Newb question, change oil on mileage or service date?

[cosmophonic12]

dealership changed oil late august and truck has 2500 miles on the oil as of today. i believe they used regular motocraft 15w 40 and new ford filter. should i change oil at the 5k mark or now? i do a lot of stop and go driving mixed with highway and idling. i also pull a light trailer with cargo too (maybe 3k of cargo) once or twice a month. if you recommend i change now, do you think i should change my interval to 3k or 5k? thank you!!!

[svlandscape]

I always do it at 5k miles, always use genuine Ford/Motorcraft filters. I change the fuel filters every other oil change. These engines are a bit finicky when it comes to oil changes. The reason I do it at 5k vs 7500 as the manual recommends is that it is easy to remember, 5k, 10k, 15k, etc.

Go to youtube and look up 6.0 vs 7.3 The gentlemen in those videos really knows his Fords. That is all he works on in his shop. You will learn a lot about your engine and what it takes to make it last a loooong time.

Hope this helps.

[hitecdan]

Sounds like your using your truck the same way I use my truck. The 6.0L engine shears down oil pretty good. I've done some oil analyzes and have found that a 15W-40 oil gets sheared down to a 30W oil after about 4,000 miles. Dino oil or synthetic, they all get sheared. So don't waste your money on synthetic oil, it won't last much longer the the dino stuff. I change my oil every 3,000 miles and change the oil filter every 6,000. Also, oil does have a shelf life. So if your truck spend a lot of time just sitting in the driveway, then it possible it may need to be changed every six months then every 3K to 4K.
You don't need to change your fuel filters every 10K unless you know they get choked up in that amount of time. If so, I would find a new service station to buy your diesel at cause the one your using has some dirty fuel. Ford recommends changing the fuel filters every 15K, and my experience shows that's a good time to change them. And at $50 for a set of fuel filters, I think I'll stick with the 15K recommendation.

[OMCUSNR]

Last Blackstone:

REID: You've a long enough run a fuel-free samples now to know the fuel we were reporting earlier was probably from operational difficulties rather than a fuel system issue. The low viscosity is routine for this type engine and it is more a matter of interest than a problem. All oils of all makes tend to shear down in use in the 6.0L. You've been running oil change intervals up in the 7,000-mile range for a long while and your engine is still smiling. We don't think 8,000 or 8,500 is out of the question if you are willing to give it a go. A really nicely wearing IH engine.
11/08/08
D59851 PSD 1

Diesel
Chevron Delo 15W/40
0 qts
01/11/08 04/27/07 08/06/06 04/01/06 11/04/05
68,880
12/1/2008
69-78
<0.1
>415
12.11
400
1.5
0.0
0.0
0.4
0.0
<2.0
<0.8

I usually change my oil ever 7 to 7.5k, but I drive about 80% highway and not much stop & go. I tow about 6.5k 7-8 times a year, and have a 6% grade in every direction to get out of the Rogue Valley. I've taken an OA at every oil change to track fuel dilution. I had one spike at 3%, but every one other than that has been 1.5 or less, including this one. As far as shearing goes, it seems to stabilize after about 4k, and these trucks run well with 30wt in them. I have no smoke, it fires right up (even with 6yr old batteries), and runs great.

If I were in a cold climate, I'd look at using Schaeffer's 9000, bypass filtration & an OCI of 15k. I'd take a OA at 5k intervals to track how well the additive package is doing & use that to tell me when to change. Schaeffer's has shown to be about the most shear stable of all the oils available.

OMC