High mileage oil?

My wagon will be over 179,000 miles by the end of the weekend and a friend alerted me to a leaking crank seal and leaking valve covers while he had my car on a lift. Not really wanting to delve into pulling the crank pully to get to the crank seal or the valve covers right now I am curious how well the high mileage oils, specifically Valvoline Maxlife, work for helping out the engine seals. The PO used dino oil not synthetic and prior to these leaks showing up my plan was to go with Shell Rotella on my next change.

 

So, can I expect anything from using high mileage oil on my next change?

 

 

Also, is there a step by step anywhere on doing the crank seal? How about adjusting the lifters when I eventually have to do the valve covers?

Use a little bit heavier wt. Like go with rotella t6 5w40 and a wix filter.

 

If that doesn't do much, or you think it wont with the severity of the leak, replace 1 qt with lucas full synthetic oil stabilizer.

 

Should buy you time, at least a bit

The leaks aren't anything extreme. I maybe lost 1/2qt over 3k miles. I attribute some of that loss to a little oil making it past the rings due to piston slap.

The stablizer will definitely surpress it.

 

My car has solid lifters and the lash I think is a tad out of wack, and the stabilizer quiets it down a bit when the engine is cold.(buffalo winters ftw)

I am at a similar junction... 148,000 (2009 Legacy non turbo ), no known leaks, want this to be my run forever car, in part to quiet all the Toyota , Honda critics. I was considering using a quart of Maxlife full syn. with each future oil change, to take advantage of that additive package. Also, I have been using the Lucas Syn oil stabilizer for the final .2 quarts. Always looking ideas, so any other high mile guys, please share