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How often should I change my oil in my 2012 Camry?

  

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Topic starter

hey Scotty, I have a Toyota Camry SE from 2012 that my dad bought for me used with just over 100k miles on it and I love it. 

The thing though is that it burns oil at a slow rate. If my oil is at the high recommended mark on the dipstick and check back in 2-3 months, it is usually of the end of the dipstick and there have been a few cases where it didn't even reach the stick. I drive the car about 15k miles a year and have had it since Nov. 2020 and I also have a high output alternator for a power inverter in my car and idle a lot and drive my car in one gear lower than most efficient to help it keep the batteries charged. The car is always at about 50% weight capacity and I do accelerate moderately quickly to keep up with traffic and avoid wrecks in my hell hole of a city. I also only drive on E0 gas as I find the efficiency overpowers the extra cost in my experience on the highway which is most of the miles I get on my vehicle.

The question I have is how often should I change my oil? I feel like the higher rpm's and higher strain on the engine with a high run time on the vehicle, I should probably change my oil every 2 months or every 2-3K miles on it because that's when the oil sharts to get noticeably different in color. But my dad follows a strict 3-4 month 3-5K miles before oil changes and never gets to it quickly when he gets to that point anyways. (my dad "own's" the vehicle and we do our own oil changes)

I would imagine more than necessary would be a good idea in this case and since he watches your videos too maybe he'll change.

God Bless

2 Answers
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With the conditions you drive the car, change the oil sooner.

Couple more questions for you:

You mentioned you put a high throughout alternator, why you do not use overdrive when driving?

Another one is about the transmission. That Cry has transmission issues, make sure you take care of it before it is too late. 

The higher octane gas should not make a difference in power for your car unless your engine built up carbon. 

E0 = Ethanol zero

My mistake.

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Posted by: @christopher-dugas

and drive my car in one gear lower than most efficient to help it keep the batteries charged.

What?

Posted by: @christopher-dugas

how often should I change my oil?

From the forum FAQ - https://carkiller.com/scottykilmer/qa/factory-oil-change-intervals/

In your case, I guess check it every week and keep adding oil so it doesn’t go below the bottom mark. Change it (and the filter every 5000 miles).

 

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