On Mon, 22 Jun 2020 12:37:11 -0400, Clare Snyder wrote:

I have no beef with mechanics - I was one half my working life - but
the shysters at the fast lube, tire, and muffler shops should
virtually all be in jail.

I agree with Clare that fast-lube, tire, and muffler shop mechanics have
multiple jobs, where one of their most important jobs is to get you to
spend more than you were intending on spending when you came in.

Once I was behind a lady at the tire shop, where I overheard the counter
person say she was within (I forget how much) of the legal limit and she
should get all her tires replaced. As I recall, the amount of tread left
was plenty, where I noticed the lady already had a two thousand dollar bill
(and that didn't include tires). It must have been brakes, but even brakes
couldn't cost that much... anyway...

I whispered to the lady that tire wear is like shoe wear. It's not worn
until it's worn, and they're never new except on the first day, so they're
_always_ worn.

She declined the new tires, but what shocked me was the disdain the counter
lady gave her saying it's "unsafe", which was patently false. That's how
they get people, I guess. They scare them, I guess.

Me? I wait until the belts show, but I agree that's going too far, and, I
usually try to replace those bald tires before the rainy season (here it
doesn't rain even once from about May to about November).

And that's using the cheapest oily swill they can buy and the
ceappiest filters made - not to mention only 1 in about 10 get out the
door without spending another $25 minimum on un-needed stuff.

Here is where I agree and disagree with Clare, where Clare certainly has
the experience, where I try to rely mostly on research (aka "book
knowledge"), neither of which is a foolproof method in and of itself
(IMHO).

I agree on the crappy filters (e.g., Fram), where the best approach, AFAIK,
is to find an oil filter review where the guy cuts open the filters, and
then pick the set of brands that you like best based on those reviews and
on availability (bearing in mind, just as with batteries and gasoline,
there are ten times the number of brands than there are outfits who make
them).

I disagree on the oil, where "cheap" is meaningless in terms of quality
(anyone who says "you get what you pay for" is an idiot, IMHO, since you
get what you get, no matter what you pay for it).

For oil, while there _are_ distinctions that show up in tests where they
rip apart the engine after a stated number of miles to measure stuff, and,
there are tests of contaminants you can run, outside of that there is a
very simple way to get "the best" oil you can buy (at whatever price it
costs).

It's called your owners manual.

If your owners manual specifies, oh, say, API SL quality oil, than you buy
SL or better (the second letter being alphabetical) at whatever price it
costs (usually you buy the cheapest SL you can find, IMHO).

If your car specifies SL, then SM, or SM, etc., will work fine, but the
rule I use is to simply buy the cheapest SL (or better) you can get, where,
if you change regularly, will be no better (IMHO) than the most expensive
SL you can get - which is my point about price.
--
As for viscosity, I won't even go there since it really doesn't matter
except in extremes, and we're not discussing extremes here.