i work at an auto parts store and i hear so many horror storys about those places i never been to one and dont think i ever will infact we had one lady come from a place called big10 tires and from the looks of it the oil plug was loose fell off and she blew her motor as she was getting in the parking lot

 

All ican say is I do my own NO one touches my car unless its the guys at work while i'm there to see it. I guess i'm kinda **** like that. Most of the oil change place hire whoever they can get for next to min. wage. Trust me most of the guys at wal-mart could care less not because of the customer but because of how they are treated by walmart. the second they start to care bout customers they turn up being fired for numerous reasons. For the time and money do it yourself and know its done right.

 

Unfortunetley I have to agree with most of you about the fast lube places. Saying that, I run a fast lube and tune place and I can't defend my competitors, I can thank the two that around me for there customers. I see alot of them coming to my shop for oil changes and repairs on oil pans. It would be a great worl if everybody did a jon 100% all the time as I'm sure we all do in our own profession. But we are talking about the love of our life, "CARS" and like I tell my guys you can fool with me but not my food, my wife, my tools or my cars. No specific order. I would like to point out thoght that if you find a good place and fill comfortable with the shop you can get a better service on you car such as lubing the grease fittings, checking all the boxes and topping off as needed, trany, dif, transfer cases
a general saftey check. I hire my techs by background and williness to learn the buisness. I pay a fare wage for the area and I dismis when a employee looses the drive to excel. I have had two of the three emplyees with me now for 4 years. It's great.

 

I change my own since it's the most convenient for my retarded weekly schedule. I also don't trust others since my mom's car got really screwed the last time she got hers changed at a WalMart (then again, personally, I don't think I'd ever bring my truck to wal mart to get the oil changed...) and the repairs ended up taking a whole weekend. They first FORGOT to put oil back into it and then put a "defective" Fram oil filter on it.
For a non-Fram (my boyfriend has convinced me that Fram is the devil) oil filter and Castrol GTX oil, I spend about $16 at Autozone. I change it every 3k-4k miles.

Question: Given that I have a 2002 (new body style) 4.7L ram with 70k miles, should I switch to synthetic oil? I've heard that unless you start it on a low mileage car, its pointless to switch. Any ideas?

 

hhmmm. .. lets see, $80 to have the stealership change the oil, or $25 for me to do it. (3 gallons in the Cummins BTW)

I used to work in an auto shop, when the oil changes backed up I usualy hopped in on them to help out the fresh meat. most of these guys could bairly tell the difference between the oil fill and the radiator fill. it was scarry. this is why I do it myself.

 

Question: Given that I have a 2002 (new body style) 4.7L ram with 70k miles, should I switch to synthetic oil? I've heard that unless you start it on a low mileage car, its pointless to switch. Any ideas?


my father in law bought his dakota with the 4.7 in it around 70000 on the clock and switched to mobil1 and said he will never go back. The old way of thinking was with high miles that synthetic would leak from the seals. this held true some of the time when seal were worn because the old syn was thin and would clean so well that i would find tiny leaks in the system. since the synthetic has been thickened up a bit to reduce these problems. I myself have never seen a vechile leaking oil from using synthetic oil. that said it is never to late to switch to a synthetic oil. the properties of the oil are just that much superior to organic oil that it out weighs the competition. I would recomend though when switching to synthetic oil after that many miles to do a oil system flush making sure to drain the system completely and fill with the synthetic. After 3000 mile do an oil change (i know what your thinking yes synthetic last longer) but with the switch to synthetic oil it is going to clean alot of crap out of the motor, it is more just to help get some of the crud out and keep it out. after you change the oil go what ever you feel you need for OCI wether it is 5000 or 6000 miles.

 

seeing that I already go 10k between oil changes, and yes I do keep an eye on my oil and only change it when the soot gets high enough to leave my fingers black, going to synthetics would only extend that.

However, I also have heard about the synthetic rumor and I believe that with todays synthetics the leaking has been fixed so you can toss it in when ever you like.

However, FYI the Engine is the only component of the entire truck that from the factory has dyno, everything else is synthetic.

 

Is mobil 1 a synthetic motor oil. I have 45,000klm on my 03 5.7 hemi but it is still under warrantee.

 

Yes, Mobil 1 is a synthetic motor oil.

In regards to the leaking synthetics. On cars of old, the seals would over time, get hard and brittle leading to cracking and leakage, however, the oil that was used would sludge up and collect in the places where the oil would have leaked out, creating an effective seal. When the person would switch over to synthetic, the synthetic would dissolve some of the sludge and would 'unplug' the sludge plugs and casue leakage, leading to the popular misconception of synthetic oil makes your engine leak all over the place.

On another note, dino oils are refined and have impressive additive packages added in that the older oils did not. On a microscopic level, the particles that make up dino oil are of varying size, as opposed to the synthetics smaller more uniform size, which contribute to thier respective properties. I'd prefer to have Mobil 1 in my crankcase, however, money issues prevail and I'm using dino oil right now. I hope to switch over at 15K.