going to change the oil in my 95 impreza ej18 5mt.

i was pondering changing over to synthetic.

car has 160k on it but in the past 5k i did everything to the engine short of splitting the case(rings/bearings) and am willing to pay for good oil.

what type/brand of oil have you have good experience with for the engine and tranny?

 

also got some of this to try out:

 

we'll see if it works or not. looks pretty sweet tho.

oil discussions are pretty much pointless. you can basically get opinions on anything, they run the spectrum. it's all been talked about before, search here or online - there's nothing "subaru specific" about oil - so google it and read years worth of oil opinions:lol:

 

it's not going to matter, changing it frequently is more important than brand.

 

i would speculate that for seal and gasket health that sticking with one brand is very beneficial - keeping consistent on additives and such for the materials. but i don't make decisions based on that.

i think synthetic oils are overpriced, especially for an older vehicle with 150k plus miles. The older cars were engineered for normal oil.

change it every 3k miles.

I've been using Amsoil full synthetic in my Lincoln for the past few years. I run 15k miles / 12 months drain intervals and change the filter at about halfway. I plan to do the same in my Subaru once I get all the oil leaks sealed up. I did regular oil analysis testing (every 2500 miles) when I switched to determine a baseline change interval. I still do testing, but now only about every 6 months.

 

Amsoil full synthetic has a regular change interval of 25k or 12 months under normal conditions. But even doing the heavy use interval of 15k miles you still spend less money in the long run compared to the 3k/3 month conventional oil interval.