Breaking in a Yaris?

[blacksan]

I am a machinist by trade and have been involved in motor work for longer then I care to remember. Having said that I firmly believe in manufacture suggest break in. There is a reason for them telling you this folks! These motors need to bed in the components to some degree. Not all motors will be the same due to production tolerance in individual parts, but you can not go wrong by following procedure. On the other hand not following procedure is in fact POSSIBLY abusing the motor which MIGHT lead to premature failure and most certainly contribute to shortened service life of the engine. I have seen a lot of debris in oil samples of relatively new engines before. I would even suggest that you swap your filter and top off you oil at about 500 miles.

[ponieswhee]

Originally Posted by blacksan

I am a machinist by trade and have been involved in motor work for longer then I care to remember. Having said that I firmly believe in manufacture suggest break in. There is a reason for them telling you this folks! These motors need to bed in the components to some degree. Not all motors will be the same due to production tolerance in individual parts, but you can not go wrong by following procedure. On the other hand not following procedure is in fact POSSIBLY abusing the motor which MIGHT lead to premature failure and most certainly contribute to shortened service life of the engine. I have seen a lot of debris in oil samples of relatively new engines before. I would even suggest that you swap your filter and top off you oil at about 500 miles.

Like I said, I'm almost done with the break in period, so it won't kill me take it easy for a week. The roads around here are tight and curvy enough to the point where it seems like the stock 185/60 tires are more of a performance bottleneck than not being able to wind the motor all the way out. I'll take your suggestion and check the oil filter tomorrow. Would it be ok to switch to Mobil 1 when I do that, or is there some reason the first change has to be done at 3000 miles?

[blacksan]

Originally Posted by ponieswhee

Like I said, I'm almost done with the break in period, so it won't kill me take it easy for a week. The roads around here are tight and curvy enough to the point where it seems like the stock 185/60 tires are more of a performance bottleneck than not being able to wind the motor all the way out. I'll take your suggestion and check the oil filter tomorrow. Would it be ok to switch to Mobil 1 when I do that, or is there some reason the first change has to be done at 3000 miles?

You could run synthetic in a new motor. As far as oil change intervals are concerned a good filter/dino oil combo can go 5,000 with out any problems. Now, if you really want to get the most bang for your buck buy a good filter (Wix is my choice) and use your Mobil 1 for even longer drain intervals. You could go 15,000 on Mobil 1 by just swapping the filter every 5,000 and toping off.

We used Amsoil and Wix filters for heavy equipment applications backed by regular oil sample analysis which showed the Amsoil still providing protection for longer drain intervals then I would have ever thought feasible.

[rage2]

Originally Posted by blacksan

On the other hand not following procedure is in fact POSSIBLY abusing the motor which MIGHT lead to premature failure and most certainly contribute to shortened service life of the engine.

If manufacturers relied on consumers to follow a procedure to ensure there's no premature failure, there'd be a warranty catastrophe in the industry and companies losing money every year replacing parts because it was out of their control but still fall within their responsibility. More than 1/2 the new owners don't read the manual or don't even know about break-in procedures, and a whole lot (like myself) believe in driving it hard right off the bat. Don't forget about rental car fleets, I doubt someone renting a brand new car will adhere to a break-in schedule :).

I've raced my cars in Solo1 and Solo2, and it's one of my secrets for staying in stock class and have a power advantage over others, because it's consistent that hard break-in will give me what others call a factory freak, 5-10% more power than average. Never have I had a premature failure. One of my older cars, I sold to a friend at 90,000km, and it's still running like a champ at 320,000km today with no oil being burnt (Acura Integra).

Of course, I only have a small sample of data with 9 cars, so it's up to you to decide if my way is better or not.

[ponieswhee]

Well I'm at 580 miles now. Tonight on the way home from work I'll flog it a bit and see what she's got. Change over to full synthetic tomorrow and have some fun before I weigh my car down with a ton of audio junk. This is my first new car and I want to be careful with it, but I do value the advice of people who compete in their own cars and I got this thing to have a little fun while saving gas.