Oil consumption on older car

My 1995 850 2.5SE (10v) has now done 210,000 miles (335,000km).
In addition to the regular garage serving at 10,000 mile intervals, I
change the oil & filter every 5,000 miles, using 10W-40 semi-synthetic
oil.
However it is now using a litre of oil every 1,200 miles or so,
depending on how hard I drive the car. A small part of this comes from
a leaking main oil seal, but I suspect most is simply burnt in the
combustion process.
Is this simply a fact of life for a car of the age and mileage? Or
should I use a higher-viscosity oil, or take some other action?
Thanks
John Morris

 

In <>,

I would suggest that you make sure the flame-trap is cleaned at least
once a year (every 10,000 miles), to keep crankcase pressure down -
which will push oil past the seals.

If you're not in a warm climate, don't use a higher viscosity oil. And
what's the point of wasting money on "semi-synthetic" oil (is this
Valvoline Durablend)? Might as well as go with regular dino oil.

AC

 

I'll bet that virtually all of the oil is going out that
main seal. What often happens is it will leak much more on
the highway than at low speeds near home, so you only see a
few drops under the car. The advice about the flame trap is
solid.
--







http://freevision.org/michael/index.html

 

The blended oil if often around 5% why even bother, use the real synthetic
oil ,avoid imitations .so I wont use castrol, got my drift .

 

In <43be78ef$0$12718$>,

I agree, and my point was that if the engine has gone 200,000+ miles on
what is basically dino oil (syn. blend), why not just save money and
stick with dino .....

Switching to synthetic after so many miles may get oil past the valve
seals etc.

AC

 

Thanks everyone for all the helpful advice.
One question - does "semi-synthetic" oil like (Castrol GTX Magnatec in
the UK) confer no benefits over regular mineral oil at all?
In which case, are there any benefits to the engine in using
"fully-synthetic" oil such as Mobile-One, which is very expensive?