THE IMPORTANCE OF OIL CHANGES.
I currently own an auto service center and an auto parts store and I can never stress enough to customers how important oil changes are, especially in cars today. I have seen too many times customers refuse to change their oil regularly and it ends up costing them a fortune. Oil changes are the life of your engine! Most vehicles today have overhead cams and they need much more oil pressure to pump the oil to the top of the engine to lubricate critical parts. The oil ports in the block and cylinder heads are slightly smaller than the older style overhead valve engines. Therefore, the oil must be clean at all times to prevent sludge formation and clogging of the oil ports. Once the ports are clogged the oil pump can’t do its job and you end up losing oil pressure and that’s it for the engine. A very costly mistake.
Here’s an example of an engine we had to replace due to a lack of oil change. This was a 2007 Dodge Charger with a 70,000 mile V-6. The customer brought the car in and said he was being driven on the interstate one day and all of a sudden the oil light came on. Then the car started to go bad and died. Once it was towed away the car started and was banging. He knew that this was the end. Upon inspection, to see what caused this to happen, the valve covers were removed and about 2 inches of sludge could be seen on top of the cam and valve assembly.
I asked the customer if he had ever changed the oil and he said “not regularly”. I realized the car probably hadn’t seen an oil change since 2007. The engine change ended up costing about $3000, quite a difference from only paying a $30 oil change every few months.
THE IMPORTANCE OF ENGINE ANTIFREEZE OR COOLANT!
The purpose of antifreeze, or engine coolant as it is also called, is #1: it prevents the water in your engine from freezing in the winter and causing severe damage to your engine block and #2: it contains anti-corrosives to prevent your cooling system to corrode and clog.
If your cooling system is filled with only water and it freezes, the water will expand and crack the engine block. When it comes to corrosion, most engines today are made of aluminum, which using only water will cause corrosion and clog your cooling system. Today’s car radiators have very small cores and all the cooling holes in the engine are smaller than they used to be. So corrosion is a big problem. If you are topping up your cooling system, always mix engine coolant with water. Never use straight coolant alone, it should be mixed 50/50. You can buy coolant already pre-mixed 50/50 at all auto parts stores, or you can mix it yourself. The reason is that water cools much better than pure antifreeze. So in the summer when temperatures rise, 50% water will keep the engine much cooler to prevent overheating.
ANOTHER VERY IMPORTANT ADVICE.
If your car is losing coolant and you suspect a leak, DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT put a leak stop on your cooling system. Leaks are very critical and need to be fixed, take your vehicle to a garage as soon as possible. As I explained, all cars today have very small cooling ports, both on the radiator and on the engine. Once the stop leak gets in and hardens, it clogs most radiator ports and water ports on the engine, and your car will likely continue to overheat even after the leak is fixed. There is no solution to eliminate stop leakage, other than rebuilding the engine. I have seen many people ruin a perfectly good engine using the stop leak system. Actually, it used to be fine to use it on old style engines years ago, but not on today’s engines.