Just wanted to know how often most of you change the oil on your polw trucks? I change mine every 3000 miles but I've heard I should change it every 2000, do you think thats a good idea or is it over kill? Thank's.....Kraco_1
good idea if you go to a shop to do it see if you can get a fleet-commercial discount and tell them you want it done every 2000 you may be able to bargain a deal
A set mileage is really useless with plow trucks,we should service by hrs,but we can only guess.I just look at it,when it gets real dark and it gets ahrd to see the lines thru the oil,its time for me.If you have a plow truck that runs on the hot side with the blade on,you should be changing it often,along with your ATF fluid if its an auto.
Yeah that's kinda what I thought to. The guy that told me that owns a fleet of Taxicabs and I think they change it at 2000 miles because there cabs run 24 hours a day and most of that is at slow speeds. I'm sure that's gota be hard on an engine. So I'll keep doing mine at 3000 miles. Thank's.
I keep track of the hours plowing, and x that by 60. I then add to that the miles that I have driven since last oil change, and when that number gets to 2500, I change my oil. Some times I may only go 1000 odometer miles, but it has the = to 2500 driven miles at 60 mph. Just a ratio I use. Dino
That's a good idea Dino. I usually change mine whenever it's starts to get dark enough to make me wonder. I also change my trans fluid about every other oil change. Maybe that's overkill, but I figure that the abuse a transmission takes from plowing, it can't hurt to change it often. Plus, it's pretty easy for me to do since I have a lift at work. -Tim
Most of our trucks see less 5000 miles a year so we change once in the fall and once in the spring.The heavy equipment only does snow,so once a year for them.
I usualy change my oil every 2500 miles, that way when I dont get around to it for a week it hasn't gone over 3000 miles. I count hours A truck is out plowing. From the time it get's started to the time the jobs done. Then I multiply the hours by 50 miles or more depending on how long the truck was plowing and how heavy the snow was. It gets hard to remember when the oil was changed and how many miles to add for plowing especialy since the intervals aren't nice even numbers anymor ie 66,000, so I just right it all down in a daily log. I run prolong engine treatment and regular mobil oil. So far I havent blown anything up.
Hour meters only cost $30 or so. The diesel gets changed, year round, at 100 hours. The gas engines get 150 hour changes because they don't have the soot to deal with that a diesel does. I don't even record the mileage reading when we service - everything is done by the hourmeter. For service items according to the maintenance schedule, I figure a long-term average vehicle speed of 30 mph.
We change the oil every 3 month or 3000 miles unless we use them under extreem conditions. If we have a bad couple of weeks of snow work we'll change them after we get some sleep. We did that in December. January has been a relaxing month.
Oil change interval I try to keep to the 3,000 mile interval, plowing definitely rates as "severe service". One question for everyone out there: How often do you grease the front end? I try to be fairly regular with the grease gun (although I don't go by mileage for that) and lube up the front end numerous times between oil changes, especially if the weather has been on the mild side. (Salt and water = hard on front end components!)
On our last new truck I installed an hour meter to compare hours to actual road miles.The truck does a lot of run time compared to actual road time,makes maint easier by hours in our case.May do it on the next one too.
Oil analisys is the only way to go,especially for diesels.Using good synthetic oil,we can go 20000+ KM with only a filter change.It will give you a good idea with your plow trucks as well.Once you've found the optimum interval,you don't have to do an oil analysis every time.It will also pick up on problems before they get out of hand and cause any serious engine damage.
I change mine every 3000 to 2000 because i do notice a diference in engine performance when i change earlier than 3k. Bedros
