The Best Oil For Your New Subaru Engine And How To Get The Longest Life

What is the original oil used by subaru in Japan? When I got my forester, it was green.
Then I got my 1st oil change and it changed to brown.

I use 5w 40 full synthic with my 2008 forester xt ej255 engine and never let oil get more than 5000km / 3000miles old.

What is this crap, there is no recommendation, no real insight, just Subaru advertising.

"The Best Oil For Your New Subaru Engine And How To Get The Longest Life... "

What is the recommendation? Use Subaru branded oil, which is just relabeled Idemitsu oil, with a price markup. I find it funny that most stealerships don't even use it, opting for Castrol Edge in many cases.

Also, Subaru replaced many 2014-2015 FA20DIT WRX and Forester XT blocks because of excessive oil consumption. Excessive was listed as over 1 quart in an oil change internal. The difference between the high mark and low mark on the dipstick is 1.1 quarts, or over Subaru's excessive mark, so if you're having to "top off" between oil changes, you have a problem and needed to have it addressed.

I also find it funny that both my 2015 Forester XT 2.0DIT and 1999 Forester NA 2.5 use more oil than my 1964 Chevy C10 with it's 454 (7.4L) drag engine, and use nearly as much gasoline.

Just to let you know, the new FA24F motor in the Ascent and in the Outback XT uses 0W20 motor oil.

Re: "Full synthetic ..." When this is on the label it sounds like this would be the best engine lube money can buy. Not all synthetics are the same. When a dealer's service department threatens to void warranty if you don't use their oil remind the guy on the other side of the counter that is required to provide it at no charge. Another thing, Magnassun-Moss Act is on your side if voiding your warranty becomes an issue.

The best oil?......this story takes me back decades ago when everybody had their favorite oil, as well as oils they would never use. We are going forward to the past with this oil debate and I love it! Rudy H is spot on with his M-M Act quote. Can't be compelled to use a specific oil brand. Use the proper oil weight recommended. Just look at new car service departments. They use factory or a name brand oil. And as pointed out, factory is just rebranded name brand oil. I have an '09 Toyota Corolla with almost 186,000. I use Mobil 1 synthetic 0w-20 and a Toyota oil filter. I change the oil by 5,000 miles since that is the factory recommended oil change interval. The engine uses about a pint of oil between changes.....the same as when new. So if your engine uses oil, don't immediately blame the oil. Mobil 1 has taken really good care of my engine. When I change my oil, looking into the filler hole in the valve cover, I can see a bit of the valve train. It looks as clean as it did when new. Absolutely amazing. Oil has come a long way over the decades.

In my opinion the design of horizontally opposed engines will always see increasing oli consumption over a vertical engine. As well...investigate 100% synthetic oil....in my opinion (as opposed to genuine or even 'empirical' research) it isn't as adequate as mineral oil.

My 2010 Subaru Outback always received Mobil 1 Extended 5W-30 and Mobil-1 filter and it only consumes about a pint every 7500 mile oil/filter change. It now has 218,000 miles and going strong.

I change every 5-8k miles depending on the composition of my driving (city driving hard would be 5k, highway mostly would be 8k) and use just any API certified 0W-20 and a Fram TG filter. I think the frequency of the change is more important than the specific brand of oil and filter (within reason).

Oil claims can reach 'near hysteria'..

You mean "oils AIN'T oils Sol??

Remember or become aware that we are just advertisers' products being machinated. It's not new....fifty eight years ago the advertising agency handling new washing liquid products told me why women (unconsciously) preferred creamy white liquid which came out in spurts as they squeezed the bottle. These places are not innocent scientists interested in our welfare, but in getting inside our heads. There are ups and downs with oils and all are expected to meet minimum standards. Any 'bonus' to that requires scientific proof to be 'real'.

Fundamentally ...synthetic oil was developed by IG Farben, part of a massive group of companies which included Standard Oil .IG Farbem invented mustard gas used in WW1 and Zyklon 'B' used alleged to have been used against their religious people in WW11. Obviously a market grew up around the product. It is more molecularly 'even' than mineral oil and can contain chemicals claimed to improve engine life. It is pretty consistent over engine temperature and an easier start in truly cold weather than the thickening mineral oil when vehicles are stationary in low ambient temperatures.

Synthetic oil maintains 'thin-ness' and is more a 'leaker' than mineral oil. Like washing one's hands thoroughly, distancing and turning off the TV when Trump starts talking, these cues are meant to maintain health. Oil (and filter) changes at say 10,000 kms is pretty normal for synthetics/ The less pure mineral oil may be changed at say 8000 kMs however both could run 20,000 if clean and motor not flogged. The abused or 'well used' Subaru will be running 'stressed' and maybe collecting more metal in the sump filter and elsewhere that one driven with the typical 'legal' speed changes.

I thought I was pretty ok with oils and changes and so forth but the mechanic replacing my Pajero engine is using 'run in oil where long ago we used to simply use a thinner oil and to run the engine on water only as cooling for 1000kms...why?...some coolant products interact with the head gaskets.

I sometimes yearn for my fast old 1938 Buick 8 ! and my well worked 46 model....simplicity and reliability and longevity...none of this humbug of modern stuff...however it is what it is.

For my SAAB 2.3 Carlsson I use semi synthetic and having read the dissertations and comments here I'll look more closely into oils for my wrx...which is still interstate after getting rid of those ghastly chinese coil-overs so commonly used.

Every higher performance car I have owned has been bilstein/bilstein-eibach'd and suspension tuned by the best there is in Australia however I will not change the engine settings.

In this case I decided to experiment, fitting 'bugeye' STI suspension and strut brace (lovely pink bits which the japanese changed owing to 'gender inference' ) so I can later assess it against Bilsteins. For me, a believer these days in keeping cars 'factory' for longevity safety and resale value I don't think what I have done is heresy or hypocrisy. Voila. .

I have spent 30 years running a fleet of Diesel engineTractor Trailers in Cold Weather, along with a handful of pickup trucks with gas engines. We oil sampled our engines with a lab every 20,000kms, and determined that if you use a high quality synthetic oil (Amsoil) with a high qualtiy filtration system (spinners on the diesels), along with quality oil filters, and high quality oil filters on the gas engines, we got millions of kms from these engines, and changed the oil when the Lab told us to - the synthetic oil, when kept clean, ran for 80,000 to 120,000 kms between oil changes - we had 1 Mack engine run 400,000 kms with no oil change, just filters and lab analysis every 20,000km - and the oil was still in good order at 400,000 km, we changed it just on principle. Cleaning the 100% Synthetic Oil was the best investment we made, high grade filters and Spinners saved us many many $$'s over the life time of these vehicles.

I have a 1996 Chevy P/U that I bought new. It now has 143,000 miles. I put Amsoil 0W-30 and an Amsoil filter in it at 1000 miles. I change the oil and filter at once a year or 25,000 mile. I've done this for 25 years. The oil has never gone below the full mark on the dipstick for those 25 years. I also have a Toyota Avalon that I bought new in 2007. It now has 195,000 miles. Did the same thing with it. Has never used any oil.

How convenient, your bullshit is. Subarus have an oil consumption problem they don't want the public to know about. Hence check your oil often. You have to use 5 30 oil to slow the problem, I drive 200 miles and I'm low, only 74 k on this over priced piece of jap junk

Please kindly advise. I use a 2014 Subaru Outback with Mobil 1 full synthetic 5W 30 engine oil. Is it okay for the engine?

I currently use Mobil 1 5W 30 engine oil with my Subaru Outback 2014 model. What do you advise?

It was recommended that Castrol Edge is good to decrease oil consumption

I was hoping for comments about the Outback 3.6R. Subaru has always specified regular oil for our 2017 OB 6 cyl but no one could explain, other than cost, the downside of using synthetic. I asked the service reps, techs, everyone just shrugged. The 3.6 takes 6 qts too. Thoughts? I decide to always use synthetic but it’s not what Subaru recommends.