Bad oil change

southpawboston said:

They assign the simple jobs like oil changes to the least experienced techs. If you had an "in" with the service department, you might be to arrange for only more experienced techs to ever touch your car, but it's unlikely that the experienced techs would even want to do routine work like that.

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They usually aren't even actual techs.

There are three places I take my car in Washington for maint.

1. Achtuning
2. Auburn VW
3. Ballard (Carter) VW

lets hope 2 or 3 didnt do your oil change

nate704 said:

That's why I don't trust those "TECHS" at the dealers.

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Funny this should be the topic of conversation today.... So, I changed the oil in my wife’s old minivan this weekend (she of the future desire for a “bad girl car”, if you recall).

Turns out the numble-de-num who last changed the oil lock-tited the drain plug in place. He probably stripped the threads with an impact wrench. I dropped the entire pan to change the oil...

Shawn

Holy cow, that's something I'd expect a Jiffy Lube to do, not the dealership.

Because I'm paranoid, I'd fight for, at bare minimum, a compression test and to reimburse you for an engine bay cleaning at whatever detailer you prefer.

I suspect the oil filter gasket was not bad, it was installed incorrectly or not at all.......

Carter ran my TDi without oil during an oil change. Drove it off the rack empty then realized. It happens. There was no noticeable damage though.

Always lots of stories how dealer techs screw up oil changes. I'll bet not one customer considered asking who was doing the work on their car or their credentials. I was ignorant when I was young too.

You buy the second (or the most) expensive asset in your life yet don't care who's maintaining it? I'm not sure how it's done now, but there used to be three classes of technicians; A, B, and C. C's were the oil change/tire guys, B's were experienced mechanics, and A's were the best. They passed multiple, if not all ASE tests, and they were trained by the manufacturer of the brand. Any dealership I use, one tech does it all so I don't know if there are techs that just do grunt work anymore.

Not only do I make sure I get a top tech, I do my best to use the same tech every time. If it's an emergency and he's not there, I make sure I get someone he recommended. Also, I figure if I can afford a $45K out the door car I can afford to tip well.

So if you don't want to at least spend the amount of time researching a technician as you did when you were buying your car, I don't feel sorry for you.

And before you drive away, look at the area(s) that were worked on with the engine running. If you have an oil leak after an oil service it should be obvious. One thing to note is, the dealer is not supposed to reuse the drain plug.

A good tech would have taken the car around the block and then checked under the hood!

Excelsior said:

A good tech would have taken the car around the block and then checked under the hood!

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Techs don't do oil changes though, their time is more valuable. Some barely over minimum wage monkey does them.

I always check the car over nd around the engine bay before I start the car regardless of dealer or independent garage . So far all I have found was a breather hose was not connected to the air box and the little cog missing from the glove box damper (it had fell out and was under the seat).