opinions anyone? driving a 2000 2.7L extracab 4x with 70k miles, the milage seems to be dropping a bit, wondering if synthetic oil might bring me back a couple of mpg.

thanks in advance- bk

It may. I would be leaning toward a tune up orpossibly a timing belt, due to the mileage.

Synthetic fluids, engine oil, trans, and differential can only help due to their superior lubricating properties.

the timing belt has nothing to do with mileage, it either works or breaks. new plugs and bumper to bumper synthetics (Amsoil is rated #1) will give you a couple of mpg gain plus virtually eliminate wear. check your tire pressure as well. A note about synthetics, because they do lubricate better, they will find their way into every nook and cranny and if there is a place to leak out, it WILL find it. It doesn't cause leaks but it will find them if they are to be found. Personally I would rather have the protection with leaks than lesser protection with no leaks. but at 70K I would just about guarantee no problems whatsoever for another 100K at least.
And do the fluid changes yourself, it is exceedingly simple and will save you hundreds of dollars. Put the cash in the lube instead. Amsoil is not cheap but it is the best.

thanks fellas, much appreciated, both of you.

as far as amsoil, or any other synthetic, does the oil change frequency go up as well, or still every 5k miles?

Stay at or below 5K miles between engine oil changes whether you use synthetic or not. Even though synthetics protect better over a greater range of temperatures, they still get dirty just as fast. The real solution here is to run a high quality synthetic such as Amsoil or even Mobil 1 (just avoid the Mobil 1 syn. 0W30) and increase capacity and filtering ability. The idea here is that a high quality synthetic can last indefinately IF it can be kept clean. With this goal in mind, I run a dual remote bypass filter system that icreases my total engine oil capacity to 8 quarts and I only change the oil about once a year. I change the full flow filter (the same that you would spin onto the block) every 2,000 miles and I change the bypass filter (huge filter that filters out contaminants down to .5 micron maximum.) about every 5k to 7500 miles depending on how much wheeling I do.

The dual remote filter system runs about 250$ including 8 quarts of Amsoil synthetic and both filters and all mounting hardware. Yes I am a dealer.

If anyone is interested I will post my mobile phone #.