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My old mechanic laughed when I told him I was using 10w-30 in my 1998 Tacoma with 200k miles
Turns out he was right, the engine started knocking after 3 months and a proper oil analysis showed I needed 10w-40 all along, has anyone else had a trusted source steer them wrong on basic maintenance?
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thomas.tyler1mo ago
Wait, the oil analysis was from an actual lab? That changes things a lot. I used to be one of those guys who swore thicker oil was always better for high mileage engines, thought it was common sense. But seeing those Blackstone results year after year on the same motor kind of makes me rethink that. Learned my lesson the hard way when I put 20w-50 in an old Nissan just because it had high miles and the poor thing couldn't get oil where it needed on cold starts. Those older Toyota 3.4s really are tough as nails if you just keep clean oil in them, regardless of the weight.
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hayes.jake1mo ago
Was that oil analysis actually done by a lab or just your buddy at the auto parts store guessing? 200k miles on a 98 Tacoma is basically a ticking time bomb anyway, oil weight might not be the real problem.
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lilyg831mo ago
I actually read a pretty detailed breakdown on TacomaWorld a while back about oil analysis and those older 3.4L engines. Someone had sent their oil to Blackstone Labs year after year and their high mileage 5VZ-FE kept coming back clean with 5W-30 even at 250k miles. Those engines are pretty overbuilt honestly, the timing chain and bottom end can handle a lot if you keep up with basic maintenance. But yeah if the analysis was just a dipstick sniff test at AutoZone that's not worth much haha.
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