How Often Do You Change Oil/Filter

[Cbull]

A quick Google says you should generally change your oil every 3700 miles, obviously you should go by the manufacturer manual. This year I've managed 16k+ miles so I should have done over 4 changes but only managed 1 and I'm about to order the goods for it's next change.

For people that do good amount of mileage, are you on the ball with oil changes or are you a little like me... or even worse?

At nearly £50 for per oil change it can be quite costly if you do a lot of mileage.

[Lee540]

2009 Bandit 1250

Used daily, change oil and filter every 5000 miles, roughly do a change every 4 months.

[trickywoo]

Thing with bikes is that in most cases the engine and gearbox oil are shared which gives it a harder time.

For big miles on a bike that isn't highly strung and / or ragged everywhere I'd be happy with 6k change intervalls.

How is it costing you £50 a throw? £25 gets you 4l of really good oil and £5 for the filter.

[Cbull]

I suppose it could be done a little cheaper but this is what I bought time around...
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/4L-MOTUL-7100-10W40-OIL...

[TheInternet]

Thanks to there being no filter, every 1300 miles at £4 a time.

[KingNothing]

Change mine about every 2000 miles, as it says to if you do short journeys mostly. Pretty easy to change and doesn't cost much.

[Dannaz]

I have been doing mine once a year, as my mileage a year has been roughly 1500 to 2000.

I have been paying about 40 to 60 quid a service, as the service kit for the LC8 in my KTM is about 25 quid from main dealer and then use Motrex oil as per the manual.

[Mr2Mike]

Always change the oil on both car and on time, and even a bit before it's due if I happen to have some spare time. Engine oil that gets shared by a gearbox has a hard life.

[CoolHands]

on the other hand the number of bikes that will fail due to engine / gearbox issues is exceedingly small; therefore save your money and do once a year. The bike will in all likelihood be crashed / stolen / sold / MOT failed / uneconomical to repair at some point - none due to lack of engine oil changes.

[Biker's Nemesis]

My track bike after every 3 days on track, road bike once a year usually 5k miles.

[catso]

Change mine every year regardless of mileage, however it's rarely more than 3-4k miles even on the most used bike. Oil's not cheap nowadays but as I'm doing it all myself it only costs the parts and I just see it as a running cost.

[Biker 1]

Why not follow the service schedule as per the owners manual?? Modern oils are technically amazing, & I'm sure that engine designers have factored in track use, riding like you stole it, short trips etc. Mine says every 8000 miles or annually, so that's what I do....

[CaptainSlow]

Oil and Filter every 3,000 miles.

Just done my air filter after 26,000 miles...it needed doing.

Eta

Edited by CaptainSlow on Thursday 28th June 18:44

[catso]

Biker 1 said:

Why not follow the service schedule as per the owners manual?? Modern oils are technically amazing, & I'm sure that engine designers have factored in track use, riding like you stole it, short trips etc. Mine says every 8000 miles or annually, so that's what I do....

Fine for new(ish) bikes made since oil has been made so well, e.g. my ('90s) Ducatis call for an oil change every 6k or annually which is what I do but I'd be happy to stretch the 6k a little to fit with annually if I did enough miles.

But the service schedule for the old Guzzi calls for oil changes every 2k miles which I believe is outdated by the fact that oils are so much better than they were in the '70s, as such I'd be happy to at least double it - that said I've only done 4k miles on it in the last 3 years so annual changing is still on schedule...

[catso]

CaptainSlow said:

Just done my air filter after 26,000 miles...it needed doing.

My Guzzi has no air filters...

[Birky_41]

My mx bikes when I raced and now my sons 250f every 3-4 rides oil and every other oil change filter

My track bike (gsxr) every 4-5 rides oil filter and oil (filter is cheap) running semi synth.

My road bike is in warranty so as per manufacturer guidelines every 6000 miles with horrendously expensive Motul fully synth. stuff...

[thatdude]

4000 miles / 12 months, that's what the yamaha book says. As it stands, it's had oil then every 3000 miles. When I was riding my SV, suzuki said 3500 miles, but I went to 4000 miles which was working out every 6 months then. I used castrol semi-synthetic with genuine filters, and at the last vlave check in my ownership (66,000 miles) the components that could be seen looked in very very good condition.

Current FZ1 gets castrol fully synthetic oil and a genuine filter. I have no service history from the previous owner(s), and the last valve check showed up some issues that could be a result of insufficient oil changes / not quite so good oil.

Edited by thatdude on Thursday 28th June 15:50

[Mr OCD]

I just do it by manufacturer intervals with decent oil. Doing sooner on a modern bike is just a waste of time and money.

[dern]

Every year or at the mileage as per the schedule.

[DirtyHarley]

5000 miles oil and filter, which is about once every 8-10 weeks depending if I just commute or also squeeze in some weekend riding (cannot wait to get back on it on Monday after a month of train/tube buggery!)