Instruction Set of How to Change the Oil of the Car - Essay Example

? How To Change the Oil of Your Car How To Change the Oil of Your Car Introduction Frequently changing the engine oil of a car along with its oil filter keeps the car’s engine healthy and increases the life of the car. While the car is operational, the quality of engine oil keeps declining and contaminants become a part of the oil filter. Oil and oil filter change depends entirely on the driving behavior of the owner of the car. The process may be required within a matter of 3 months to two years or 3,000 miles or 20,000 miles (Torbjornsen, 2010, p.106). To change the oil of your car’s engine, you do not need to contact a mechanic all the time. The task can be done by the car owner and the task is quite inexpensive. Steps Step1 Parts Required for Oil Change Figure1 Before changing the engine’s oil, ensure that all the tools and equipments needed are at the spot. The most essential of these are the wrench along with a container to carry your old engine oil, an oil container that is full of unused oil and an oil filter. Special care needs to be taken if the engine oil of a heated up engine is being changed. Step2 Oil Pan and Drain Plug Figure2 Before replacing the old engine oil with the new one, ensure that the car’s bonnet is open and then you are required to unlock the cap of the oil filler which is located on the top side of your car’s engine. This process will assist in making the old oil drain simpler as it allows air to flow inside the crankcase drain. The drain plug is located on the bottom region of the pan that carries oil, unplug the drain plug. Catching the oil may become quite difficult due to the angle at which it drains. To ensure that the oil does not ruin your garage or public property; place a cloth or a newspaper on the floor just beneath your car’ oil pan. Step3 Unplugging the Drain Plug Figure3 Use the wrench to loosen the tightness of the drain plug by moving the wrench in counter-clockwise manner. Certain time the bolt is quite tight which normally a rare incident is. If the bolt is quite tight, you might require an extension to open up the bolt. A pipe segment is a good extension that may become quite handful in opening up the bolt. While removing the plug, one should even remove or substitute the old drain plug gasket with a new one. Ensure that the plug does not end up falling in the used oil container as relocating the plug from the re-used oil container might become quite a difficult task. If by mistake, the plug is dropped inside the pan, it can be relocated through the use of a magnet or you can even use a funnel while to drain the oil and take out the plug out of the funnel. Step4 Filter Element or Funnel Figure4 In certain cars such as the BMW and the Mercedes the oil filter is not of spin on type, instead the oil filter is of filter element in nature. In these cases, you need to just unlock the reservoir which is built inside and take out the element from inside the reservoir. Step5 Oil Filter Assembly Figure5 The most difficult part of the entire oil changing process is locating the filter assembly. There is no standard location of the filter; filter location varies form car to car. Certain filters are located on the right side of the engine, others on the left and certain are located on the bottom region. To correctly locate the filter, you should look for something similar to the shape of the new filter you have purchased. The moment you are able to locate the filter, simply remove it apart form your car’s engine. Unplugging the filter can be a difficult task, start by twisting the filter in a slow and steady manner to make the filter spin. If the filter is too tight to be removed with bare hands, then you can use a filter wrench to extract the filter. The oil filter even contains ample amount of oil, so placement of an oil container is highly advisable. While removing the filter, one has to ensure that the part of the filter which is recognized as rubber gasket is even removed otherwise the new filter would not fit properly and the oil will leak from it. When installing the new filter, pour small amount of new oil content on finger and place the oil over the rubber gasket. One should not use old oil to conduct this process as the oil will wear off and oil will leak later on. Before attaching the new filter to the car’s engine, pour certain amount of new oil inside the filter as this will assist in reducing the quantity of time that will be taken by the engine to gain appropriate pressure of oil. Step6 Its time to replace the drain plug and add new washer, ensure that while tightening the drain plug, extra effort is no invested to increase the tightness of the plug. Step7 Next carefully replace the new filter that has been lubricated, while replacing make sure that too much force is not applied. In case of cartridge filters, these filters are made with at minimum one o-ring and in some cases there are at least 4 similar rings. You need to replace all these rings to make sure that the filter does not end up leaking. Step8 Oil Dipstick Figure6 Once the oil filter and the drain plug is in place, its time to add oil to the engine region that is located in the bonnet region. Remove the engine oil cap and pour oil inside the engine ensuring that sufficient amount of oil is put inside. The amount of required oil is stated in the car’s user manual, to check the level of the oil, you can even use the dip stick. In standard cases, there are two spots or holes on the dipstick and it is advised to pour enough amount of oil to cover both the spots. Step9 Once the oil has been poured inside the engine, close the engine oil cap and the bonnet. Start off your engine to check that the engine oil light inside the car is off. Next part the car and check whether oil is dipping from lower part of the engine. References Torbjornsen, T. (2010). How to make your car last forever. Minneapolis, MN: Motorbooks. Read More