Oil changes

[Speedy Emira]

Just wanted to see what everyone is intending to do with their oil changes?
I’ve always had several modified cars and even when running double the oem hp I have never had crank wear which I put down to additional oil changes.
My first service is booked in for March and although it will only be at 3000 miles I have arranged the gearbox oil to be changed. I also plan to get Lotus to do my yearly service and do a couple of additional oil changes making it every 4 months. The intention is if I go for a built JUBU engine in another 10-18 months time it will be mint when opened and be an easy build.
Will anyone put an additive in the gearbox oil or is it the general perception that modern gear oil is enough?

 

[JonFuller]

I’m not an Additives person, but frequent (at the very least, twice the frequency of factory schedule) oil changes are I believe priceless.
Factory says 1st lube service at 10k miles! Bugger that.
Did my first oil/filter @ 1300. Had intended to do 1st gearbox oil then also, but on getting all the undertrays off, found the gearbox side to not be as simple as I had expected/hoped.
So will be doing that v soon.
Also had intended to mod the gearbox drain plug with a magnet, but again, when I got into it, the drain plug actually doubles as the oil temp sensor, so wasn’t as simple as I’d hoped.

Jon

 

[Speedy Emira]

I’m not an Additives person, but frequent (at the very least, twice the frequency of factory schedule) oil changes are I believe priceless.
Factory says 1st lube service at 10k miles! Bugger that.
Did my first oil/filter @ 1300. Had intended to do 1st gearbox oil then also, but on getting all the undertrays off, found the gearbox side to not be a simple as I had expected/hoped.
So will be doing that v soon.
Also had intended to mod the gearbox drain plug with a magnet, but again, when I got into it, the drain plug is actually the oil temp sensor, so wasn’t as simple as I’d hoped.

Jon

Good idea on the magnetic sump plug and a shame you couldn’t do it. You would think being a Toyota engine the temp sensor would be somewhere better and accessible. I have a 1972 ex military series Lover Rover with a Defender 2.5 Tdi conversion and everything is so easy to get to and simple. It’s really annoying when modern cars seem to go backwards on simple maintenance and go forwards so quickly on tech. 🤦🏼‍♂️

 

[JonFuller]

I wouldn’t be so concerned about the gearbox, if it wasn’t for the Quaife LSD. These are quite metal-to-metal mechanical things, and I feel sure that they’ll produce some level of metalic contamination of the oil, especially during the early bedding in period.
A magnetic drain plug is really the minimum protection I’d like to see in it.
Changing the gear lube is a bit complex, because there’s no level plug.
You have to 'make' a dipstick (drawing given in workshop manual) and remove the transmission cooler return pipe, and dip the oil level via that hole.
The manual also says you should use the lotus diag software to manually run the transmission oil cooler pump, to empty the remaining oil from the cooler & pipework.

So, not knowing this at the outset, I’d expected to pull the drain plug, dump the metalic-silver gear oil, bond a nice neodymium magnet to the bung, refit it, and refill the gearbox via the old school filler/level plug.

But that’s not how it went 🤪

 

[JonFuller]

I have a 1972 ex military series Lover Rover .....

A Leaf sprung Army lightweight LR?

You're clinically insane!

Sorry, but anything you say moving forward, will have to be ignored.

 

[Speedy Emira]

A Leaf sprung Army lightweight LR?

You're clinically insane!

Sorry, but anything you say moving forward, will have to be ignored.

Pretty reliable after a nut and bolt rebuild but slightly less aerodynamic than the Emira. 😁