Why I will never go back to Firestone

Roboplex

Registered User
Just a heads up, this story doesn't include my Thunderbird (still getting the brakes reworked), but instead my mom's 05' Mazda MPV. But I thought you all would get a kick out of it anyway.

So starting off, I jacked the car up, put it on stands, and tried to unbolt the drain plug. I had the right tools, and even with a breaker bar, that thing just wouldn't budge. It took a TON of wrenching to get that thing loose. I can only assume they drilled it in with an impact wrench last time when she got the oil changed at Firestone.

So I FINALLY get the drain plug unbolted (partially rounding the bolt in the process), and start to drain the oil. In the past, this car has burned a little bit of oil, but not much to the point of needing to add any. It does have 240k on the clock after all. But only 3.5qts came out. Three and a half quarts of old oil. I know there's usually some still left in the engine, but it says to add 6qts regardless. I'm not sure if it really was burning that much, but it's more likely Firestone just shorted us.

Thirdly, as I'm getting off the filter, it's a really low quality STP filter that they don't even sell at O'Reillys. I could not get that thing off. Even with a strap wrench, I had to go out and buy one of the oil filter sockets.

So pretty much, they overtightened the drain plug, shorted us 2qts of oil, and way overtightened the oil filter.

But I got the oil changed in the end, and for half the cost of Firestone. My dad, who always goes to firestone, was absolutely livid when he heard about this. Needless to say I don't think we'll be going back there anytime soon xD.

The car is even starting up better now. I'm not sure if that's just the placebo effect at work, but it was starting up pretty rough, and now it starts up like a brand new car. I'm still just shaking my head as I'm writing this lol.
 
Wait, does your mom/anyone even check the dipstick regularly? At 240k it's far from unusual for a car to need a couple of quarts between changes...
 
Wait, does your mom/anyone even check the dipstick regularly? At 240k it's far from unusual for a car to need a couple of quarts between changes...
Yeah she checks it occasionally, but it's never really low. I mean, she'll add a quart every once and a while, but it wasn't drinking that much oil if I'm remembering correctly. Maybe that's changed, but I don't think it was burning nearly 3qts of oil. No oil lights have come on or anything. Plus, I changed the oil a bit early. It's only been like 3000mi since the last oil change of high mileage synthetic blend.
 
thats why if i can do the work on my vehicle i always do...you just never know who or how its been done and alot of times left guessing what grade of parts have been used..i have had the same horrible stories from getting my quick 19.99 dollar oil changes..pay a low price but the next change, you better just keep taking it to them..
 
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