@db4690 an older kia optima im not sure of the year.
My one experience with this was , the oil change boy put the vehicle on the lift & drained the oil . Quitting time came while it was up on the lift & he let it down & went home without putting oil in it . The vehicle was also to be tuned & the next morning the mechanic jumped in it & went for a test drive to see how it ran .
It didn’t make it but a mile or two . This was an old International Scout & probably didn’t have an oil light in the dash & maybe not an oil pressure gauge either . The shop completely rebuilt the engine for free .
How long will a car last without oil?
For sake of argument say the drain plug was completely removed and the engine oil drained out overnight, so the only oil left in the engine was what accumulates in puddles inside, and what’s sticking to the parts. Then you start the car and drive, how long before the engine is destroyed to the point it requires replacement or a complete overall replacing all the bearings? … hmmmm …
I’m guessing 5 miles at city-driving speed, 3 miles at freeway speed.
300++ miles without oil?
Not possible. Not even close.
You have my best wishes. The lady in question does not.
I hope your manager is not in a hurry to agree to anything they may want. They should not be offered anything without a very thorough inspection.
An old Kia Optima with junk tires comes across to me a rolling POS. If that car owner actually made a comment about a new car to your manager it seems to me they’re fishing for a deal; courtesy of a bank account not belonging to them.
If it makes you feel any better almost every shop on the planet has been blamed for things like this and quite often multiple times. Sometimes justified; sometimes not.
People will do some devious things when it comes to having to spend money on their car; an asset that most people cringe at spending a dime on.
My gut tells me this is a scammer too. I bet there were other issues than bald tires with the cord showing. Weren’t there certain models of Kia that consumed oil like mad too? Was the Optima one of those?
Yes, there are people who would do something halfway to save a penny around here and then blame you when it blows up. I had someone bring me some equipment and complained about another place they had taken it to. They wanted me to do a “temporary fix” to save them some money and I told them I wasn’t going to do that as it would only be like $50 cheaper and could last them 2 days or 2 years but that it likely would fail again sooner than later. I told them if they wanted the temporary fix, then go back to the previous guy you didn’t like as he is known for those. They ended up being very happy with the properly done fix in the end.
When I was a teenager I had a night job as a gas station attendant. At a major brand full-service gas station. Almost every single customer that came in was aces and treated me well . But there was one lady with an older “deferred maintenance” car who’d come in every night and buy $2 worth of gas, and insist I check and inflate all four tires, and the spare, and wash the windows , all of them, and check the oil, brake fluid, and transmission fluid. And make sure the battery connections were tight. The next night she’d be in for the same free service, and $2 worth of gas. I explained to her that she needed to schedule a some routine maintenance from what I could see, but she just said “Oh, just the $2 worth of gas and the other stuff again.” … lol …
^
Well, at least she was more thorough than one of my regular customers.
Every morning, this guy would come racing into the station, and ask for “$2 regular, pronto. I’m late for work”, and then he would race back out to the highway for his morning commute.
Apparently, this guy never figured out that buying a full tank of gas every few days would have cost no more money than he was already spending, and would have actually saved him a bit of time in the process.
Driving around with tires worn down to the belts hangs a big dark cloud over this customer.
I always wanted to ask:
The oil plug torque spec in any manual is assuming the surfaces are dry. Usually, the mating threads are wet with oil. Shouldn’t this call for a torque modification? I think … increase?
In practice, my tranny drain plug - brand new - had to be tightened a couple rotations beyond the torque spec before the gear oil stopped appearing as a wet ring/drops. Of course, my torque wrench might be inaccurate, but the question stands…?
A torque value for an oil drain plug is tough to nail down. I simply snug the plug using a “stubby” wrench. That limits the amount of torque I can apply while allowing me enough to snug the plug. It’s worked for me for 45++ years, so I think I’ll stick with it. I’ve never stripped a plug and never lost one.
I’m in mountainbike’s camp. I don’t torque them and like spark plugs, use only feel. Since the late 60s I’ve never had one strip or come loose so no reason to change now. 
One thing that has happend and not just on drain plugs is this. Sometimes the threads are weakened by someone in the past who has been a little ham-fisted.
Set the torque wrench to the proper spec, tighten the fastener in question, and before the wrench comes close to clicking you detect that sickening feeling of threads pulling out.
Re: tightening drain plugs without stripping threads
I had this problem w/my truck to the point where the threads got stripped and wouldn’t tighten enough to prevent leaks. I noticed the problem was the threads on the drain plug bolt more than the threads in the pan. So I installed a thick rubber washer so as to use threads higher up on the bolt. The rubber washer sort of acts like a spring, so there’s some leeway in the tightening process. I’ve never had any drain plug leaks or thread problems since. I guess I unwittingly discovered the importance of putting a new washer on each time.
This poor mower went 12:25 before the rod let go! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlyNR7nMqfc I suggest forwarding to near this point, otherwise you will be bored with all the crap.
This looked like just a cheap mower and they ran it without oil and had dirt and sand in the oil and it STILL RAN for as long as it did!
It probably lasted that long because the engine is very low compression with comparatively little strain on the lower end and mowers are not exactly closely tolerance.
Seems a shame to destroy a mower for a YouTube video…
I heard about a guy once that took his newish Dodge Ram truck to Walmart for an oil change. After the change, the guy took his truck straight home and parked it. When he went to start it the next morning, somehow or another all of the oil had drained out of the engine, and the engine was basically toast. He called Walmart to complain. Within a very short period of time, Walmart sent a tow truck to the man’s house to get the truck, and in less than a week, the man had his truck back with a brand new engine. Never saw a bill of any kind.
With a dry crankcase, few cars can make it past 7 miles before the engine seizes…If the oil leaked out, the oil pressure warning light should have alerted the driver to the problem…
Hm, still more interesting than much of the “reality” television on basic cable. 
@ok4450 "Seems a shame to destroy a mower for a YouTube video… " Well, at least he seems to have plenty of spares sitting around in the background!
Looks like he takes off the oil cap at 4:30 so the thing didn’t really run the whole 12:25 without oil. It would be interesting if he drained the oil, started it up, DON’T add any crap, and see how long it goes.
There was a commercial that used to run years and years ago where they’d have two car engines in a “laboratory” on stands, one with regular oil and one with their additive, and they’d drain out all the oil and re-start the engines. Of course the one with the regular oil would seize up and the one that had had the additive in it would keep running. . . and running. But that was a long time ago and I don’t remember the name of the additive.
Prolong was the name of the additive. They used to claim an engine could be run without oil for days after using it and had big TV infomercials. I read several reviews that basically claimed the stuff was snake oil though and not really suggested. I kinda view Lucas much the same way. Bobistheoilguy has all kinds of information on these additives.
I am sure the loose tolerances are one reason that mower lasted as long as it did. I am always amazed at some of the sludge monsters I have come across where you change the oil and all seems well. The amount of abuse and neglect a mower can put up with before blowing up is pretty amazing. The average cheap consumer mower like the one pictured usually has the deck rust through or similar before the engine ever dies. I am sure this was a trash-picked mower that was used.
I know a guy who owns a mower repair business and is a warranty service center for some of the brands sold at Lowes and other big box stores. He has seen plenty of brand new shiny mowers that have never mowed a single blade of grass with locked up engines or holes in the side of the blocks. The new owner never added the included bottle of oil. The last time I bought a mower there were like 3 safety seals around the pull start that had to be removed, each with large warnings about adding oil before the first use. Of course people get all pissy when warranty is denied on a brand new mower.
cwatkin: 3 safety seals with warnings and they still failed to add the oil? It proves that making something “idiot proof” merely creates better idiots!