first oil change: report

1. The user manual you received with your car would tell you the proper oil viscosity. I know my 2025 Camry HEV says 0W8 but some people use 0W15, claiming prolonged engine life. Other people are changing oil at 5K miles instead of 10K mile intervals.

 

Preferred oil is 0W-16. European manual says

"SAE 0W-16 is filled into your Toyota vehicle at manufacturing, and the best choice for good fuel economy and good starting in cold weather.

"If SAE 0W-16 oil is not available, SAE 0W-20 oil may be used. However, it should be replaced with SAE 0W-16 at the next oil change."

Engine air filter is not on the first service.

 

This is was at what 10k miles? Way early for cabin filter. Way early for all that nonsense. OW20 is fine. OW16 is spec'd IIRC, but nothing wrong with 0W20.

What tank is this, the gas tank, lol?

No offense, but you seriously need to start doing some reading yourself, starting with the Toyota maintenance schedule, explained in the Warranty and Maintenance Booklet that should be in the glove box.

 

Cabin filter is scheduled for change every 10,000.

 

Nortrh American Warranty and Maintenance Booklet shows first cabin filter change at 30k miles.


Even that, I would say just inspect, replace IF needed. Would never pay a mechanic labour charge to replace that.

 

Show the 10,000 mile page - that's what we're talking about.

 

I've not done a 5th gen conversion to table format, but looks to be very similar to 4th gen:

 

I'm almost inclined to think that's an error. I couldn't get the US Prius Toyota book, but other US Toyota models and a third-party Prius 2024 schedule matched the Europe every-10,000 schedule.

I've long been somewhat of the impression that the minor 10,000 service includes the cabin filter just to give them something to do other than changing the oil - help it justify being called a service.

 

FYI, the 2025 Camry manual shows cabin filter replacement every 10K miles for normal. & special operating conditions.. They are using a different, less convenient but more compact format in that manual.

The 2023 Prius is every 30K miles though. I figured out this link to the guide.
https://www.toyota.com/content/dam/toyota/brochures/pdf/2023/T-MMS-23Prius.pdf

Same with the 2023 Prius Prime
https://www.toyota.com/content/dam/toyota/brochures/pdf/2023/T-MMS-23PriusPrime.pdf

 

The correct viscosity is SAE 0W-16, but SAE 0W-20 will mostly hurt the fuel economy and be OK otherwise. I don’t like thicker oils in Priuses because the engine is on only half the time and the oil hardly ever warms up.

Overfilling the oil would cause foaming (aeration) if the oil in the pan touches the bearings, which would in turn result in engine damage due to insufficient lubrication because of the air bubbles in the oil. Nevertheless, only 1-cm-too-high should be OK, as there is a good safety margin between the top of the oil in the oil pan and the bearings. If you are too concerned about it, you can buy a manually operated vacuum pump and suck the oil out of the dipstick.

As for the cabin air filter, it is very expensive, and doing it every 10,000 miles is an overkill unless you are driving on very dusty roads. As long as your windshield does not fog, doing it every 30,000 miles as in the US maintenance manual is OK.

 

The 10k mile for the cabin filter is probably to get fresh carbon in there to avoid smell issues.

 

I thought it was for dealer service to upsell you and reclaim some profit lost by only selling hybrid Camrys.

 

Air filters(both cabin and engine) only need to be replaced if they're dirty. It's a waste of money to replace them on a set schedule.

The only exception is if you use activated charcoal cabin air filters. Those have to be replaced once a year because the activated charcoal has a shelf life. An activated charcoal filter will continue to filter the air just fine after a year, it just won't have the odor removing qualities that a fresh filter does.

(to my knowledge)The Prius comes with a standard cabin air filter, so there's no need to automatically replace it after one year.

The HVAC disinfection was also a scam addon unless the owner complained about bad odors when they brought it in for the service.
And the fuel additive was a scam.

I'd be shopping around for a new dealership for the servicing. (I'm assuming they charged extra for the filters, additives, and services.)

 

2-3 decades back there were no cabin filters, however did we cope?

I finally changed both cabin and engine on our ‘10, at 90k kms: cabin filter was getting there, engine filter looked practically new still. Just figured better do it once in the car’s lifetime. To be fair: we’re west coast BC, not as dusty I think.

again, paying professional mechanics to do this is nuts. They scare owners with the “maintain complete service record” script, pile on all the BS services Toyota says nothing about, and omit the ones that are difficult, not cost effective (easy) for them, and/or expensive for owners. Brake maintenance in particular is neglected, dealerships and owners dislike dealing with it.

 

I am surprised city pollution did not clog filters up.
Here in rural Virginia I definitely keep a check & change the engine air filter regularly. I do not check the cabin air filter as much but I have had to change it due to rodents building a winter nest on it,