Hello all - A little background first. I've owned my '03 for nearly a year now, and when I bought it, it had 23K miles on it. At that time, it was getting close to Inspection I, and when that happened (at 29K miles) I took it to the dealer. The main reason I took it in was to make sure it had everything up to date (like the DME recall, which it did not) and to have them give it a once-over. The dealer did the Inspection I, and I felt as though I was slightly overcharged, so I decided that from that point on, I would do my own maintenance. I have done my own maintenance on all my previous cars, so I wasn't worried about this.
After reading many posts on the subject of oil, frequency of changes, and the like, I decided that I would change every 5K miles and switch to Mobil 1 0W-40. 34K came pretty quick, so I planned on doing the oil change yesterday (Saturday).
In preparation, I ran over to the dealer, which is about an hour round-trip for me, and picked up an oil filter kit. Then on Saturday morning, I went in search of Mobil 1 0W-40. I found it at Autozone for about $6.50/qt. I tried Wal-Mart, but they did not carry that weight.
So into the garage, and up in the air. I still don't have any ramps that will work (in plan) so I went through my ritual of getting her up on two jack stands, and set about the job.
Based on what I read in the TIS, the oil service / inspection sheets, and on this board, I started by removing the oil filter housing cap. Man, was that thing tight! It took quite a bit of effort to break it loose. In fact, I noticed that one of the rubber mounting grommets was broken, causing my oil filter housing to be slightly wobbly. I will replace that part shortly.
I then removed the oil fill cap, and proceded under the car to drain the crankcase. I love the trap-door concept. The oil drain plug was also extremely tight, but I was successful in breaking it loose without rounding it off (thank you six-point socket) and drained the oil. My favorite part of the oil change was the realization that replacing the drain plug after drainage was the end of my under-car experience. In other words, I was happy that the filter was handled from up above. Never had that on a car before.
Now came the first glitch. And it was totally my fault. I was replacing the drain plug, and it slipped out of my hand and into my drain pan. Not a big deal, you say, but I use drain pans that are enclosed, with just a hole in the center for the oil to enter. Well, drain plugs can also enter in there! Yikes. So I spent several minutes pouring the oil from the drain pan into some gallon jugs I had in the garage in order to rescue the wayward plug. That accomplished, I successfully replaced the drain plug (with new metal washer) and closed up the trap door.
Now for the second glitch. The parts guy sold me the wrong oil filter kit. I took the filter out of the box, and the proceeded to take the old filter out of the cap, and noticed that they were very different sizes. Dammit. Double dammit. So, pack up the old one, take the incorrect one, and off to the dealer before they close. That's the last time I do that. Pelicanparts, here I come. Anyway, got the correct filter and back to the garage. Hey, it fits! Novel approach.
So, after she's all buttoned up, proceed to fill with the Mobil 1, fire it up, and check the level. 7 quarts put it about 1/2 way up the dipstick, but that could be because I didn't really warm it up and let it idle for a minute before checking. I will recheck when I gas up today or tomorrow.
Overall, I was very happy with how easy it was, and I wanted to say thanks for all the great advice from this board on oil choices and change intervals. There are many to choose from, and everyone is free to pick what works for them, but I believe for me, I made a good choice.
For those who actually read this whole post, have a cold one on me.
Mike S.
Linear Mode
