One of the most basic parts of car ownership is taking care of basic maintenance. The most frequent item that should be addressed is changing your vehicle’s oil , and that’s a task that comes down to a simple choice: Do you do it yourself or take it somewhere?
As we’ve established, I was a grease monkey in a prior life. But even with those skills and know-how, I elect to have someone else handle the job. Why? Well, time is money, and the money you save by doing it yourself, you might have to reinvest many times over in labor, risk, and cleanup. I was trained to work on cars standing up; crawling under is a hard adjustment. But I’m cheap and picky, so I’m selective on where I get an oil change done.
Let’s run the numbers.
As Matt has recently shown us, oil, through the right retailer, is cheap. And based on lab testing as David discusses in “Expensive Oil Is Waste Of Money,” there is little difference between the performance of the cheap stuff versus pricey oils. [Ed Note: I hated the headline “Why Expensive Oil Is A Waste Of Money.” I didn’t write it. That headline, without the word ‘sometimes’ after ‘is,’ is misleading. -DT]
However, if you’re going to a shop for an instant oil change or even the dealership, you might feel like you’ve just lost an arm and a leg. It just depends on what the shop is prioritizing and what you’re willing to accept.
For this demonstration, I’ll be using my Ford Maverick hybrid. It takes 5.7 quarts of 0W-20. When I called the nearest Valvoline, they quoted me:
- $107.68 for full synthetic oil: $99.99 for 5 quarts and a filter, and an additional $7.69 for the remaining 0.7 quart
- $75.99 for synthetic blend oil: $70.40 for 5 quarts and a filter, and an additional $5.59 for the remaining 0.7 quart
- $55.88 for conventional oil: $50.99 for 5 quarts and a filter, and an additional $4.89 for the remaining 0.7 quart
Now let’s look at the nearby Ford dealership where I took my Maverick to address four recalls.
- $98.47 for 5.7 quarts of Full Synthetic Oil and a filter
Welp, that’s the last time I ask someone to do an oil change without asking the costs ahead of time. And now the Chevrolet dealership in Mishawaka that I took the truck to last May.
- $55 for 5.7 quarts of full synthetic oil and a filter
Between the highest and lowest prices, for the same type of oil, that’s a 95% difference in price! So what are the differences between these places?
Let’s Talk Labor Costs
At Valvoline in 2016, I was making $10.50/hour as a Senior Tech. I was one or two steps above entry level and was a keyholder, a shade below Assistant Store Manager. Then in my second stint with Valvoline in 2021, I picked it up as a second job in an attempt to pay off bills, and my primary source of income was just enough to break even; I was making $15/hour. Based on this trajectory of increase, I’ll use $18/hour as the going rate for labor in 2024.
For a two-bay store, there’d typically be between four to five staffers at a time; one or two customer service advisors, two toppers, and one pitter. Each car would take at most 15 minutes, barring any complications or additional services. Based on this, on a busy day, the store could get through at least eight cars in an hour.
Labor cost per car with four staffers:
$18/hour x 4 staffers ÷ 8 cars = $9 in labor/car
Labor cost per car with five staffers:
$18/hour x 5 staffers ÷ 8 cars = $11.25 in labor/car
Seems straightforward enough! Yet, while eight cars in an hour would be ideal for profit, like any business, there are rushes and dead times throughout the day. A possibly more exact calculation would be to look at the average number of cars a quick lube shop sees in a day and the total hours paid out for that day.
Using my primary store in Midland, we would see roughly 32 cars a day and hopefully have at least five people scheduled for eight-hour shifts.
$18/hour x 5 staffers x 8 hours ÷ 32 cars = $22.5 in labor/car
Cost Of Oil And Filter
Oil is cheap! While that might run counter to current prices at a quick lube, you can get 5 quarts of full synthetic for $18.98 at Walmart, $21.99 at Meijer, or if you’re getting more outdoors supplies, $24.99 at Tractor Supply. I’ll stick with using full synthetic oil for the rest of this exercise because if you need to use 0W-20 oil, it’s probably the best option. And the Maverick is my queen and deserves the best.
Looking for cheap but acceptable filters, Bosch filters for my Maverick start at $2.60 a piece at Rock Auto.
Obviously, places like dealerships and Valvoline get fluids at wholesale prices. A quick search for bulk quantities and I learned you could order a 55-gallon drum of 0W-20 full synthetic oil from the Miami Oil Company for $654.75. That works out to $2.98/quart or $14.90/5 quarts. I’d assume there are even better rates for Valvoline and the like but I do not have access to their books.
Ticket Price, Or ‘How Did I Just Come In For Just One Thing And Leave With Five?’
The ticket price is the hidden number customers don’t see. It’s a target corporate sets as the desired revenue per car. At Valvoline, if your store did well on the number of customers you saw per month, the average “ticket,” and customer reviews, you’d get a bonus. This obviously encouraged CSAs to upsell when possible.
That could be from suggesting customers try a full synthetic oil instead of a mix, or attempting to sell a coolant or transmission service. Heck, air filters were/are a big part of this too. As of now, Valvoline charges $24.99 for an engine filter and $54.99 (!!!) for a cabin filter. While researching prices for my significant other’s 2012 Honda Fit, I saw Rock Auto sells Bosch engine and cabinet filters for $4 and $9 respectively. This is one of the more uncomfortable aspects associated with working in quick lube.
I was texting one of my closest friends whom I met while working at Valvoline. I had expressed my shock after discovering Valvoline’s new prices. He gave me permission to share his response.
Adding It All Up
So working with limited data, my best estimate is that it costs at least $22.50 in labor/car and at most $17.68 in materials costs for my Maverick, for a grand total of $40.18 for a quick lube oil change. Subtracting that from the original quote of $107.68 leaves $67.50 to go towards overhead costs and net profits.
Now looking at the Mishawaka dealership, labor costs are slightly different. The best-going rate I can find when calling around is a $25 labor charge when I supply my own oil and filter. If an oil change takes 15 minutes, that’s $100/hour in labor costs, not an unheard-of number. $25 in labor + $17.68 in materials = $42.68. Subtracting that from the $55 overall cost leaves $12.32 for revenue, a much more reasonable number.
I once asked one of the dealership’s service managers why the cost was so low, relatively speaking, compared to their competition. He said it’s an intentional loss leader. They didn’t care about squeezing the money out of an oil change because that’s not their main business – they want to sell cars. By offering cheaper oil changes, they establish a positive reputation in the community and increase the number of people who visit their dealership. And boy, did it work. It wasn’t uncommon to see the dealership’s driveway filled with cars in line for oil changes.
For me, my go-to is grabbing oil and a filter for $29 while I’m grocery shopping at Meijer. I then take it to whichever dealership has the best quote for labor. I’m okay with that because I don’t have jacks or stands (yet) and my apartment complex frowns upon wrenching in their parking lot. But one day, I’ll have a house with a pole barn and a lift. Then just watch me. I’m sure I’ll find new, unexpected ways to make mistakes and get messy. [Ed Note: And write about them!]
Topshot: oil container via Valvoline; background image by methaphum/stock.adobe.com
To us in the UK the US seems to have a weird obsession with changing oil. We don’t really have oil change shops.
We mostly take our cars to a garage for a service (oil,filters,plugs, etc) according to the service schedule in the handbook. Or do the whole lot ourselves.
So you could easily do 30,000 miles between oil changes, or whatever the manufacturer’s recommended interval is.
One thing in the US is that recommended intervals used to be a lot shorter (when I was a kid, 3000 miles was the advice that was hammered into everyone’s heads). That meant that people were changing oil extremely often, which created the market for quick lube places.
(And, while a lot of cars called for longer intervals in the manual, people had been conditioned for decades to not trust those intervals… and those intervals were for “normal service”, with quite a lot of things pushing you into “severe service”.)
Also, engine oil is generally cheaper in the US, as I understand (even when you’re getting modern synthetics), so there’s not as much expectation of running it for long times, so a lot of people are willing to change it earlier to avoid expensive engine damage. (Some engine families don’t do well with the manufacturer recommended intervals…) This also means that a lot of modern cars here don’t have the oil life monitoring systems that they have in Europe, instead having oil changes every 10,000 miles (or 5,000 miles for some turbocharged engines), with other services like tire rotation.
(Meanwhile, my Honda Helix scooter, from 2007 (really 1986, but it’s a 2007 model year) doesn’t have an oil filter, and has a *1200 mile* oil change interval.)
Thanks for that, it explains a lot.
Now I understand why so many European cars have stamped service books (never seen that here in the US) but sludge issues are common.
Of course, some US owners neglect their cars and end up with sludge, but the norm is to change the oil more frequently than is recommended, sometimes too frequently. Consequently I’ve owned about a dozen cars with over 200,000 miles and every one of them has had a spotless valvetrain with no sludge in sight.
30,000 miles in between oil changes is completely insane; even with high-quality synthetic oil, 10,000 miles is the absolutely maximum I’d recommend for any car ever.
The oil reminder light in a majority of vehicles is simply a mile counter. Yes, GM has a few other algorithms set in place to account for idle time and air intake sensors info, but that is not the norm in all vehicles.
Regardless, if you don’t have an extended oil capacity, like some vehicles do, then you should absolutely change your oil at 3 to 5 k miles. Reason? You need to actually Read the owner’s manual and you will see that the longer mile changes are Only set up for “normal driving conditions.” Well, guess what. Most vehicles are NOT driven within those “normal” parameters, but are actually in the higher use (extended or extreme) categories.
Funny thing is, Grandma drives within what they consider “normal” driving.
How do I know this? I’ve worked at many different Marque Dealerships across the manufacturer spectrum. One of the extremely important jobs of a salesman is the delivery process, and part of that process is to go over the owner’s manual packet. You know, that pleather pouch that most people just throw into the glove box or in the rear cargo area.
Every vehicle manufacturer actually trains their salesmen to go through that book with the new owners. No, not every salesman will, but tjry are instructed to do so.
All of the 3 to 5k mile (max) intervals has been backed up by lab tests, which you can find all over YT.
Your scooter probably has an oil “screen” instead of a filter, and hopefully you are cleaning that screen when you do an oil change.
It does, it calls for cleaning it every 8000 miles.
What the heck cars have a 30,000 change interval!? Longest I’ve seen here in the US is 12,000 miles. My current car has 6,000 mile interval from the manufacturer. Previous car was 10,000 miles. I just follow that.
On my old ’65 that sees seasonal use, I do 3,000 because that could be two years depending on how much I’ve used it.
A lot of European market cars have oil life sensors and can go as long as 31,000 miles between changes with the specified high quality synthetic oils. (Which, AFAIK, cost the equivalent of over $20/qt there, as opposed to at most $10/qt for the same oils here, which is where a lot of the desire for long intervals comes from there.)
I know even on my old Mk4 Golf TDI, you could get that engine in Europe with that capability, when here in the US, it was 10,000 mile intervals on the same 5W40 synthetics.
Are you sure it was the exact same synthetics? My understanding is that European oil standards are stricter than US ones which is one of the reasons they can go longer between changes.
In the case of VW diesels? Yes, because there were VW specifications (505.00) for this, not just API or ACEA specs.
(And, tbh, a lot of people in the US have reliably run 20-25k intervals based on oil testing on a couple of very good US oils (Mobil Delvac 1/Turbo Diesel Truck and Shell Rotella T(6) 5W40).)
Some Honda Civics have a 30,000 mile service interval.
30k miles or Km? Even if it was 30k Km, that is way, way too long to make your oil and filter work and not sludge up the engine.
30,000 miles.
My day job is designing engines for OEMs, and then dealing with any concerns that come up during durability testing. We don’t set long service intervals without being very certain that it’s ok.
In the entire 20 years I’ve been driving, I’ve taken my car to a quick change place once when I was 18. I just got a new to me car that was a bit rough (1996 Civic CX with a B16A2 engine swap) . The status of the oil was probably not great so I wanted to get an oil change immediately. Right out of the gate, they were confused about what my car was. I told them to just look up a 99 Civic Si. They argued with me that that wasn’t what the car was. I said I knew that, but the engine was swapped. It took ages to get them to ignore what the body was and look up the correct engine. Then the geniuses didn’t put a new crush washer on so the car was leaking oil like nobody’s business. The next day, my brother and I went and bought everything we needed and changed the oil again ourselves.
Since then, either I did all oil changes myself, or I bought the oil and filter and took it to my Honda specialist mechanic or my local Honda dealer when I was in college and living in an apartment. I’ve done all the oil changes myself on my old 2007 Honda Fit Sport and current 2016 Honda HR-V EX-L dailies. They are both mega easy to do. The next change on my Civic is going to be done by my mechanic though. The car needs a new timing belt and probably $2000+ of other work (loving an old car is expensive) so I’ll let him take care of it.
A shop that’s primary purpose is to change car oil is a pretty foreign idea to me. That you buy your own oil then get them to do it seems even more wild.
Here it’s pretty much new car goes to the dealer so you get a nice stamp. Out of warranty you go to your fave mechanic for the lot.
If you enjoy it or you’re tight, you do stuff yourself. Taking your car to a shop just to dump oil, madness!
Given a dealer’s reputation for being expensive I always assumed they used cheap oil changes as a way to establish a reputation/relationship for future business. Good to know my hunch was on point.
I went to a Valvoline place once and I was shocked at how overpriced it was. Just the oil change was ~$70 and they wanted $50 bucks for a tire rotation, and I had a bulb that went out and they were going to charge something like $25 to replace it.
Never going back to one of those places again.
There’s a reason it’s often called “Iffy Lube”
Hello fellow Mishawakian!
I know exactly which dealership that is just by that limited picture!
Side note, I do not change the oil in 2 of our 3 cars because they are still under warranty. One car was bought brand new, and the other with less than 9000 miles. They are taken to the dealership for oil changes so there’s nothing undocumented in the GM (yes, they’re both GM cars) system for them to deny a warranty claim. After the warranty period is over, they will get backyard oil changes like the 3rd car does. Also, the dealers that sold the vehicle often send some coupons for general services when the time comes around.
Wise! When I had to have an engine replaced under warranty the advisor at the Dodge dealer said he was so happy he didn’t have to deal with an irate customer. Evidently around that time they’d been instructed to deny claims without documents for everything since new. He hated doing so when he knew the engine, from frequency and type of fault, had an issue. But I’d done exactly as you say for the same reason: if warranty period, then dealer service. And he was pleased to tell corporate Dodge I had all the papers, so get stuffed and fix the man’s car.
I use to change my own oil 30 years ago now I have money take it to the dealer I bought it from usually with a coupon they sent me. Grab a cup of coffee sit in the waiting room maybe look at new models and out the door I go.
BTW I remember buying rerefined oil in quart bottles down in South Carolina for 25 cents while I was in the Marines living with poverty wages
I learned to do my own oil changes (and eventually, much much more) to save money when I was in school. Now I do my own oil changes to save time. Maybe a quick lube place could be faster – I haven’t tried one and have one close by I could give a shot – but regular shops turn it into a half day affair involving an appointment.
I’m still doing my own repairs to save money. There are jobs I would prefer someone else to do, but the same factors that make me not want to do them myself make them cost thousands. The quick and easy jobs are gravy.
Yeah for me it is saving money, saving time since it takes way longer to go to an oil change place and wait, and peace of mind because I just don’t trust them changing my oil or even driving the cars.
Doing the oil change myself is time set aside to relax and putz in the garage. I listen to Car Talk, lie under the car while the oil drains and inspect the underside of the engine, suspension, etc. Sometimes I nap. Cheaper, more enjoyable, and more affective than seeing a shrink.
There’s something so peaceful, almost indulgent, about being under the car with nothing else to do. I’ve nearly napped a few times myself. Definitely had my eyes glaze over more than once.
Surprising how comfortable cardboard on top of concrete can be. From time to time.
I find the focus of the work relaxing, in the same way I find motorcycle riding relaxing – all the other stuff that’s swirling around in my mind is shut out as I focus on what I’m doing right there. Even if it’s as simple as wrestling with a recalcitrant oil filter.
As someone who lives in an apartment, I feel your pain!
But I have found workarounds – I have a rolling storage box thing that’s big enough to fit jack stands, jack, and plenty of tools, filters, etc. so I can easily and unobtrusively transport all of it to the parking lot. I do my work in the off hours when nobody from the management is likely to see it. Haven’t had any issues (yet!).
I was a master of 1am oil changes at apartments. Being skinny enough to not need to raise the front end helps a lot also. I did dozens of oil changes and was never caught. All the parking spots already had oil slicks so I never worried about being perfectly neat.
I never trusted anyone to do my oil changes. I have seen too many leaks due to reused drain plug gaskets, mangled drain plugs and overtightened oil filters from “professionals”.
had a cheap shop kill my alfa spider by not putting in enough oil in after they changed it…the couldn’t count to 7
Please, even if you have plenty of money, not doing it yourself is just laziness (unless you physically can’t or you’re so absurdly rich you have your own mechanic). You can get 5 quarts and a filter from Walmart for like 30 bucks. Anything over 70 for a simple oil change is crazy.
He said exactly why he doesn’t do his own changes at the end of the article.
And there are plenty of valid reasons for either doing your own oil changes or NOT doing them. There’s no shame either way.
Personally, I would do them because no one cares about your car more than YOU do, so doing stuff yourself means it will get done correctly, or at least if it doesn’t then you know who to blame.
A great reason to NOT do them yourself (assuming you even have a place to wrench in the first place) is that it’s not always cost-effective. Waiting 15 minutes for a $60 oil change (approx the avg for regular dino juice by me at a non-dealer spot) can be the right choice if it’s going to take you an hour or more to do it and those hours could be better spent at a job that pays you a more lucrative hourly rate. To say nothing of cleanup trouble and costs.
What jobs pay $60/hr to someone who can’t figure out how to change their oil in an hour?
People making $60/hr are likely at a point in their lives where time becomes more important than money because they have enough of the latter and never enough of the former.
That might be true if that time was spent playing with puppies or doing something fun. Instead that time is spent driving to and from the shop and sitting in the waiting room.
You think people pay to have their oil changed ONLY because they don’t know how to do it? And you think that after reading this article where the author mentions in the last part of it that he only doesn’t change his own oil because he doesn’t have a safe place to do it?
If so, okay.
For the rest of us (and as I mentioned) there are various reasons a person might CHOOSE to have someone else do the oil change. Just like many people might choose to have someone else do lawn care for their house or literally any other task that is someone’s job.
Life is about choices, and if you make good money doing whatever it is you like to do, sometimes the smart choice is to pay for other people to do tasks that you don’t like to do and don’t necessarily have time to do efficiently. There’s nothing wrong with making that choice.
Pretending there needs to be gatekeeping in the car community about who does oil changes is not going to help anyone.
“You think people pay to have their oil changed ONLY because they don’t know how to do it?”
Yes, of anyone who buys into the ridiculous justification of time=money when it comes to an oil and filter change. If you want to spend lawyer money on elementary school dropout work because you don’t want to get a little dirty fine, it’s your money that you are being parted from. Just don’t go around bragging how smart you are because you spent that time earning more driving to/from the shop and sitting in the waiting room. You’ll peg yourself as an easy mark.
If you are taking your car in because you genuinely don’t have access to a safe place to do it, because of constant bad weather and a lack of shelter, or that the car is so badly engineered a simple oil/filter change is worth the cost and hassle of a visit to the shop sure, that’s understandable.
You can be as ignorantly judgmental as you want, but you’re still missing other valid reasons.
I know plenty of former mechanics who can’t even do simple procedures like oil changes anymore due to job related injuries and/or age. I guess they’re “easy marks” too.
No, just you.
I mean, lol
I’ve spent 20 years as a dealer tech before getting out, I’ve done more oil changes than you could hope to do in your entire life, even if I hardly got any in the last 5 years because the shop couldn’t afford to pay me to do them.
I’m not doing it myself to save 10 dollars for the privilege of laying under the car when I could be doing countless more productive things involving chores it’s either less cost effective to pay for people to do, or things I enjoy. Plus when I’m done I have 5 quarts of used oil I need to drive 20 miles into town to find a shop that can dispose of it
Save 10 dollars? As Timbuck2 said, its usually $40 savings or more. I never spend over $30 for synthetic oil and filter, which is $70 less than the Valvoline.
You dont have to drive 20 miles into town. You just take it with you on your next convenient trip to a parts store or Walmart, where youre going anyways.
BS with that $40 savings number. Unless you have a truck that takes a crapload of synthetic or something, that’s a wild miss on the cost savings even where I am, which is historically a pricey area for, well, anything.
A regular oil change is $45 here. Unless you can do it for $5 magically, the cost savings ain’t what you’re trying to sell.
Now how much can I save on a blinker fluid change by you, this easy mark would like to know?
So you think more time and cost effective to 20 miles into town for an oil change?
20 miles? Surely there’s a wildlife sanctuary full of cute, endangered, baby animals you can dump it in closer than that!
The nearest Walmart is across an ocean. I street park and maintenance is not allowed on the street. I can park about a third of a mile walk from where I live, but it’s a mile-and-a-half drive from there to my door. I could get the oil, the pan, and the jacks – a shop next to the dealership sells them –, and keep them in the house. At oil change time, I’d have to walk to my car, drive into town, load the equipment, drive out of town, find a place in the country, set up, do the deed, then drive down to the waste facility, confirm with the people there that I am a resident, drop the oil, drive back into town, unload the equipment, and then drive out and park.
Or I could just go to the dealership, give them a couple hundred bucks, and have them service the car, replacing the oil, consumables, clean the interior and wash the car, and perform the scheduled maintenance, while I do my shopping next door.
I could get it done cheaper by the mechanic who swaps the summer and winter wheels, but those dealership records are useful to have.
I used to change the oil in my mk1 Legacy by parking one side on the curb and that wasn’t even really needed and the oil filter was right in front facing down so it didn’t spill and could be replaced by barely putting a knee down. I’d be surprised if a Maverick had lower ground clearance (no aero pans back then, though).
I still change my own oil because it takes less time than it would to drive to a place and wait even before they get to the job, plus it’s cheaper, I don’t have to listen to some BS upselling, I don’t have to roll the dice on the job being done right or possible damage from some clown who can’t drive a manual but likes to think he can hitting something (it happened the last time I let someone else do it—the “free” oil change on my new Focus ST ended up with me in a rental for a couple weeks while the dealer replaced the front bumper cover). Only sort of trick is that I have a huge heavy duty milk jug-like container for the oil, so I only have to bring it in once every 3 or 4 changes. I go to the shady town next to me as they don’t have any wusses there complaining about the weight like the better towns where they dump it for you—they just walk me out back and have me dump it myself.
Why? Well, time is money, and the money you save by doing it yourself, you might have to reinvest many times over in labor, risk, and cleanup.
Uh huh.
Vs. driving to the oil change, standing in line for the oil change, waiting for the oil change, waiting longer for the oil change, then driving home from the oil change. So a 15 minute DIY job even a child can do with basic hand tools in a parking lot becomes an hour or more of driving and waiting and driving some more.
Risk? I think the risk of a trainee forgetting to reattach the splash guard, over/under filling the oil, using the wrong grade of oil, not changing the crush washer, not torquing something properly, driving the car into the pit, or simply sawzalling through the splash guard to get to the filter is higher than any mistake most DIYers with any experience at all would make. Sure there are some folks who have no choice because of their living situation or weather but even they can likely find a way to DIY if they want to.
Cleanup? Wear gloves and an old T-shirt. Scrub off motor oil afterwards with soap and cooking oil. Not rocket science here.
Sure you have to pick up the oil and filter – so what? Just pencil it into your Walmart shopping list. Or order from Amazon. Dropping off the oil for many folks is as easy as putting it back into the container it came in and putting it on the curb on trash day.
Besides how many people’s time here is legitimately worth $320/hr after taxes? Especially since most of it is just waiting for the oil to drain?
Yeah didn’t think so.
And most Walmarts will take the used oil from you no problem. I put it back in the container in which I bought it from them in the first place. And not like I need a lot of reason to go to Walmart as it is…
Exactly right on the ‘time is money’ argument. That, and there’s no way it takes less total time to just do the change myself anyway because I don’t live at a dealer. Parts are ordered and the used oil is deposited at my local recycling spot when I’m already heading there with other stuff.
You apply only your own factors to this equation, so obviously you get the answer that you want when you control all of the variables.
Here is a specific example with actual numbers –
It costs $45+tax (so slightly less than $50) for a conventional oil change on a garden variety small car/crossover here.
The oil change place does those, inspections, and basically nothing else.
It’s on the way out of town and I have never waited in a line for an oil change. If I see a line, I just keep driving to work.
They are done in roughly 15 minutes.
I could do it myself in the carport, but it will take me about 30 min to get everything out of the sheds, the car raised, the oil and filter drained and contained, the car lowered, everything put back, and to clean up before bringing the oil somewhere to be recycled.
Considering that the cost to have it done is basically worth a half-hour at work anyway, why the hell would I do that 4x a year (one of which will be hot as balls and another one (at least) of which will be literally freezing) outside in the delightful embrace of the carport, when I can instead sit inside and listen to music while someone else does it before heading back on my way to my climate controlled job?
If that makes me an easy mark, so be it.
I still do my own lawn care, which is another PITA, so I assume the pointless gatekeepers will bless that at least.
But sure, let’s pretend everyone is going out of their way to get it done at a dealer or some other place that is simultaneously inconvenient and ludicrously expensive to boot.
There’s a reason the quick lube place does well here, salaries and cost of living are high, but if you have a normal vehicle that takes regular oil, the oil change cost is a comparative bargain. Similarly, lawn care services are also popular here because that takes way more time per attempt and is only like $150 for the month if you pay them.
I guess if I had a truck and it needed synthetic the math would switch…. but I don’t.
My Chevy dealership will put 6 quarts of full synthetic oil (Dexos), filter, and rotate tires for $75. I used to change oil myself every 3,000 miles, but now get it changed when the oil life monitor hits ~20%. Why? Because I don’t want to deal with it anymore, and yes, I will gladly pay $20 to have someone put a new air filter on my car, because it’s not as simple as twisting off a wingnut. (Don’t even get me started on replacing the cabin filter – it would take me an entire weekend because the entire lower-right dash has to be disassembled.) Yeah, I’m old, so I want to make the most of what time I have left.
I don’t know about your car in particular, but on most cars made this century, changing the air filter is literally as easy as undoing like 4 clips and swapping filters. It’s literally simpler and easier than twisting off a wingnut.
Some do, like my pickup, which I still do. However, taking the time to buy a filter (Amazon, or whatever) isn’t worth my time anymore.
There are plenty of cars where it’s more difficult than that. One big issue is after you unclip the filter housing you might have to disconnect more stuff to enable it to be moved enough to get the filter out and in.
One of the most glorious creations is the cartridge/tray that slides in to the side of the airbox for the air filter. You don’t even have to fight the 4 snaps or screws or reassembly. Just 2 snaps, slide out, slide in. I love it, but alas, I have none that do it.
I mean, people pay for not having to do something, or learn something. Tale as old as time, or at least as long as my parents have been alive.
– – – – – – – – – – –
If you want a real shocker, apparently if you go across income levels, the average American only prepares 21 – 35% of their meals. I kept digging into it, thinking it had to be limiting it to a specific cohort, or market, but nope. 21-35% covers all the continental US, and all income levels.
For the record, “not preparing” includes dine in, fast food, take out, delivery, pre-prepped (stuff to heat and eat from supermarkets), meal kits, and frozen meals. This shocked me, as I prepare about 98% of my meals. I mathed out what my food budget would be if I went along with my income cohort, and my food costs would more than triple.
It really said a lot to me about why people are complaining so much about food prices (which to be fair, are up), because even though there’s a very real lever to pull to vastly reduce costs, the average person clearly won’t consider it.
EDIT: I actually discussed my findings with friends. My friends are more frugal than most people, but most were still only preparing 40-50% of their meals.
– – – – – – – – – – –
I DIY a lot of stuff because I end up getting the same or better result for far less money. I can then use the money I save to get things I actually care about, instead of paying more for things I don’t necessarily care about.
It’s also not about saving that money once. It’s about saving it time and time again, over months. There’s 12 months a year. 120 months a decade. After 10 years, you end up with a hell of a pile from those savings, and that buys you real shit you REALLY want.
Any wonder that we’re a country of depressed, obese grumps with maxed out credit cards?
I started making a variety of healthy soups and chilis from scratch in batches of about 24 oz and freezing them in reusable 2-cup containers. Making a big batch is pretty much the same effort as a small one and I keep about 6 different kinds on hand. They heat in the microwave in minutes and I make them without pasta or rice (for soups that would use that) and cook them with spice on the lower side (depending on what it is) so I can add that as I want depending on the day and because pasta and rice takes up space better used for other ingredients. Stuff like red lentil soup or even chicken are really versatile. They’re great plain or I can add different spices to make it North African style, Persian, or cajun or whatever. It makes it easier to eat healthy, it’s cheaper and quicker than a fast food drive-through, and there’s always something on hand. Meal cost varies, but it’s somewhere between $2-4 per container, usually on the lower end (beef pho and bison black lentil were on the high end thanks to the prices on the meat and good amount of spice I had to buy that I didn’t have). I rarely eat out or get prepared foods anymore.
For me, making my own meals is also great for portion control – if I’m doing it myself, it’s much easier to make and eat the amount I’m actually supposed to.
Makes staying in shape a lot easier for me. It’s no secret that takeout meals are gigantic and contain way more calories than anyone short of a professional athlete actually needs.
On the flip side, we eat out and do takeout quite a bit where I am. But my wife and I enjoy many different types of food and luckily where we are, there are absolutely tons of different places with all different types of cuisine.
Besides that reason, sometimes we would rather spend the meal prep (and cleanup, which isn’t insignificant) time on something else, so I’ll order out and grab it on my way home from work.
If you have a lot of options where you are, then there are probably plenty of healthy options too and you can always set aside a portion of your meal or share it. Portion control is easy to do regardless of whether you’ve made the meal or not.
But obviously I’m not going to bitch about prices of food if I’m eating out for a portion of that because that would be ridiculous.
There are plenty of valid reasons to cook your own food (you enjoy cooking, keeping a strict diet of ingredients, you’re cheap, etc) just as there are plenty of valid reasons to order food.
I would never give someone a hard time for making choices that suit their lifestyle, we all have different priorities.
“just as there are plenty of valid reasons to order food.”
And a lot of totally made up, bullshit reasons roo.
You seem intent on pretending that the choices you make are the best choices for everyone. Good luck with that.
Nope. My point is simply the vast majority of folks save neither time nor money by paying $100 for an oil change.
I live on the east coast in a highly affluent suburb. Where the hell are you that you’re paying $100 for an oil change? Because there isn’t one around here, unless you cherry pick a horrible place to get your car serviced.
> But obviously I’m not going to bitch about prices of food if I’m eating out for a portion of that because that would be ridiculous.
Most important point, and I wholeheartedly agree here.
I have nothing against eating out or people who choose to eat out. I do it too, just rarely. However, I’ve had to address people I know who nonstop complain about food prices yet won’t change their habits. Get them to actually stop and think about what they’re doing, and what they might do to change course so they’re not complaining all the time — solutions are there, but complaining isn’t one of them.
I’ve laser focused things to get a dream car I want, responsibly (nearly cash). I’ll be glad when it’s done less than a year from now. Yet I didn’t get there by complaining, but by committing to a huge number of small decisions which in aggregate got me the result. Just like I hacked off 30lbs recently (back down to 145).
100%, I’m with you there. Sometimes people complain because they don’t know a better way (in which case your feedback can be incredibly constructive) and other times people just like to complain. Either way, if I’m someone who eats out a bunch (for whatever reason), complaining about the price of food should probably not be high up on my list of complaints.
Congrats on the car and the weight loss (hopefully sans Ozempic, haha). Most people’s ability to plan ahead is sadly lacking. Working retail (or anywhere really) and seeking how many couldn’t handle a paycheck every other week was an amazing eye-opener. And some of those same people had kids, incredibly scary.
Thanks for the congrats, but it was more, “about time.” Just track what I eat, walk more, and weight comes off if A < B.
It was also to preempt the suggestion when I shave a bit of weight from the car. There’s nothing to come off of me anymore!
Cheapest way to lighten your ride is to lighten yourself!
I didn’t think of that part of it, but that’s a real good point. It definitely works for that, too. The containers I use work out to be a regular sized bowl of soup even with added pasta or rice. Portions are way too big in a lot of places, especially so at the places that sell the stuff people should be eating less of in the first place. I also control what I put in: there’s way too much salt (and sugar, but that doesn’t come up much in soups) in stuff we buy and I’ve taken to making things without it to see if it still works. It’s easy to add later, but I’ve been amazed at how little I need. Also, I don’t use processed crap and almost all fresh ingredients (I do use some flash frozen stuff, like fresh okra can be difficult to find, so I get frozen and pre sliced and the plus side to that is that I can also add that later as I please). I was never much of a fan of cooking, but I find I’ve gotten pretty damn good at these soups and now I enjoy doing it. I usually try an experimental one here or there, which I have some fun with. There’s a couple I wouldn’t make again as they were mostly not worth the extra cost or effort, but none have been failures.
Just order off the value or kiddie menu. It’s cheaper to boot.
This is very, very true. I’m 22 and most of my friends eat out constantly. I like to cook and do my own thing. It’s really not hard to make a cheap, good meal. It’s just that everyone is so used to the luxury of cheap takeout. Besides, for my job I see a lot of commercial kitchens and there’s not a single restaurant (except maybe 5 guys and Chick-fil-A) that actually cleans their kitchens right. Most kitchens I see literally smell like a sewer and have years and years of grease buildup everywhere.
Kitchen-safe degreaser is a godsend and I wish I learned of it earlier in life.
This is so true.
When I lived in London, I took out a fixed amount every week for groceries and always had change left over. Coins went into a jar and any notes went into a little safe I had in the apartment. Once I had 500 British monies in the safe, I deposited half of it into my savings account. Every year I’d exchange the coins for notes and bank that too. The change I saved every week helped pay for vacations around Europe and helped me ship my car back to NZ after 9 years.
I’m lucky that I don’t have to worry about money now like I used to back then, but I still have a jar for change and always keep $1000 cash in the safe.
Another point of anecdata: Even among my friends who like to cook, they don’t like to cook only for themselves. When they have a family or significant other they like to do it, but on their own it’s not worth the hassle.
Also, in my experience most people are pretty bad cooks. The exceptions are mostly older people who a) grew up in an era where there weren’t as many prepared meals available and b) have had a lifetime to hone their cooking skills. For all the shit people give places like Applebee’s about having mediocre food, it’s still better than most of what you’d get from an inexperienced home chef.
I’ve often found that the math doesn’t work as well when you are flying solo as well. A decent meal for one may cost $12 to cook or $15 to buy. But the same meal for two may cost $15 to cook and $30 to buy. And the amount of time to prep/make/cleanup for 2 is barely any different than the amount of time for 1. Even cooking for 4 only adds maybe 10% to total time.
So the total cost/benefit analysis is much less obvious to an individual than to a family.
Just make the portion for 2 and you have leftovers. I don’t really see how you aren’t saving money cooking your own food unless you’re going about it in a very odd manner.
I make the conscious choice to do takeout and dine-in regularly, but I wouldn’t try to argue that I’m saving money. That’s really not the point.
We all have things we like to spend our money on (cars, gambling, sports, concerts, whatever), food is just another experience where you can decide to spend money on it or the bare minimum. There’s no right choice for everyone.
Oil change shops can turn your $100 oil change into an $8,000 engine repair. They have so many creative ways too!
Sure, there’s the classic “Forgot the oil”..an oldie but a goodie.
For the connoisseur they offer the “We told you we used synthetic but we didn’t”. That’s playing the long game!
Don’t forget the always entertaining “Left the plastic wrap on the oil filter”.
I especially loved “Doubled up filter gasket”. Memorable!
Even “Cross threaded your oil pan plug” has its fans.
So many looks!
Or there’s the time about six months back when my daughter took her GX470 into a shop for a change because it was too hard to remove a few extra bolts to get the skid plate off to remove the filter. Last month we decided to do it at home like usual and things were a lot easier because hey, no more skid plate! Guess the grease monkeys thought it was too much work as well and decided to help us out by just throwing it away.
Yup. Every time I see a car on the highway with its underside flapping like a caught trout I think: Gee, thanks Jiffylube.
I think it’s more thank the vehicle manufacturer for not making the flappy underbody cover easier to remove. I would highlight BMW as the one to emulate. Every once I’ve done has 6-8 half turn screws that stay trapped in the cover so you don’t lose them. Compare this to some GM ones I’ve done that take 15-20 push fasteners of a couple different sizes that take a special tool to remove and still break 1/2 of the time.
-I cuss Ford every time I change oil on my 17 Escape…9 torx head fasteners. Have to remove whole apron, no access hole like wife’s Subaru.
-I bought Escape with 16k miles. It was already missing 5 of the special fasteners; held on by only 4. Had to order the special fasteners from Ford…no other equivalent. Super step pitch coarse thread I guess for fast removal/reinstall.
I have a C-Max with the fasteners you mention, with over 250k miles, so lots of oil changes. Most of the plastic inserts for said screws are stripped out, so I just stopped putting the shield back on a while back.
On my 2002 Forester, there is a factor oil drain opening in the engine shield. I rough cut an additional flap under the oil filter and used the weight of vice grips to hold the flap open when needed. When done with the filter replacement, I tuck the flap up and the burrs from the rough cut held it closed. Has worked for years.
> Oil change shops can turn your $100 oil change into an $8,000 engine repair. They have so many creative ways too!
Haha! So can I!
That would be a good old fashioned organic sustainable locally grown f@&k up, so it’s cool
I change all of the oil for my family. When my daughter was at college she took her car to the dealer for an oil change. They forgot to reinstall the oil cap. She only realized this a week later when blue smoke started pouring out from under the hood. Ford was cool and extended her engine warranty and cleaned up the mess, but to this day the hood liner continues to drip the occasional drop of oil. That was 6 years ago.
I have the same vehicle (22 hybrid). It is a pain to remove the 15 T30 bolts to remove the underside shield but the oil drain and filter are so easy to access. I do it but I take my time and find it relaxing. (Usually twice a year with the oil change intervals and my commute) . It costs about half of a Valvoline Oil Change doing it myself.
For years, I put my 1st gen Insight on jack stands and laboriously removed the aero shields under the car for oil changes, which was a PITA. Then I got an Abarth which also has a bunch of crap to remove under the car when I’d rather be drinking a tasty pilsner or walking my cat or whatever.
So I experimented and bought a $21 delivered extraction pump from Aliexpress and quickly fell in love with my new gadget. It rapidly pumps the oil from the bottom of the pan up and into my waste can, no muss, no fuss, no jacks or stands or sliding around on dirty surfaces.
If the link doesn’t work, try searching for “12V 5L Transfer Pump Extractor Oil Fluid Scavenge”.
https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805357298172.html
Still gotta get to the filter, unless that’s accessible from the top.
Fiat used a cartridge filter accessible from the top. It requires a socket extension and a swivel fitting + a (I think) a 27mm socket. Pull the intake duct to the turbo aside and it comes out with little mess if you give it time to drain first.
The engine bay on an Abarth is way too cramped, but this is easy enough.
“walking my cat”
=D
Read your owner’s manual! Only use the specific type, and weight they specified. You CANNOT put regular oil in a modern engine, and not do damage! Modern engines have much tighter tolerances, and REQUIRE full synthetic to get in between those tolerances! What is wasteful, is using full synthetic on a classic that has not been rebuilt to tighter tolerances, because you will get more oil consumption.
That’s…… misinformation.
Synthetic oil does not “get in between those tolerances” any differently than conventional oil does. You’re describing viscosity, which is the same between synthetic and conventional oil.
You absolutely can run conventional in a newer engine without damaging it. Millions of people do every day. It will not last as long between oil changes, and it may not be best practice(especially on turbo engines), but it’s obviously false to say otherwise.
For a said viscosity, full synthetic does indeed flow faster due to uniform molecular structure. It is also more stable at temperature extremes. I’m aware there are varying opinions on this, but surely you can agree that following the manufacturers specifications while under warranty is the only way to go. The article made it sound arbitrary.
“I’m aware there are varying opinions on this”
And that’s why specifications exist.
I doubt there’s any 0w-20 that’s not full-synth, at those low viscosities a non-synthetic oil will likely require changes at 2-3k miles before it breaks down and falls out of spec.
I can’t remember any car or motorbike made in the last 3-4 decades that didn’t require full-synth oil, written clearly in the owner’s manual.
As baby jesus once said, RTFM
3-4 decades? You know that means 40 years, right? Because i can assure you, my 90s Hondas, 90s Jeeps, and 90s f150 do not ask for synthetic oil in the manual. Believe me, i’ve checked.
Yeah, that fool has no idea what he’s talking about
3-4 decades?! ha ha ha ha!!!
I was still living in Europe back then, so I’ve no idea what an F150 of that vintage would require (canola oil from walmart, maybe..? 🙂
I do remember, however, my ’99 BMW and my Kawasaki requiring synthetic in the owner’s manual. Before that my memory is a bit fuzzy, I think my older twin-spark Alfas also required synthetic, but it’s been too long and I’m an old now..
I mean, we have an ’07 Forester (Subaru 2.5) and Vibe/Matrix (with the ubiquitous Corolla 1.8), neither of them specify synthetic or have ever gotten it. Those two are both very common engines as well.
You went a little crazy with that statement. 4 decades is wildly inaccurate.
I literally said “I can’t remember” (see my original post above), so maybe I wasn’t hanging my hat on the 3-4 decades estimate, but it’s funny how all the replies have been laser-focused on that rather than my points about newer engines requiring synth oil and 0W-20 being exclusively synthetic.
Also I’m sure I have a certain bias due to my preference for more performance-oriented vehicles than old EJs and ‘murican Corollas, which would probably run fine on canola oil from Walmart 🙂
We’re harping on it because it’s an odd statement considering the most popular/common cars and trucks being sold in the US (and other places) up until maybe 10 years ago almost all specified regular oil in the manual.
It’s hard to imagine someone forgot about the entirety of appliance vehicles and missed the age range by 3 decades just because they own a bike and a BMW. Especially if you’re going to tell people to RTFM and then make comments about Walmart oil. That’s both ignorant AND annoying.
hmm..
VW’s 1.8T 20v engines had synth oil reqs and were notorious for sludging with crappy oil, they were made from the mid-90’s and put in Golfs, Passats & Beetles, all of which I definitely consider ‘appliance cars’.
Sorry bud, maybe this time you won’t get to be right on the internet, no matter how much you call others ignorant 🙂
You conveniently forgot the rest of that attached sentence wherein it says “considering the most popular/common cars and trucks being sold in the US…”.
Golfs, Passats, and Beetles would not be considered among the most common/popular cars when compared to pickups and Corollas. Those car sales by year are rounding errors compared to Corollas, let alone pickups.
For the Beetle, Toyota sold more Corollas in the US in 2006 than the last 15 years of Beetle sales COMBINED.
For the Golf, it’s combined US totals in the last 15 years is dwarfed by 2005+2006 of Corolla sales.
For the Passat, combined sales for the last 15 years are no match for the Corolla if we add 2007 to the 2005+2006 totals.
So yeah, no. At best, those VWs are less than a fifth of Corolla sales. Nevermind pickups.
Oh, yeah.. you’re right, Golfs, Passats and Beetles are exotic limited-edition supercars, because everyone knows it’s production & sales numbers that define ‘appliance cars’. /s
..which is why we can buy such exotics as the Mitsubishi Mirage, which sold less than 20k units/year here 🙂
This was my sentence – We’re harping on it because it’s an odd statement considering the most popular/common cars and trucks being sold in the US (and other places) up until maybe 10 years ago almost all specified regular oil in the manual.
I never said appliance cars there or mentioned anything about exotic cars.
Read and understand the whole sentence. While Golfs/Passats/Beetles are not unpopular or uncommon, they are not among THE MOST COMMON, as my sentence reads.
There isn’t even a VW of any kind in the top 25 US vehicles for last year. You are not making valid points.
Sample – https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g43553191/bestselling-cars-2023/
I also have no clue what you’re on about with your Mirage comment. No one cares about a Mitsubishi Mirage.
I usually do it myself b/c I enjoy it, but will take my cars to my preferred Ford dealer if I’m pressed on time and have a coupon.
I understand the economics of the business, so I don’t begrudge their attempts to pay down the overhead, etc. BUT what I find really suspicious is their newer “<fill in the season> driving check!” service.
It seems to amount to a desultory look at “major systems” to ensure they’re okay. And by major, I mean tires, wipers, that sort of thing.
It’s bad enough they charge ~$40 for this, but I suspect it’s basically a fishing expedition to take advantage of people who don’t know cars.
It’s right up there with “dealer-recommended services” that owners manuals don’t mention.
uh… bro it’s a maverick. Just drive one side up on a curb and drain and fill it. Takes 10 min. I did “curb” oil changes from when I was 16-20 or so, until I made friends with people with garages.
This, and slide a big piece of cardboard underneath the truck before you drain the oil and you won’t have any mess to clean up.
That, or those drive-on plastic ramps. I bought a set because jacking up my mother’s Monte Carlo with that long SS nose piece just took forever.
I have a pair of metal ramps and a newer plastic pair that I found at a garage sale. Your first DIY oil change will pay for them, and they are great to have. Paying for someone who knows less about cars (and cares less about your car) than you do is silly, as long as you are able-bodied. Look at it this way: each tire rotation, filter change or oil change that you do yourself saves you enough money for at least a half a tank of free gasoline, and you know it has been done right, and you get to pick the quality and brand of parts that are used.
I bought a 2nd set of the plastic ramps and now I can fully raise my vehicles up. Originally did this so I could change my trans fluid that has to be level and running when refilling. You fill til comes out plug hole on trans. No dipstick.
What does being a Maverick have to do with that? I don’t think it has enough clearance for curb oil changes to be practical.
I promise it does. Find a tall curb. Drive up from a driveway entrance, one wheel on the curb. Bing bang boom done.
Depending on where the drain plug is on the pan you might not get a complete drain of the oil that way.
But a lot of the newer vehicles have that damn cover that has to be fully removed to access pan/filter…looking at you Ford.
I bet like 75% of them won’t have them within a few years.
Depends where he is. Where I used to live the drivers would likely run you over trying to do that. Worth it to take it to someone instead.
Apt life makes many things hard to do.
So use a dark corner of a parking structure. Or a quiet street. Or your boss’s driveway when s/he’s away.
.
Property owners hate this one simple trick!
Yeah, no. No one with any sanity is going to let you wrench on their property, at least not around here. I guess if you live in the boonies maybe. Liability is a bitch.
YMMV. This is a topic for Wrenching Wednesday: Where to Wrench.
I’ve also been a bit sticker shocked lately but oil change prices.
I used to work at a quick lube type place(30 years ago) and they were a little on the pricey side at the time but still under $30 in general(the owner was an idiot, he’d point across the street at the Wal-mart doing oil changes and say “that’s not our competition, we have a higher level of service!” ok buddy, nobody cares, they see $15 oil change vs $30 and go there).
And then for years did my own, and close friends and family’s too so didn’t become aware of the prices steadily rising.
Now we just have the 1 car to do and my time is becoming more valuable so I just take it to the local Take 5 place, in and out, it’s still about $70 which falls into that, a little high, but we don’t put as many miles on the gas car and again it’s quick and easy so paying for convenience too.
I have had at least on negative experience at an oil change place, so hesitant to use them again. I have a sloped driveway, so built ramps to level out the car which as a bonus provides easy access to under the engine. Doing both an oil change and tire rotation at the same time works well. When my grandkid was living with me, doing such work together was a great way to teach about cars and doing stuff together. When I was commutting 100 miles per day, every 10 weeks I was doing the procedure. Now that I’m working form home, I still do it when needed. It also provides the opportunity to look over the brake pads and whatever is exposed when the wheels are off along with eyeballing the tires. Bonus when doing it at home is that I can parcel the various steps out during the day and get other stuff done at the same time. I bring out the vacuum cleaner and vacuum out the engine bay and the floor mats as well.
When I bought my van in 2021, I also purchased one of those pre-paid maintenance plans. It was about $2000 for all planned maintenance for the next eight years, all rolled into my financing. And the best part is, I inflation-proofed myself!
I don’t like doing fluids-related service myself because the storage and disposal is a hassle and a half. So I’ll gladly pay someone else to do the dirty work. And now I don’t care how much an oil change costs anymore, because I already paid for it three years ago.
So you paid $2000 for $500 of fluids, parts and easy peasy DIY labor.
Genius!!
You’re only doing 20 oil changes (being generous at only $25 per DIY oil change) in 8 years? Do you people even drive?
Considering that we don’t know how many oil changes he averages per year, he could absolutely be a genius. Besides the fact that crapping on other people’s active decisions, especially with regards to paying for things they don’t enjoy doing, is pretty pointless.
Only? Even 20 changes in 8 years is overkill on a modern(ish) car:
“For the Accord, Honda recommends changing your oil every 7,500 miles or 12 months under normal driving conditions”
https://honda-tech.com/how-tos/a/honda-accord-general-information-and-maintenance-schedule-374611
Maybe with synthetic. With traditional oil that’s likely going to be an extended interval and that’s assuming you don’t fall under the severe schedule.
Best way is to get an oil analysis done at something like 5k and see the actual results in the oil.
Otherwise you’re just guessing.
That article you cited applies mostly to cars not even made in this millennium btw. If we’re just citing random articles, here is one from a dealer that says conventional should be every 3k or 3 months. https://www.bramanhonda.com/how-often-should-you-change-your-oil-miami-fl/
That is the very purpose of standards. And those have only been improving over time.
So if the manual for your 1999 Honda Accord calls for changes every 7500 miles using motor oil that met API standards 2001 it is as sure a bet as you’re going to find that you’ll be fine going 7500 miles between changes using any recommended oil made in 2024. If analyzing your oil every 5k makes you feel better by all means do so. It’s your money.
Personally I don’t see the point over simply examining the waste oil and drain plug magnet unless those show something of concern. So far I’ve noted nothing of concern in any vehicle I’ve ever owned and never had an engine issue due to oil induced wear, even on my old Triumph. In fact I just did the very first valve clearance check on my 18 yo Accord at 160k and found they were all dead center of factory specs, no adjustment needed at all.
I said AT something like 5k, not EVERY 5k. If your engine is changing characteristics so often that it necessitates a test every time, you’ve got serious issues.
But there’s certainly no harm in doing an oil analysis a few times to see what the state of your oil is as you hone your change interval. Not all usage scenarios or engines (or oil for that matter) are the same.
And while I think 3k is erring excessively on the low side for most usage, mfrs have been known to list maintenance intervals for things that are wildly optimistic. How many “lifetime” designations have been written into car manuals that were anything but?
“I said AT something like 5k, not EVERY 5k”
5k from new? 5k after it’s bought used at 439k?
“But there’s certainly no harm in doing an oil analysis a few times to see what the state of your oil is as you hone your change interval.”
Except the time and money spent of those analysis of course.
IMO the only time such an analysis is going to have any meaningful action for a typical consumer is by the buyer as part of the pre purchase inspection on a vehicle without service records or by the seller of a vehicle as a selling point, otherwise it’s for engine abusers (racers, etc) and manufacturer R&D.
How many “lifetime” designations have been written into car manuals that were anything but?
That’s a valid point; however, it’s easy enough on most cars to just pull the dipstick and take a look/feel/sniff. If you don’t like what you get maybe its time for a change, otherwise just wait till the book says so.
Preferably 5k after you last changed the oil. But feel free to substitute whatever oil interval you feel is a fair starting point.
While you may be able to see or sniff better than a $35 Blackstone test breakdown, I would wager that most people cannot.
The time and money spent on the analysis/analyses will help you save money in the form of either less oil changes or more frequent oil changes that are staving off increased engine wear. That’s a smart investment, not a waste of money.
As for doing it at the time of a PPI, I don’t see how that would work unless you’re just using it as a general engine health indicator. The seller can do it but you aren’t going to trust them on the change interval. And if the car doesn’t have good records, doing it yourself at time of the PPI is entirely pointless because you have no idea how long the oil has been in the car. Either way, it doesn’t help you adjust the oil change interval, which was my initial point for why you would want to run an oil analysis in the first place.
“Smart investment”…
Hmm, spend $35 on a test to tell me maybe I can save $20 by skipping the next oil change or should think about spending $20 on an extra oil change or that I’m already totally, utterly boned.
I dunno, seems that’s something the manufacturer already did to an extent far greater than I could ever hope to do as part of the development of the engine, hence the maintenance schedule. Given that’s how literally millions of drivers have scheduled their oil changes and that to the best of my knowledge only a tiny fraction of those millions who follow the schedule see problems attributable to excessive, preventable wear and how most off those cars are disposed of long before their engines wear out I’m just gonna stick with the schedule. It’s worked quite well for me so far.
Even amongst the same model, every car is going to act differently based on: how it was assembled, where and how it is operated, how it is maintained (or not) and a variety of other factors.
If you don’t think it worth it to know the state of your particular engine health to that degree and also don’t care to customize your oil change intervals to what best suits your particular situation, that’s your choice. But paying $35 a few times to gain insight into something you are likely to keep for a decade or more seems logical to me. Especially when said object is a staple part of your existence.
Saving a buck isn’t the be-all and end-all in life.
Speak for yourself 😉
I don’t disagree, but check the username of the person you sent that to.