Boy ain't that the truth...........

 

The first oil change I did at 1500 miles I used the Motorcraft 5W-20 synthetic blend. At 3000 miles I switched to Mobil 1 5W-20 full synthetic, and have been using it every 3000 miles since then.

Now I have 12,000 miles, and cannot find Mobil 1 5W-20 anywhere in my area. In the last 3 weeks, I've been to two different Walmarts two times each, and neither one had a single quart of Mobil 1 5W-20. One of them had some Mobil 1 0W-20, which I understand passes the same Ford spec as the 5W-20, but I passed on that. Later I went back to get it, and it was gone.

I have also been to the local Autozone twice and no 5W-20 there either...

I think I can probably let the oil change go for an extra 1000 miles or so and not worry about it, but this is getting frustrating!

Not only that, but in the year and a half I've owned the car, I've never seen Mobil 1 5W-20 offered in the 5-quart jugs. Walmart seems to carry every other Mobil 1 viscosity in 5-quart jugs except for 5W-20 (or 0W-20 for that matter). That annoys me too, since Walmart sells the 5-quart containers for $22 or so, which is a pretty good deal.

The only conclusion I can come to is that not many consumers are looking for 5W-20, so the stores aren't stocking much of it.

 

My autozone has 5-20 Mobil I full synthetic...

 

That's great. All I need to do is fly 1500 miles to Tampa to get it...

 

I won't tell you that they had it on sale then....

 

This weekend was my third trip to Walmart to see if they had any Mobil 1 5W-20 in stock, and YES they finally did. They had 12 quarts. I picked them all up. They also had 6 quarts of 0W-20. Still no 5W-20 in the 5-quart containers, but I was just glad to finally get some. $5.68 per quart.

So I was only 750 miles past 3000 miles since the last change. No biggie.

I did notice that only 5 quarts of dirty oil drained out, so it burned 1 quart in 3750 miles. Is that relatively normal?

 

I would say that is not too bad, considering that you don't drive many miles and startup after a long time of sitting can burn more oil than if you run it daily. Also, cold starts burn more oil than running/starting at operating temp.