I'm with most of this. But for 5-8 bucks, I'm not going two intervals with the same oil filter. I'm sure like many things "it's fine," but if I'm going to go through the hassle of draining I'm going with a fresh filter too. Next is that yes according to the recommendations, you should use 2 bottles of Ceratec for 10 quarts. But this is a 20 plus dollar extra that IMHO is not necessary. I've done two intervals with just one bottle per 10 quarts and there is no signs of the tick. I also do full synthetic 5W30. Unlike the filter change, IF you do a fill and one bottle of Ceratec does not do the job, you can always add more.
Would be interesting to find out if the Mobil will stop it. I tend to think it won't and you just hit the tick zone. If not, I may switch from Castrol EDGE EP to the Mobil and try it w/o Ceratec. Till then, I'm tick free with one Ceratec bottle per fill with 5K OCI's. May be overkill but works for me.
Good words... good words. It is the oddest thing, literally the second fresh oil is poured in and the car pulled off ramps. I was a little arrogant and cocky not too long ago when I parked my car at the side of the road to take a leek and listened at the front fender saying "... hahaha those suckers with odd sounding engines... listen to this purr...."... NOT a noise, couldn't tell it was really running.
Mine was rattling at 2k ish on my way home from the lot with 7 miles on the odometer. Did some exhaust work and now I don't hear anything from the engine compartment. Of course it's still there but exhaust overpowers it so I'm a happy care free camper.
I went through the phase of going crazy over it but it isn't effecting the performance of the car so stopped worrying about it. I do still keep a keen ear for new odd noises for sure. Spent several summers when still in grade school with my dad (mechanic) and learned very well to actually listen to the car. Plenty of great memories actually. My wife is the one to turn up the radio and drive home on a flat tire. Ugh!! lol.
