We don't have magic oil filters which last even 22k miles. You should be replacing them every 6 months / 6k miles, or 12 months / 12k miles depending on your risk tolerance (some people suggest even half my short interval).

Anyone who actually drives their car regularly will be doing an oil change at least twice a year. If an oil change takes more than 30 minutes of actual labour time of an inexperienced mechanic, it's going to be a serious financial burden which will likely outweigh any 2mpg improvement.

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bluGill 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> We don't have magic oil filters which last even 22k miles. You should be replacing them every 6 months / 6k miles, or 12 months / 12k miles depending on your risk tolerance (some people suggest even half my short interval).

We do - they are just a lot bigger.

You should replace the oil filter when it is no longer filtering. Replacing it early is a pure waste of money. Unfortunately the tests of do you need to change the oil filter is more expensive than just replacing the filter so just replace it before it can possibly be clogged is the right answer. Generally the manufactures recommendations are correct and you should follow what they say unless you have lab results that say otherwise.

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its_ethan 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I'm just gonna copy and paste a response to another similar comment: The point that I am making (obviously, I think) is that tradeoffs exist, even if you don't think the right decision was made, your full view into the trade space is likely incomplete, or prioritizes something different than the engineers.

Putting some random number of hypothetical mpg improvement was clearly a mistake, but I assumed people here would be able to get the point I was trying to make, instead of getting riled up about the relationship (or lack thereof) of oil filters and fuel efficiency.

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Arch-TK 4 hours ago | parent [-]

You can also read my reply in my other comment.

But to keep it concise: The core problem is that you are stating a truism in response to a famous counter-example to specifically that truism. The other problem being that you are stating a truism which everyone else is already familiar with.

	▲	its_ethan 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Given how many people have seemingly jumped on misinterpreting the truism as me making some claim of a specific fuel efficiency improvement, I'd disagree with people being already familiar with it. To be concise as well: it's been duly noted by me that contributing to a conversation by attempting to bring in nuance is not always well received when you make up a hypothetical for a topic people are very touchy about.