^
I agree with all of your observations, oblivion, but I perceive a difference between household/personal hygiene chores and checking one’s oil. If you lose friends because of a dirty house/yard/body, it is pretty obvious that the offender has nobody to blame but himself/herself. However, when a car’s engine self-destructs because of a lack of oil, it just becomes so easy to blame the manufacturer–who supposedly made a defective piece of equipment.
I think that it all comes down to that old bugaboo regarding failure to accept responsibility for one’s own actions (and inactions). It’s pretty hard for even the best rationalizer to deny responsibility for failing to shower one’s own body/wipe one’s nether regions/pick up dog poop, etc, but it just becomes so easy to dodge personal responsibility for lax car maintenance by blaming the folks who made the car.
I know many regulars will disagree with me on this (and that’s fine), but comments about those not accepting responsibility and blaming others are really referring to a minority of the population - one that’s likely always existed and never worth trying to change.
The fact that youth today have no concern about checking their oil is something we need to accept part of the blame for. Many of us contributors here grew up with car repairs being done all around us, and we learned by our role models. Today’s youth aren’t growing up in that environment.
What are we doing to help they learn about how to take car of cars at an early age? Blaming them after the fact only serves to make the blamer feel good.
I love the one about the guy bringing the car in for stalling. This is like the person who brings me a broken computer and says “There was nothing wrong with it when I brought it to you” when I call with the estimate. People also don’t call or bring their car to a mechanic if “there is nothing wrong with it”. This wasn’t like a routine maintenance issue like an oil change but an actual problem.
Some of this is just that people are dumb. Others have a serious “entitlement” mentality and try to get everything for nothing.
I just read the following from a guy who works at a Chevy dealership:
"a customer came in with a 2015 Z06 corvette, 7 speed
manual, with the 3LT and Z07 package and 500 miles. This is
the fastest version of the Z06 and is as close to a race car
for the street that Chevrolet has ever produced.
The complaint as written on the repair order was “When
pulling out rapidly into traffic, customer states that the
rear tires spin and the car lurches sideways. He states that
this is a very scary and dangerous situation.”
I have a saying: You can always fix the car but you can’t always fix the customer.
I sure hope the tech who is assigned this complaint with the car still under warranty at least gets paid a little for his time. If it were up to me a customer would pay 2 hours of diag time for investigating a complaint like this
That is hilarious! You have a car that is very specialized and going to be quite the handful and the owner says this! I bet this Corvette is worthless in any rain or snow too. Did they complain about that? This is NOT a daily driver unless you live on Phoenix or something most of the year.
I remember seeing a list of funny technical support stories. Of course many of them were computer related. An old woman thought the mouse was a foot pedal like on a sewing machine and didn’t know why the computer wouldn’t start up. Then there was one where the computer turned off and wouldn’t turn back on. It finally came out on the call that the power was out.
There were others too and one of the best ones was to General Motors. Someone had bought a car and it ran great for about two weeks and then just quit running. It finally came out that the owner didn’t understand that you needed to put gas into your car for it to continue running. How can you not realize why there are gas stations all over and that you need to do this? Again, you can’t fix stupid.
“When pulling out rapidly into traffic, customer states that the
rear tires spin and the car lurches sideways. He states that
this is a very scary and dangerous situation.”
Reminds me of an episode of “LA Law” where a guy who, according to his wife and others" isn’t a very good driver, buys a radically set up '60s muscle car and promptly wrecks it, then tries to sue the seller.
The complaint as written on the repair order was "When
pulling out rapidly into traffic, customer states that the
rear tires spin and the car lurches sideways. He states that
this is a very scary and dangerous situation."
I’d be first in line for this job. Excuse me sir, I’m going to need about 2 hours to diagnose this “defect” on the street. I believe you will need at least two new tires when I return. Yee-haw!!
Cars are coming of age. When something proves to be uber reliable and skipping the spot checks does not return to bite you in the behind…people stop doing them…
There’s a famous tech-support story told here in Silicon Valley, dated, but still funny. The customer phones up tech support and asks for help w/his floppy disc drive. Tech says “First, make sure the door is closed.” Customer says “ok, wait”. Tech hears room door go “SLAM!” Customer: Ok, I just closed the door. … lol …
Back to the oil price … . I stopped in at Costco over the weekend but they don’t sell the Pennzoil brand any longer it appears. “Chevron” or “Mobile 1” is all I saw on the shelves. I prefer to stick w/the same brand of oil, so I think I recall one of the posts above said that Wal-Mart sells Pennzoil for a competitive price, so I’ll check it out next time I visit Wally-World.
Edit: Not all bad news. They still sell huge, delicious watermelons at Costco!
I stopped in at Costco over the weekend but they don’t sell the Pennzoil brand any longer it appears.
When did Costco sell Pennzoil? (Forgive me, I’m a young man.) Why should it matter which brand they sell? Engines require motor oil and Costco sells motor oil.
I taught all of my kids how to maintain a car. This includes pulling the dipstick once a week, checking tire pressures, and keeping a maintenance log of everything done to the car, including wipers and air filters. I have them help me with tire rotations, oil changes and brake work. Unfortunately, I think many people either do not have the knowledge of cars to teach others or it is just one more thing that my generation of parents just takes care of for our spoiled, entitled brats. Is it any wonder they don’t check under the hood?
“When did Costco sell Pennzoil? (Forgive me, I’m a young man.) Why should it matter which brand they sell? Engines require motor oil and Costco sells motor oil.”
+1
I honestly can’t recall ever seeing Pennzoil at Costco, and it seems to me that over the past 10 years or so, the only oils that they have sold were Shell & Chevron conventional oils, and Mobil-1.
(Note: Unless the cases of motor oil move around on their own, they are not “mobile”.)
Nevada writes … “When did Costco sell Pennzoil? Why should it matter?”
Costco sold the Chevron dino-oil for about $3/quart, so it’s a pretty good deal, if you don’t mind using Chevron brand.
Here in the San Jose area at least they used to sell Pennzoil at Costco. If you Google “does Costco sell Pennzoil?” you can find some old expired Costco website links indicating they used to sell it. When that was, search me. I’d been using some gifted motor oil for a while. A friend was moving to LA, I helped him pack up his rental truck, in return he gave me three cases of Pennzoil 10W-30. And I already had 2 cases on hand. So I haven’t purchased motor oil in a number of years, until just recently, when I experienced sticker shock.
Why does the oil brand matter? I expect most major brands are good quality oil, and pretty much the same basic stuff. But each brand puts in their own additives, and the additives may not always be compatible between brands. I think it’s safer, once you choose a brand, to stick with the same brand.
I changed oil and filter in three cars this afternoon. Took about 17 quarts so my stock is a little depleted. I get mine at the farm store-Mobil and Mobil 1. On to tire rotation and interior cleaning. Why don’t people rotate their tires?
Personally, I don’t rotate my tires because I’d rather not mask any signs of abnormal wear and because it allows me to change them in pairs, amortizing the cost somewhat. I’m one of those rare individuals who actually monitors his tire wear.
I changed oil and filter in three cars this afternoon. Took about 17 quarts so my stock is a little depleted. I get mine at the farm store-Mobil and Mobil 1. On to tire rotation and interior cleaning. Why don’t people rotate their tires?
If I didn’t go to work at an auto shop every day, I can’t imagine changing my own oil or rotating my own tires. “Flatbacking” it is for the birds. I’ve got better things to do with my time and money.
Maybe I’m jaded after spending a lifetime (ok, I’m only 45) changing oil and rotating tires for other people.
@the same mountainbike "Personally, I don’t rotate my tires because I’d rather not mask any signs of abnormal wear and because it allows me to change them in pairs, amortizing the cost somewhat. I’m one of those rare individuals who actually monitors his tire wear."
I’m with you on this. I started the habit when my family was driving 4 vehicles thousands of miles per month. Rotating tires, in addition to many frequent oil changes, wouldn’t have possibly fit into my schedule, not enough hours in the day.
Not rotating, monitoring/reading wear patterns, and replacing tires in pairs or fours when necessary worked so well that I continue it now with fewer drivers and fewer miles driven.
Besides, I get such even wear on my GM vehicles that I don’t have uneven wear problems. I guess that for somebody with a car with funky tire wear characteristics, this idea wouldn’t work.
I have always checked under-hood fluids weekly and still do.
Ase, I actually enjoy doing these things… to the extent that I’m still able. I’ve always done as much on my own cars as I could, and always enjoyed it. Of course, I also spent some years of my life fixing B52s too, and also enjoyed that, and many years playing with hardware in the manufacturing industry, and always enjoyed that too. When I was a kid I was always either building a model or tearing down and rebuilding the spare engine we had for our gokart. I was too young to know how to do it properly, but it always worked. I guess I just like hardware. Always have.
I enjoy my work, but for me it’s just that, work. After 10 hours at the shop the last thing I want to do is come home and do more of that.
For years and years I almost always had a project car in the garage at home, in various states of repair or assembly. But after the last one, a 64 Olds that sat untouched in the garage for 2 years, my wife told me to either finish it or sell it. So I sold it. Finishing it would just take more time and money than I have to spare right now. When my kids are a little older I’ll get back into it, but right now my weekends are filled with little league and soccer games.