I don’t, however, have data from an oil analysis to support any of this. It’s just what feels right to me.
 

nd4sped

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Just check your fluids before you take it out after a few months. Its recommended to at least start the car once a month and let the thing heat cycle.
 


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