In every forum this is always dicussed, but was at Pepboys and say Castrol's Euro Formula. About to do my first DIY oil chain on a 550i. Should I go with BMW oil or Castrol Euro Formula? Is the BMW oil the same stuff?

Thank you

euro castrol 5/30 is the same stuff as bmw 5/30-i got mine today at teh dealer for 99 dollars--you really have a hard time justifying a diy change when you can get the dealer to do it for 99 bucks--atlesat in my opinion

Castrol engine oil is the same as BMW engine oil. It say Castrol oil on my engine oil cap.

EURO castrol is--not regular castrol. It has to say EURO blend castrol syntec.. The next best thing is Mobile 1 10w40 as the bmw/eurocastrol 5w30 is not really consistent with other brand 5w30 and is more conssitent with 10w40

NOTE: BMW approved Euro Castrol is 0W-30 (not 5W-30) and Euro Mobil 1 is 0W-40 (10W-40) in the US!

BMW Long-life rating LL-01 Approved Synthetic Oils for the US Market:

* Castrol Syntec European Formula SAE 0W-30

* Mobil 1 SAE 0W-40

* Pennzoil Platinum European Formula Ultra SAE 5W-30

* Valvoline SynPower SAE 5W-30

BMW Approved for US Market

Why not go with BMW oil since it costs the same, at least for where I am.

if you are in the US, as far as i know, autozone is the only place that sells the GERMAN MADE castrol syntec, 0w30. all of the other castrol syntec's in autozone and elsewhere are made in the US and are not the same oil or quality at all and by no means are the US and German versions equivalent. check out bobistheoilguy.com if you want to see some oil analysis on both to see just how much better the German stuff is.

like i said, 0w30 is the only true German castrol syntec, but if you want to be sure, look on the back of it and it will say "made in Germany," whereas the others will all say, "made in the US."

The big jumps in quality are when you go from conventional oil to synthetic blend, and also when you go from synthetic blend to full synthetic. Within each class, the differences between brands are minimal. They all have to go through GL certification and thus meet or exceed what you need. Save your money and go with the lowest cost full synthetic. You can even afford to change it more often then. That would make a much bigger difference than going from Castrol to BMW Euro Castro.

absolutely not true. go google or to the website i mentioned above for oil analyses, you will see there is a huge disparity between different full synthetic oils. german castrol 0w30 is some of the best and goes very long without needing changes before breaking down. 15k is what bmw suggests. that might be a little steep, but the german castrol should have no problems going 10-12k miles between changes.

word-I didnt beleive the bmw policy so looked into the differences and from the data I gathered it is perfectly reasonable for bmw to re 15k oil changes or so. Keep in mind if you drive your car hard--which I did at first it will indicate 10k mile oil changes:) So I think bmw is totally reasonable. It is all a matter of the oil breaking downand losig its lubrication and losing ability to not get superheated. The euro synthetics I read about consistently coul go 20k EASY in tests--so I think 15k is conservatively under that figure-

I do drive my car hard so I settle and get it at 10k miles but for 99 bucks at the dealer it is worth it to me for piece of mind. But I am OCD and for the 99 percent of people who are not--I doubt they will have an issue