Oldsmobile Intrigue

ss67

About to change the oil & oil filter on my 2002 GX. Picked up a Fram oil filter for it - the auto parts store said that Fram CH8765 filter is the right one (checking on the Fram web site this seems to be the correct one).

My question is how difficult is it to change this cartridge-type filter vs. more standard spin-on type oil filter? Has anyone done this filter change themselves and, if so, how is it done (what kind of housing is there for the filter cartridge and how is it removed from the engine)?

b4z

Did you get my emails?

Looked at a '03 Accord yesterday. Looks bigger.
More front seat room than last year's model.
fit and finish very nice compared to the GM products. Choice of wood or metal accents.
240 hp is very impressive sounding with a 0-60 between 6.5 and 7.0 secs.
Honda engines are the smoothest around.
23K for a loaded EX with 4 banger. I think the V6 is about 2 grand more, so it is about the same as the wbodies.
Grand Prix GTP will be replaced this winter. So I would wait.
Not sure how you will feel going from the DOHC to the pushrod 3800 engine.
If intrigue continues to run well hold on to it until next year.

oldsman01

Glad to hear from you. I've got the headlamp "flicker" which everyone says is the alternator, but have had the car checked three times by two different dealers and get the same "could not duplicate" response. What part of my notes stating the problem is intermittent do they not understand?? I've not had any problems with hard starting. Brakes haven't been a problem either. I have yet to detect any vibration in the brakes and the pads look okay from what I can tell. The only suspension problem I've had was a "clunk" type noise I was hearing when doing over bumps and the dealer said they needed lubrication and after that no more noise. I'd look at the Cadillac CTS if your thinking of upgrading from your Olds.

oldsman01

The performance numbers of the new V6 Accords look tempting, but the styling of the car(inside and out)leaves much to be desired. Nissan Maxima SE with 6 speed would be my pick over an Accordian. Still not the best looking car around, but in the right colors and with those 17" wheels, I could get used to the styling. Better yet, just wait until 2004, pocket your spare change and upgrade to a Cadillac CTS which gets a 250+ V6 and 6 speed manual then.

dindak

Like the Accord enough but the V6 is now getting up into the mid C$30's so really I would not bother and just go for a driver's car like a CTS or a Max. Accord's are reliable and have good engines, but they leave a lot to be desired in the style and driving excitement categories. Wouldn't get a 4 banger as a primary car.

petergoergen

On my 99 Intrigue, sometimes the "Service Vehicle Soon", "Anti-Lock", and "Trac Off" lights come on simultaneously while I'm driving. Car seems to be running fine otherwise.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,
Pete Goergen

one2one

I had the air bag lite come on and stay on in my '98. It was a loose switch that had to be replaced. It was covered under warranty and was pretty cheap even if it wasn't. (Won't tell you why or how it came loose ;-) Otherwise, it "possibly" could be an indicator of a future electrical problem.

00zx3

ss67, I have changed the oil on my '02 GX. It was at least as easy as the canister type. The holder/cap unscrews from the bottom of the oil pan. The filter drops down with the cap. I can't remember if I had to use an oil filter wrench (non-strap) to get it off, but I think I did. In any case, it was a no-brainer to change.

TSchramm

One of the shortcomings of the Intrigue seems to be that the sun visors are not wide enough, and , when placed over the side driver window, it leaves a gap of about 6 inches between the end of the visor and the B pillar. That gets to be quite annoying in the earlier morning and evening hours when the Sun is closer to the horizon.

My Aurora had visor "extendors" -plastic tabs that slid out and covered the gap. Even my Taurus company car has wider, sculpted visors, that cover the gap.

Does anyone know if there is an after market, sun visor extender that can be attached to the existing visor? Or am I stuck with paper-clipping a road map like my dad did in our Chevy wagon back in the 60's?

b4z

If you guys are interested in seeing some modified Intrigues go to www.cardomain.com and click on "Oldsmobile" then click on "Intrigue."
There are about 20 of them there.

sunsession

I know that the Intrigue body has a basecoat/clearcoat paint job. Does anyone know if the aluminum-alloy wheels are clearcoated? I'm trying to battle the brake dust problem, and if the wheels are clearcoated, I guess I can just wipe them with a paper towel, or maybe use Turtle Wax wheel non-acidic wheel cleaner.

b4z

They are clearcoated.
You haven't waxed them already?

oldsman01

Saw an 03 Accord on the road today(first one I've seen in person) and the front end looks way wrong. I first thought it was a Civic but it looked too big to be a Civic and as the car got closer I could see what it was. That dumb looking "H" emblem they use is starting to get dated too, I think it's time Honda update their nomenclature a bit. Having said that, the Accord looks great compared to the completely ridiculous looking Element. The recent issue of Autoweek has a review of it and the thing is just pathetic. First the new Bettle, then the Echo, the Aztek, and now this. When will the madness of ugly cars end!!

dindak

You mean the Honda Aztek? Of course, because it's a Honda I'm sure it got a great review.

I like the new Accord but for the cost of a V6, I'd go Maxima or 04 Grand Prix. Besides, the Accord is a car for the masses, I'm not interested in following the crowd.

sunsession

I haven't done anything to the wheels yet. What should I do and what should I use? I am planning to go to a detailing place next week to have the car hand-washed (it's only a couple of weeks old)and detailed to the extent that a new car should be protected.

ss67

00ZX3, thanks for the feedback on changing the oil filter..just one more thing, did you use a Fram oil filter and, if so, could you confirm the part number?

dindak

Sounds sweet. Up here Intrigue carries a C$4200 credit in lieu of the 0% for 48 months. There seems to be some stock left as they are being advertised by local dealers. If I could get a good price for our 2000 I would upgrade, but I just don't want to take a hit.

ss67

Yes, the deals on '02 Intrigues are sweet here in Canada...GM is discounting C$5,400 from list (no haggling necessary) for a GX with 1sb package..if you're the least bit interested, better get one before they're all gone.

jg28

look at this 98 Intrigue up for sale on eBay: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1859636168

I cannot BELIEVE how different the interior is. It looks so vastly different. When did they change the interior in 98? I thought the interior was always the same. I know the XFiles car had the same interior as the rest of us. Does anyone know more about this?

winter9

My wife's 99 has the short sun visors - I hate them. My 02 has different visors with a pull-out tab that stretches all the way to the B-pillar. I use it all the time. I assume the 2 parts are interchangeable so ordering a new set may be an option. I think the visors got changed in 00 or 01. Good luck.

pgl1

At 62K mi., my '99's rear defogger when turned on causes static interference on the FM Band. Has anyone else experienced this problem?

dindak

You are right, the interior of the 98 does look a little different. I never really noticed before.

I would like to see a better picture so I could see it better.

one2one

That must be an eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaarrrrrrly 1998 model. I had a 98 and it looks just like my 2001. Maybe they made different interiors for rental cars that year. Notice it has a mast antenna. The car was billed as having an integrated antenna in the rear window. Notice too that the gauges have orange needles and the entire center console and its contents are different--including a pop-out cupholder under the radio! A/C controls aren't even in the same position. I wouldn't be surprised if that car wasn't meant for these shores. It has a strong resemblence to the Lumina sold overseas.

Can anyone figure out anything from the VIN?

b4z

Looks like it has diferent seat covers. Or maybe they just relaced the seat fabric because the old stuff wore out.
My computer monitor at work is very dark so I couldn't tell if it has 12volt power at the right side of the console.

b4z

I guess they are trying to keep their transaction prices up. LOL
Did you notice how much quieter the 2002 is vs. your '99?
Those wheelwell liners really help the road noise issue.

b4z

That car is not green it is bronzemist.
A color not available until '99.
Also it has the very rare Sable interior.
Which was basically the neutral or mocha with black accents.
It might be a '98 that was repainted bronzemist.
It is a low option car nonetheless. Manual driver seat and no tweeters on the side doors tell us that is a base car.
This is the first intrigue that I have ever seen with the Sable interior.

vcjumper

That interior is way off.. The hvac controls, stereo, passenger airbag placement, ignition, centre console.. whats up with that!

Sure makes me value my interior more :-).

swagled

I've been away from the forum a while. But it was interesting to see the post from Arnie that he has an inner seam split on one of his Goodyears at 35K miles. I do too.

The Goodyear shop said the car is out of alignment, which caused the problem. But I think it's just crummy OEM tires. (Alignment might be a bit off, but this strikes me more as tire failure than just bad "wear". It was a front tire originally, but it's been on the back now for the last 7000 miles. Plenty of tread left... I think it should have lasted another 20-40K.)

Anyway, I'm gonna use this as an excuse to get away from those squeally Eagle LS tires, and try out the Michelin Pilots. Yeah-- kinda pricey, but it's only 30 bucks a tire more than the Eagles... Not really such a big expense, when you spread it over a couple of years driving.

dindak

$398.50?? Wow, what a rip.

The dealer i last bought from charged C$299 but I negotiated down to $150 which is still too much, but better than most.

oldsman01

That is NOT an Intrigue's interior!! Either that is the picture of another car's interior or someone has done MAJOR mods to their Intrigue. The dash looks like it came from a Daewoo. I remember first seeing an Intrigue in early 97 in MT(still have the issue) and the interior design and layout is the same as today. I think the only change has been the radio faceplate for 02 and colors. That color looks like bronzemist, but there was a different color offered in 98 which was similar to bronzemist so it could be that color.

dbogey, that sounds like a great deal if they will do it. If they do, I'd go for it. Either that or hold onto yours for another year or so and trade up to a Cadillac CTS in 04 which is what I'm probably going to do. If your looking at an Acura then your like me and you lean toward the extra refinement a luxury car offers and as good as the Intrigue is, a luxury car it is not. Good luck with what sounds like a "fun" dealer to deal with.

b4z

How can they reject your credit card earinings?

swagled

Well, in the end, I got Yokohama YK420's after discussing my driving style (and the road conditions in NC) with the salesman. Hopefully I will be content-- a treadwear 420 takes a long time to use up!

He assured me the Yokohamas are still good performing H-rated tires, and with the savings in cost, the Yoko's could be sipped for extra wet traction for what it would have cost to get Michelins anyway.

I was receptive to this argument b/c ten years ago I lost control of a car in the rain. Feeling my car whirl off the roadway on the wet is not something I want to experience again.

Anyway, the Yokos seem to ride well enough on the way home. They're just a little quieter than those 36K worn Eagles were. And a little stiffer, but not too firm. I'm still in Portland now, but I'll be putting 3K on these real soon for going cross-country.

lmacmil

I don't see that model on either the Yokohama site or the Tirerack site. I assume that's the Discount Tire relabeling of one of their regular models? Do you know which one?

focus

paid $225 cdn for 25% grey metalic tint on all windows except front, a/c seem to be cooler, car seems quieter too. No more suntan on my left arm!

one2one

Let us know what you think about the tires. I'm particularly interested in cornering feel, noise and ride quality/comfort.

swagled

Yes, they're from "Discount Tire", and the tread pattern is the same as the Yokohama AVID H4. Kind of a performance blend style of tire with some edge in the wet.

This is the marketing blurb from Yokohama's site:

"AVID H4/V4 combines decades of race-proven technology with an uncanny ability to deliver superior ride comfort, low noise and long treadwear through all kinds of weather."

Their blurb for the T4 makes more mention of cornering ability. I haven't driven much on these yet, but my impression so far is cornering with the H tire is about the same as it was when the GoodYear Eagles were new.

I will be curious to try these under different stopping conditions. I often felt like the Intrigue anti-lock was a little too "eager" with the GoodYears. Maybe tires with more bite will dampen it a little.

delrick

redline 65, The Envoy you are considering, XL 2WD XLT, is the configuration we leased.

Haven't had any regrets. Lotta room, lotta goodies, decent mileage. I really like the 270hp I6.

Dindak, my 2002 Intrigue doesn't have an oil life monitor. I have an idiot lite that is preset to 3000 miles after each change.

b4z, yup I expect synthetic oil to last 10000 miles, if it is kept clean. Some manufacturers recommend that interval, or 1 year, whichever comes first. Don't forget, the 3000 mile change interval has been around since before there was synthetic oil. The manufacturer obviously is making the safest recommendation, based on a previous generation of lubricant. It is intended to protect them from a worst case scenario, so they provide a recommendation that doesn't begin to reflect the capabilities of syn oil. Basically you are using a substance that is very different from dino oil. It does not break down as quickly, nor does it change state to varnish and it tolerates much more heat.
Filter it.

I do not use ordinary filters. To be most effective, there are deep filters specifically designed use with syn oils. Mobil sells the most popular one, but Blue LIne and Amzoil also have long life filters for syn oil.

My Intrigue has a 6 qt capacity, I believe. My approach is to replace the filter and add a quart at 5000 miles. I think there is a difference between dirty dino oil partially used syn oil. That is why the added quart provides the additives to safely go to 10000 with the rest.

one2one, I am not surprised that Castrol recommends changing at maufacturer intervals. It is incredibly good for their bottom line, and illiminates any hassle with the car makers. I have used Syntec by the way. One of the best on the market.

one2one

I'm glad you feel Castrol Syntec is "one of the best on the market". I've been on the syntheic thread and the reasoning over there is if you're not using Mobil 1 or Amsoil you're wasting money. Everyone refers back to the Mobil vs. Castol lawsuit from almost 10 years ago when Castrol claimed they had synthetic when it was really just a cracked dyno.

How long did you keep your cars while using Castrol? I switched to syn early on because I plan on keeping the car a long time (after a year and 2 months I've put 29,000+ miles on it) and want as little trouble as possible from wear and gasket problems. As I mentioned earlier, I'm using 5W-50 because of the oil consumption. I've read more times than I can remember that people using syn have dropped their oil pans after 100k and it's so clean you could eat off it. That's what I'm looking for.

b4z

The light in the intrigue is not an idiot light.
But it is not really a true "oil life" monitor either. Number of starts, rpms, etc. are factored into the equation. If yours is going off at 3000 miles then you are accelerating harder than normal driver or doing a lot of stop and go driving.

Regarding 3000 mile oil changes: My 203,000 mile Camaro has the Tuned Port Injection engine which by design runs hot. My second cooling fan is calibrated not to come on until 230 degrees or if the A/C is on.
As you can probably guess this is hard on oil. I adhered to a 3000 mile oil change strategy except for 3 times where I went to 5000 miles.
My oil pressure will actually drop after 2000-2500 miles unless I use Valvoline HD 20w-50.
Hindsight is 20/20 and I probably should have done a 2500 mile oil change interval.
This car absolutely abuses lesser oils, so the 3000 mile oil change has validity.

lmacmil

I think for the driving most of us do, the only benefit of synthetic oil is the longer change interval.

Consumer Reports did a study using NYC taxi cabs in 1996. Here's a summary I found on the web: "The testers placed freshly rebuilt engines in 75 New York taxis and then ran them for nearly two years, with each cab racking up 60,000 miles, placing different brands and weights in different cars and changing the oil at 3,000 miles in half the cars and 6,000 in the other half....The two most surprising results: the frequency with which oil is changed doesn't matter after the first few oil changes on a new engine, and the type or brand of oil used can not be shown to make any difference."

Given that most of our Intrigues' duty cycles are much less severe than the typical NY taxi, if you are changing your oil more often than the manufacturer recommend interval (or oil change indicator), you are wasting your money.

dindak

Envoy and an Intrigue, nice choice of vehicles.

Like b4z, it's more than an idiot light and I think it's pretty good. It's definitely not on at exact intervals. Sometimes it's 5000 kms, sometimes it's 8000.

one2one

What's smaller than a grain of salt? That's what I take Consumer Reports tests and evaluations with. Oil has a great bearing on engines, contrary to the report. Corvettes have 10,000 mile intervals and come from the factory with Mobil 1. GM probably makes more engines than anyone in the world, so they should be pretty well versed in how oil will affect them. I HIGHLY doubt they would allow a high performance engine to go that long unless the oil could handle it. Mercedes also allows long oil changes but they, too, use syn.

As I mentioned above, there are numerous studies that show that after using syn oil pans are clean as a bell. Now, if using regular oil leaves filthy, gunky deposits, that stuff is bound to get into the engine and affect it. If an oil pan is clean, there is nothing to ruin the engine. A lot has changed since 1996. Back then Slick 50 was a big deal. The very fact that syn handles higher temps better than conventional in itself means that it should protect better.

As far as the change oil light, the '98 went to 80,000 miles and was smooth as butter, no blue smoke from the exhaust.... In fact, for people who didn't know, they were shocked to find it had so many miles on it. And that was with regular QuakerState.

redline65

Looks like I might have to hold out for the Envoy XUV next year. Go here and click on the link to 2004 Envoy XUV:

http://www.gmc.com/gmcjsp/envoy/

dindak

XUV looks cool, but I bet it won't come cheap.

I personally like the exterior looks of the Trailblazer better than the Envoy though the Envoy has a better interior.

redline65

I'll get to see the Envoy XUV in 7 days, at the state fair of Texas!!

b4z

Those NYC taxi cabs are either old cop cars or built at the factory as taxi cabs with engine oil coolers, transmission coolers and extra capacity radiators. They are designed to run for long periods at idle.
So their cooling systems are way above what we have in our cars.

delrick

one2one, I used to use Castrol Syntec exclusively. For some reason, they do not carry it the Costco in Tucson anymore. I have started using Mobil1, which they do carry. I guess the redeeming grace with my schedule is that I never exceed 30,000 miles on my leased vehicles. Getting 2 at a time, we just don't generate enough miles to see any long term effects. I do closely inspect all removed filters. They are always pristine on the syn. May nor be the case internally though.

We did buy the 2002 Intrigue. Pissed me off, but leases were out of the question as a result GM's Olds debacle. And, I really am influenced by the engines. Nothing else in the GM line was comparable or acceptable. Will drive the shortstar as long as I can. I no longer use pushrod engines.

b4z, I guess I didn't see the info regarding the oil monitor capabilities on the Intrigue. If it looks like an idiot light and acts like an idiot light, I did assume that it was one. Wonder why the Intrigue is SO much rougher on the oil than the Envoy though. With the non-sym factory oil, is still showing 70% remaining life at about 3500 miles.

dindak, I agree with the choice of vehicles, obviosly ..

I do believe they are standouts in their respective categories, and examples of state of the art engine designs, even if they can't make decent steering assembly for the Intrigue.

b4z

Saw a mechanic from my old Olds dealership yesterday and I was telling him about my suspension noises. He said the lack of interest in the service department from the dealer's owners is to blame.
He felt that the Shortstar was a well made engine that he described as "beefy".
Nice to hear good things about my favorite GM engine.

lmacmil

I'm not sure what your point is. Your own experience indicates that following the manufacturer's recommended interval using regular oil resulted in a "smooth as butter" running engine after 80K miles. So what benefit would you have expected by changing it more often or using synthetic oil?

I cited a controlled, documented study covering 4.5 million miles indicating that changing oil more often than the manufacturer recommended didn't improve an engines longevity after 60,000 miles.

"Numerous studies" (can you site an actual reference?) showing synthetic oil leaves oil pans "clean as a bell" in no way contradicts or disproves the CR study.

Pase buen dia.

dindak

I agree. Even our new Alero is pretty state of the art with that gem of a 4 banger, the Ecotec. Car itself is screwed together even tighter than the Intrigue IMO and since the Intrigue has zero rattles after 2 years, I am optimistic the same fate with the Alero.

Next vehicle may very well be a 2WD Trailblazer or Envoy barring gas going to $1 / liter.

:-(