Well it was just below the freezing mark today for the first time in a while and Canadian Rubber had Mobil1 on sale for 35$ for 5.4l. Works out to about half of regular price up here so what the heck and bought a couple of jugs. Like I said it was a nice day and tolerable in the unheated garage so why not change the oil. I usally get lazy and hit the quick change at the dealership and now I'm having second doubts. The plug came out easy enough but the darn filter was TIGHT. I swear they must have found a way to torque the sucker on to 100lbs. I've used various sizes of those plastic cup sockets and this time it snapped in half. Couldn't find my metal strap wrench so went next door to borrow his. The metal strap broke off the wrench after putting my body weight into it. A cut to the forehead and 4-5 on the hands later, I found the pieces of the wrench and held them back in place with vise grips. At this point it was sort of personal so I held the whole works together with two hands, the vise grips to replace the broken clip on the wrench and slip resist cloth. It took about 1-2 turns before I could manage to turn the filter by hand it was so seazed on there. No way it should have been that way since the summer. I gather they probably didn't oil the gasket and must have used a lot of force to slap the thing on. Anyway, that's my venting for the year and too bad the dealership is far enough away I couldn't return their darn filter through the service window. ****ty day after all but hey now I'll never forget the day I made the switch from conventional oil. Sorry almost forgot the question... any trick to loosening a filter when it just won't move? Worst one I've seen in 20+ years of oil changes but I'm sure I can learn something.

 

When I have trouble getting filters off I let the engine warm up for 10 minutes or so and if I still can't get it by hand I use and old leather belt and if that won't work the last trick always gets it is a Phillips head screw driver and hammer

 

Never even thought of punchng a screw driver through it but I think it might have ripped the housing apart anyway. The engine and oil was definately warm but it still broke 2 filter wrenches. Since the metal strap wrench snapped where the band wraps around the pivot/bolt, I'm going to look into the similar models with synthetic straps. Seems like they would be stronger in case I ever come across this again. usually the socket types allow you to take them off by hand pretty easy so I never really worried about it before.

 

I stuck that grip tape on the inside of my metal strap oil filter wrench. I haven't busted my knuckles up yet under there!