Nissan Frontier Oil Change not been done in 25,000 miles

Maintenance/Repairs
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1

I am looking at a used '01 Nissan Frontier with 46,000 miles that is for sale from a private person. Test drove the truck and heard no noises and drove smooth. But I noticed that the oil has not been changed in 25,000 miles! Is this only going to present problems later? Should I walk away?

2

I’d definitely walk away.

3

If possible, look inside a valve cover to check for oil sludge. If any is found walk away. Here’s an example of oil sludge. http://www.tegger.com/hondafaq/sludge/cleaning_sludge.html

Tester

4

Personally, I would RUN away from this situation.
If the owner has not changed the oil (which is the easiest of services), just imagine how little other maintenance has ever been done on this truck over the past 10 years.
More than likely, no maintenance has ever been done.
Perhaps, if you are not risk averse, you can get this rolling timebomb for a very low price.

Find out what the book value is for one of these trucks, in fair condition.
Then, subtract ~$3k from that price and make an offer for that amount.
Since it is likely that you will have to replace/rebuild the engine within short order, getting the price down by at least $3k is appropriate.

5

My vote is with VDCdriver. Run away so fast that it would put an Olympic sprinter to shame.

Some unlucky sould is going to wind up with an expensive headache in the foreseeable future.
The only way I would consider this truck would be if the price was in the dirt cheap range but my gut feeling is the seller is probably asking a premium because of low mileage.

6

No noises Very good! How do you know it hasnt been changed in 25,000?

7

Dont be scared yet. Some of these trucks are very hard to kill

8

The sticker on windshield may not be indicative. I would ask owner and see how they respond about it.

9

Talk is cheap.
If the seller claims that the oil has been changed at appropriate intervals, ask to see his maintenance invoices.

10

If the oil has not been changed in 25K miles then just think of all the other important maintenance items that have been neglected. Run away.

11

I don’t keep maintenance invoices for ANY of my oil changes once past warranty.

If the oil truly hasn’t been changed in 25k miles…I don’t care if it doesn’t make any noise or if there’s not even one drop of sludge…RUN…Don’t walk away.