“Tips for making oil changes easier and less messy?”
@Barkeydog agree
Take it to a local garage and have them do it.
Sometimes the difference in price and the aggravation of disposal, freezing your hands in the winter and stains…just isn’t worth it.
I use ramps, corrogated cardboard to slide under the car, a rag, and a $1 turkey baster pan (which I discard). The tools I keep in a small “toolbox”. And I have a set of 3-finger “stubby” box-end wrenches to prevent overtightening of the drain plug. Filters should only be tightened wrist tight, but I use dispozable latex gloves to grip the filter to tighten it.
When I did my own oil changes, one “tool” I found quite useful was one of my old belts. I had one car where there wasn’t room to work the handle on strap filter. However, I could wrap the belt around the filter and there was room to pull on the belt. The filter would come right off. The car where I used this was my 1978 Oldsmobile Cutlass Salon with the 260 cubic inch V-8 engine. I had purchased a filter wrench that would fit the end of the filter, but it only worked on the AC filter. I had used another make of filter at an oil change. When it was time for the next oil change, the filter wrench that fit the end of the AC filter wouldn’t fit the other brand. There wasn’t enough room as a said before to use the strap wrench, so to complete the job, I just took off my belt. The belt became my filter wrench if I happened to use another filter make than an AC.
I find that all the owners manuals I have has so far have had a few blank pages in the back, I use these to record all maintenance. I also keep a pen in the car. I find that if I don’t record it right away, I don’t record it at all.
I also use appliance boxes under the vehicle, the tri-wall construction is quite comfortable over my crushed stone driveway.