Regular or synthetic oil

ANSWER : Using the synthetic oil will not harm your motor or seals in any way as long as the oil weight is the same as recommended by manufacturer. You can keep using this oil until next oil change where you can go back to regular oil if you want.

ANSWER : Excessive oil consumption is usually related to piston ring wear or valve guide seals not properly sealing causing engine oil to pass by and be ignited and burnt in the combustion chamber along with the fuel and air mixture. Generally, synthetic oil will not cure a situation like this as this is something that will require a fairly extensive repair job. With that said, there are many different opinions and theories on engine oil. Synthetic vs conventional oil is one of the most debated myths surrounding the topic of oil changes. This will not hurt your engine when switching from synthetic to conventional or vice versa. In fact, Synthetic blend oils are actually a mix of conventional oils and synthetic oils. It is recommended that you use the same oil to top off when needed, giving you the best protection from the oil you have chosen to use in your vehicle. Many people often wonder about the benefits of using synthetic oils. Many synthetic oils are made up of a base oil of approximately 80%, with other additives making up the remaining 20%. The main difference between the molecules in synthetically engineered oils and conventional oils are the uniformity of the molecules. The molecules found in most conventional oils differ in shape, size and impurity. The type of oil that should be used for a specific application depends largely on the driver’s driving habits, the environment in which the car is driven, the mileage on the car’s engine and the limits that the engine may be pushed to. I would recommend having an expert from Your Mechanic come to your home to diagnose your engine oil burning problem as this may be a sign of a bigger problem.

ANSWER : The fuel pump will not stay on if you loose oil pressure. This is why it is shutting off. The loss of oil pressure may be from bad crankshaft bearings or camshaft bearings. The engine oil pan should be removed and the oil pump needs to be checked to ensure that you put in the pick up tube seal to the pump and connected the pump to the block. Then remove at least one main bearing cap and inspect the bearings for excessive wear and crankshaft damage. If you need some help with this, consider YourMechanic, as a certified technician can help diagnose the issue with your oil pressure firsthand and help you fix it accordingly.

ANSWER : Oil change intervals on your vehicle are determined by the vehicle’s engine oil change monitoring system. A message on your instrument panel will alert you when it is necessary to change the oil. The change interval is based on a computer algorithm and is "duty cycle based". Consequently, the oil change interval is not fixed and will vary depending on personal driving style and drivings conditions. For example, lots of short trips will necessitate a more frequent oil change than if your driving mileage is accumulated under continuous highway driving. An engine computer keeps track of all the required data, processes the data, and then the car’s messaging system lets you know when to change the oil. With some minor caveats, as stated below, synthetic oil can be used at any time and you can switch back and forth between conventional oil and synthetics at any time. Although existing leaks may potentially leak at a somewhat greater rate when using synthetic oils versus purely mineral based (aka, "conventional" oil), the added leakage, if any, is meaningless in most seal locations and in most circumstances. The potential for a leak is due to the smaller size of the molecules in synthetic versus conventional oils. However, synthetic oil cannot possibly cause or otherwise mechanically enlarge a leak. In any event, any "distinction" in leak rate is meaningless simply because if you put synthetic oil in a car and you can see a leak from a seal, that seal was most decidedly leaking anyway with regular oil and so would have to be repaired regardless of the oil "type" you are using.

In your specific case, with a relatively newer car and low miles on the engine, this possibility of a leak probably does not exist at least for a while, although you are getting close to the time frame when just due to rubber aging (over time, not mileage related), leaks will start developing anyway. The bottom line is you can and should use synthetic oil in your circumstances due to its huge advantages in physical properties and potential to lengthen the service life of your engine and even seemingly unrelated parts such as oxygen sensors and the catalytic converter (synthetics don’t have the sulfur and other elemental contaminants that mineral oil has). Full synthetics will be less subject to degradation and evaporation during the oil service interval, too. I would recommend you use "100% synthetic oil". If it were my car I would use the most expensive, highest rated synthetic oil I could find. Changing your oil removes dirt and contaminants and newer cars with all sort of oil actuated mechanisms, such as variable valve timing, need very clean oil. YourMechanic offers oil and filter changes during mobile visits right to your location and you should certainly avail yourself of that service as the cost is lower and the service is much more personalized than at a shop or dealer. If you have additional concerns, don’t hesitate to re-contact YourMechanic.

ANSWER : Hi there. Regular oil should not hurt your motor. Using synthetic oil can extend the oil change intervals over conventional oils. I would recommend using the oil type and weight recommended by your manufacturer. A certified technician from YourMechanic can change the oil at your home or office if needed.

ANSWER : Hi there. If you asked this question about 10 years ago – then yes, you might have issues with seals or gaskets wearing prematurely. However, as technology has improved, the gap between semi-synthetic and full synthetic is not as big. You should be just fine without having problems.

ANSWER : Hi there, thanks for writing in. The valve stem seals are the most common cause of this on your engine. When they fail, it requires that the cylinder heads be removed and rebuilt to fix it. The piston rings can also cause this but they are not as common. Unfortunately there is not anything, not even heavier oil that will fix this. You will need to have the heads rebuilt.

ANSWER : You might have a problem with the oil filter leaking when you rev the engine and increase the oil pressure. This can be from a collapsed oil filter media or excessive oil pressure from the engine. I recommend having the oil and filter replaced using a good quality filter and have the oil leak verified to be from the filter. Make sure to not run the engine low on oil. If you are finding you do not want to drive with the leak, a mobile technician from YourMechanic can come to your home or office, and replace both your filter, and oil.