Adamal wrote:I've seen an SR20DE that was overdue for a change and the oil lines to the cam lobes were all blocked up. The lobes felt like sand paper!!!
I've got an SR18DE in my GTi Pulsar and it's still going fine at 265,000 km. It's all up to how you look after your engine. It had 87,000 km on it when I purchased it. I do oil changes every 10,000 km.
I either use STP engine flush and haven't had any problems with it, usually put an engine flush in every second oil change.
Or there is the cheaper more dodgy, time consuming engine flush I do. Empty oil, leave oil filter on, using the equivalent amount of diesel as you would use oil fill up your engine, run for between 30s and 60s.
RUN AT IDLE ONLY, DON'T REV IT. Diesel is a lubricant in its own right and it has detergents in it. You will still have oil protecting the metal parts providing lubrication for a short period. I usually empty out the diesel and refill with cheap oil ($10 warehouse oil, can be used more than once) and run the engine briefly to remove the last of the diesel, then drain out the cheap oil, change the filter and add new oil. It definitely removes a lot of crap that would otherwise remain in the engine. My oil usually doesn't start to look dirty until about 7,000 km.
Note: At 265,000 km my engine doesn't use, burn or leak oil and never has.
Works a treat for me, but I'm no mechanic, don't try it yourself and blame me for any problems you may incur.