I have 1,400 miles on my Insight now. I just checked the oil and was pleasantly surprised to see how clean the oil looked. The oil on the dipstick looks like I changed it yesterday. That is absolutely amazing to see a car do that from the factory without heavy duty aftermarket oil filters.
That just goes to show that this car is really built to last. Honda did a outstanding job at engineering this car.
With all of the oils I intend on using in this car, I see no reason why this car could not easily reach 1,000,000 miles if I so desired to keep it that long.
I was comparing oil the color of oil with a friend who had a Chevy van. At the time I had 7,000 miles on my Amsoil it and looked just as clean. He had 1,000 miles on his van and his oil was already all black.
I'm so glad I bought this car. For a car that's no speed demon like the muscle cars I've owned in the past, I find this car a joy to drive every day.
I hope all of you are enjoying your Insights as much as I am.
I'm exstatic that you're so pleased with the Insight... I'm just a little confused about your comments.
BTW, when doing my valves, my oil had 3k on it and it too looked brand new. The engine had 188k on it at the time. I so love Mobile 1
I used Mobil 1 for many, many years and swore by it. I had a car that had bad oil consumption with it. I switched to Amsoil and all of the problems went away. So I can no longer swear to how good Mobil 1 was. Plus after seeing all of the comparison tests of Mobil 1 vs Amsoil, I don't know how anyone could ever use Mobil 1 after learning about Amsoil and seeing the improvements. And the added benefit of being able to go much farther on an oil change. There's zero benefit to sticking with Mobil 1 after that. Why spend money on something that is going to cost more to use and protect less? I don't see the logic in that. That's like saying, what if Shell yielded me 45 MPG, but BP yielded me 65 MPG and costs 10 cents more per gallon. Why on earth would I ever go back to Shell after learning about BP if this was the case even though I never had any problems with using Shell?
Just because you used something for a long time doesn't mean you should stick to it. If you discover something else comes along that is better and costs less, you switch (especially in this bad economy). Everything else pretty much works the same. You do everything always did in the past. You simply do it much less often.
In regards to your confusion, I was not expecting the oil to be that clean with all of those miles. I had a bypass filter installed on my car from Trasko and that keeps the oil super clean. I was not expecting the oil in the Insight to look as clean as the Amsoil with the Trasko filter. The Amsoil bypass filters are crazy expensive. The Trasko is cheaper and 10x easier to install because it fits in place of your existing oil filter. That only drawback is that you have to change it every 10,000 miles while the Amsoil one lasts like 60,000 miles. Both have the same performance. It all depends on the vehicle and circumstances.
I was pleasantly surprised with how clean the Honda oil was without having a bypass filter. If the car isn't making the oil get dark that fast, then these cars should be running trouble-free for many years. If the Insight I's are doing the same, then I can understand how people could easily put 300,000 miles on those.
I wish more people bought hybrids. The cost of fuel would drop if people would stop driving gas hog SUV's. I'm just as happy driving this Honda as I was my past 3 SUV's. With that big hatch in the back, I can carry lots of large items comfortably.
WTF? You told me in another thread as I made the same comment after 5 thousand miles that you cant tell how clean an oil is by looking at it.
Oil can be dark and can be suitable or not suitable for driving.
If a regular car can destroy a 3,000 mile conventional oil in a short time, the Insight seems to be doing a lot better job. It seems that oil in an Insight will go a lot farther than in other cars.
If I went the same 1,400 miles in another car, the oil would be dark brown already.
I was just amazed that the oil was still clear. It should have been very dark by this time and it wasn't. I just found that to be odd in our favor.
That's like saying, what if Shell yielded me 45 MPG, but BP yielded me 65 MPG and costs 10 cents more per gallon. Why on earth would I ever go back to Shell after learning about BP if this was the case even though I never had any problems with using Shell?
Unfortunately, for most of us, we haven't personally experimented so extensively with these things and when we walk into a store to buy oil every manufacturer has their own advertising that says their product is the best. So who's to say which product is really the best? And if you ask one auto mechanic he'll swear by one product, and another automechanic will swear by another.
With such heavy marketing campaigns out there these days, it is hard to really know the truth without personal experience. In fact, many products are nothing but marketing. For example, products claiming to increase fuel efficiency. 99% of vitamins and "alternate medicines" out there are just bottles of marketing. But some of it may actually work, although just that 1%. How am I to know which one it is? Another great example, I had trouble for years with athletes foot. I tried every cream out there. Sure, those creams would keep it under control, but if I stopped using them for even a few days, the athletes' foot was back with a vengance. Then one day somebody told me to soak my feet in a mixture of vinegar water. I tried it, and low and behold it worked! One treatment for 20 minutes was enough to cure the problem permanently. About once a year, I have an outbreak and I go buy a jug of vinegar for 99 cents at Wal-Mart, and the problem is solved for another year. Now, if everybody out there knew about this, all of those manufacturers making those creams would probably go out of business.
So, there are definitely good and bad products out there, but for the typical person it is really hard to know which ones live up to the hype and which ones don't.
Personally, I never gave oil much of a thought.. oil is oil.
I wish somebody would do scientific tests with vitamins the way they have done for the oils. That would be cool. There's so many vitamins out there and there's no way to know which ones are best.
I wish somebody would do scientific tests with vitamins the way they have done for the oils. That would be cool. There's so many vitamins out there and there's no way to know which ones are best.
He is right about Amsoil, though. It's an excellent lubricant, my only reluctance is the extended drain intervals while still under warranty. I don't doubt Amsoil's properties for extended drains, I just don't want the grief from Honda if the issue happens to arise. My HCH II is almost out of warranty and I've been looking at Amsoil in the next OC for awhile.
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2010 Insight Ex w/navi Tango Red
2006 Civic hybrid w/navi Alabaster Silver
He is right about Amsoil, though. It's an excellent lubricant, my only reluctance is the extended drain intervals while still under warranty. I don't doubt Amsoil's properties for extended drains, I just don't want the grief from Honda if the issue happens to arise. My HCH II is almost out of warranty and I've been looking at Amsoil in the next OC for awhile.
I can doubt the sky is blue, but that doesn't mean it's not true.
If those extended drain intervals were blowing up engines, don't you think the FTC would have shut Amsoil down for false advertising?
I've gone 25,000 miles on these oils LOTS of times in many of my previous cars and have had zero problems. I have friends and relatives also using it and they also have had no problems at all.
If this stuff didn't work, I would have not wasted my time talking about it here (fortunately it doesn't take but a few seconds for me to type a message.)
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Built to last
I'm exstatic that you're so pleased with the Insight... I'm just a little confused about your comments.
