Stuff You Should Know - Short Stuff: How Often Do You Need To Change Your Oil?

Episode Date: January 9, 2019

First things, first: Take that oil change reminder sticker off your windshield and throw it away forever and never look back!  Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey friends when you're staying at an Airbnb you might be like me wondering could my place be an Airbnb and if it could what could it earn? So I was pretty surprised to hear about Lisa in Manitoba who got the idea to Airbnb the backyard guest house over childhood home now The extra income helps pay her mortgage. So yeah, you might not realize it But you might have an Airbnb to find out what your place could be earning at air bnb.ca Hey and welcome to the short stuff. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. I'm Josh Clark. There's Jerry over there And this is the the the short stuff where we improve your life for the better Yeah, one of our few Sort of auto-centric. We don't do this kind of stuff. No, this is we leave this to the car talk guys

God rest one of their souls They were great. Yeah, they were great and you know, Hodgman always John Hodgman our friend always Very sincerely said that he thought we had Sort of the most natural rapport since he had heard click and clack. I forgot about that. That's a high compliment That is a high compliment. Thanks, Hodgman Yeah, so this one's a little ironic because I am so far overdue for an oil change. It's embarrassing It's hilarious, man. It's bad. I do the opposite. I show up. I'm like, is it time yet? Really? Man, I'm so far behind and the main reason is because I don't want to go to one of those

I won't mention brands, but one of the no appointment necessary We can do it in 30 minutes and you're out of here places Right and you have to give them like the routing number and your bank account because you owe them so much money when you leave No, and it's just like, you know, there's horror stories of them not really changing your oil and leaving the oil tank empty And not changing your filter and so it's recommended to not go to those places So I want to make an appointment with like my mechanic and I just haven't done it in so long Man, I know how you feel. I gotta do it Do you have a good mechanic?

Well, not since I've gotten the Honda Pilot, but I imagine I could go to my other sort of standby mechanic and it's not Like I go to the same place, but it's not like my LA mechanic because I had an old junker car Like we knew each other really well Oh, gotcha Because I was there a lot So me and Jimmy were pals, but I'm not pals with my mechanic now That's why I hesitated when you said do you have a good mechanic And LA is a bit of a drive for an oil change

Yes So, alright Chuck, well, how do you know you need an oil change? This is my first question There may be more Well, there's a few ways You mean how do I know right now? Yes Oh, because I am thousands of miles over even the highest recommended limit Okay, alright, well, wait a minute

Does your car have one of those oil life indicators? Yes Okay, has it come on yet? Oh, it came on about six months ago You need an oil change And it says zero percent on there, which freaked me out at first Because as you will learn right now, everyone, if you have a newer car, there are two lights One that says, hey, you need an oil change

And one that says you are out of oil or close to it And if you get that second light, you need to stop driving Literally as soon as you can That is why I'm really crazy about oil changes now is I've done that I've driven until the engine was like done, see ya, thank you for my life Yep Yeah, I mean, that's what that means everyone, I'm not sure if you know If you drive a car that runs out of oil, sometimes even a mile, your engine is toast

Yep They can't just like lube it back up again and get it going Yes I was almost to the peep for brunch And I was like, by God, I'm going to go eat brunch first So I just left my car on the side of the road and walked to the peep and ate And then walked back and dealt with my car That sucks, man

Remember the peep? Sure Great place Was it worth it? How was that brunch? Oh, it was totally worth it It was the last good brunch I ever had I'm kidding So we should really specify, you said it, but we really need to make clear

There are two different oil lights in a newer car One is, hey, it's time for you to go get your oil changed One is, pull your car over to the side of the road and stop driving it now Yeah, it's really not worth like, oh, I think I can make it Right, and the oil system indicator, the one that just says, hey, go get an oil change soon That's a fairly new thing And it's because of that new thing that the recommendation of driving or changing your oil after 3,000 miles or every three months is gone That's gone

Yeah Unless you have an older car, it's probably not the case for what you need to do with your oil You're probably okay to go 5,000, 7,500, 10,000 If you drive a Jaguar the right way, 15,000 is their highest recommended time in between oil changes So that whole 3,000 miles or three months thing, that's gone But it's not gone And from what I can tell, from what I'm reading in places like Edmunds The only reason it's still around is because the auto service industry is keeping it going with everything they've got

Heck yeah, man Because they want that money, baby Yeah, I mean, like you said, if you have an old car and when I had my old Plymouth Valiant It was the kind of deal where like, I could tell when I got an oil change Oh, yeah Like it drove better Right And so modern cars, you know, you can't really tell when you got an oil change

I don't think so, can you? I mean, this is the first newer car I've ever had No, you really shouldn't be able to I think it's a real issue if you can't tell I'm going to actually, I'm going to get my oil change and then follow up There you go And let everyone know But certainly with a tune-up you can tell Yeah, for sure

So with that oil indicator, like what it's doing, Chuck, is it's analyzing how you drive It's checking the oil, the temperature, all this stuff, it's basically keeping tabs on your oil And based on all this, it will turn that light on when it's time for you to go get an oil change So even if you are beyond the mileage of your recommended time between oil changes That you'll find in your owner's manual If that light hasn't come on, you're still probably good Yeah, but I would definitely trust that, if you have a newer car, trust that light over that little sticker they put in your window That's a big one

Because they're still saying 3,000 miles Right, exactly So first things first, stop paying any attention to that whatsoever Unless you are literally related by blood to your mechanic who put that sticker up there Pull it off and throw it away It is meaningless, it's a sales gimmick, okay? That's to step one Step two is to then go to your owner's manual and look up oil And it will tell you what the person or the company that made your car recommends

How often you get your oil And it's not an arbitrary number that they just pull out of the air Usually there's a low one and a high one, something like 5,000 miles to 7,500 miles And those numbers depend on how you drive your car Because there's really two ways you can drive your car, normally or severely Sometimes severe, it's not that I drive crazy, I drive like a grandma But I never get on the highway, which is great I live near where I work and I don't really ever have to go on the highway

Occasionally if I have some weird errand But my normal everyday driving commute does not involve high speed travel or highway mileage And that's where you can get away with going a little bit longer It might be counterintuitive because you would think that's harder on your car But it's easier on your car It is because so when conventional oil is stuff they pull out of the ground and refine from petroleum That stuff breaks down over time and it condenses, water condenses out of it And that water can mess up your engine, right?

It can lead to engine part ruination, I think is the technical term Nox and pings? Pretty much So I think that was from let it gas So when you drive out on the highway, which is something over like 10 miles at like a highway speed A distance over 10 miles You actually get your engine going enough so that it burns off any condensation that might have built up Which is why if you drive on the highway regularly, that's ideal or normal driving

When you drive stop and go commute kind of traffic or less than 10 miles just about every time That's actually like you were saying way harder on your car than driving it on the highway Because of that condensation that can build up over time So if you're driving it severely, you want to take that lower number Yeah and that's also why when you go to sell a car or buy a car, use someone will usually indicate like highway miles Like higher miles but highway miles is a lot of times better than lower miles that aren't highway miles So let's take a little break in here little buddy and we will come right back and talk a little more about some little oil changes Hey everybody, when you're staying at an Airbnb, you might be like me wondering could my place be an Airbnb?

And if it could, what could it earn? So I was pretty surprised to hear about Lauren and Nova Scotia who realized she could Airbnb her cozy backyard treehouse And the extra income helps cover her bills and pays for her travel So yeah, you might not realize it but you might have an Airbnb too Find out what your place could be earning at airbnb.ca.host We're going to use Hey Dude as our jumping off point but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s We lived it and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it It's a podcast packed with interviews, co-stars, friends and non-stop references to the best decade ever

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Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts So Chuck, like I said that oil indicator light is one reason why you can go longer between oil changes, right? That's reason one Another reason is because people stopped opening their owner's manual So like for a very long time, cars have come out where they don't say 3,000 miles or three months That's your oil change place saying that, right? Yeah But also there's been some pretty big advances in oil technology too

And actually the way that they make cars these days has improved tremendously Yeah, for sure Synthetic oil is something that you may or may not use You may have made that switch But again, if you read your manual, they may recommend synthetic oil right off the bat And it is more expensive, but it is way better than regular oil has a lot more benefits Performance is better just right off the bat It is better for the environment

Which also by the way, if you're, I meant to say earlier, if you're one of those people that's like, no, I'm still going to get it changed every 3,000 Even though that's like far too much because it's just good for the car It's really not gaining you anything, you're just losing time, money, and it's bad for the environment You know, oil changes aren't great for the environment Yeah, like if America's cars, all the cars on the road went from 5 oil changes a year So every 3 months to 3 oil changes a year We would save something like 4.25 million gallons of oil that would be poured out of America's car every year Amazing

Yeah, so it's definitely having more of an impact than on just your free time and your wallets Right But synthetic oil is better for the environment So it depends on who you ask Like if you ask some experts, car experts might say, yeah, make the switch If you have a newer car, you should totally make the switch If you listen to other people though, they might say that you don't need to switch to synthetic Unless your car specifically calls for it

I know if you tow things a lot, then synthetics can be better And it can prolong the life of your engine But maybe if you do trust your mechanic, talk to them and say, hey, what do you think? What do you think about the synthetics? Right, and they'll be like, why are we talking like that? Yeah, and they'll say, come over here behind the soda machine So synthetics are better for the environment in that they last longer They last being poured out because there's just fewer oil changes

But I mean, they're made from chemicals and they're bad for the environment If you just go dump it in the grass or something Oh, well, sure, yeah But I mean, people love to poke holes in it No, it's not any better for the environment, you dumb hippie You know, that kind of thing So I just wanted to address that so that you wouldn't get ambushed by somebody who talks like that Right, I mean, it's not fryer oil

No, but Chuck, I saw that canola oil is being developed to replace synthetic and conventional And it actually lasts longer, it breaks down over a longer period of time And it actually may be more environmentally friendly And that would be used as fuel or just as the engine oil? Engine oil Interesting Yeah, like canola oil is just pour some Crisco in there and see what happens Yeah, olive oil

Don't do that Listen to me, I was just kidding just now It's like olive oil is a miracle oil, have they tried that? It is, right? It breaks down the antioxidants in your engine You got anything else? Not really, man, I think the keys here are this Chuck Listen to your oil life light

I know that's not what it's called, but I cannot get the words that it is called together in my head And consult your owner's manual And when they put one of those three months or 3,000 mile stickers on, get rid of it Oh, I do have one other thing Chuck I knew it If you are one of those people who drives your car less than 5,000 or 7,500 miles or however much your owner's manual recommends between oil changes a year You still want to change your oil because you're probably driving it on short trips, so you're driving it severely So your owner's manual will probably recommend a time frame too, and usually that's 6 months

That may be me actually So you probably just want to change it every 6 months at least because oil does break down over time All right, okay, so that's the last one If you want to get in touch with us, send us an email We're at Stuff Podcast at HowStuffWorks.com