Question about maintenance

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Question about maintenance

Posted: 8/29/2005 10:15:56 AM EDT

My wife's grandmother has an 98 Mazda compact car that she barely uses. She has about 16k miles on it right now. How often should she be changing the oil. It's almost 8 years old, does it need a tune up even though it has very low miles?

Posted: 8/29/2005 10:43:12 AM EDT

[#1]

I'd be concerned about all the fluids if it has been sitting quite a while. New oil is cheap insurance...so is antifreeze, especially if it has an aluminum block or head...

Posted: 8/29/2005 11:21:46 AM EDT

[#2]

Yeah, you definately should swap the fluids. That's a long time for them to sit with that little use.

Change the oil, change the antifreeze and bleed the brakes. Check the belts and hoses for any cracks as they might be a little dry. Spark plugs should be fine. Transmission fluid should be fine. She should change the oil at least every year no matter how many miles on it.

Do you plan on inheriting the car someday? If so, tune it up for her and take care of it.

Posted: 8/30/2005 4:12:02 AM EDT

[#3]

Age and sitting are just as big of killers as abuse. I would seriously consider tune up, definitley change fluids.

Posted: 8/30/2005 9:34:15 AM EDT

[#4]

I would get in serviced for her. Your car is better off driving 6000 miles in between oil changes than sitting undriven for 6 months at a time.

Posted: 8/30/2005 5:00:21 PM EDT

[#5]

I try to change the oil on my cars every 3K or three months which ever comes first. Which means that when in storage for the winter the oil is changed with no miles on it. only starting it a few times to keep a charge on the battery.

Posted: 8/30/2005 5:34:30 PM EDT

[#6]

Quoted:
I try to change the oil on my cars every 3K or three months which ever comes first. Which means that when in storage for the winter the oil is changed with no miles on it. only starting it a few times to keep a charge on the battery.

For storage you are better off spending a few bucks on a battery tender and filling the oil to the max. When I store my bike in the winter I fill the oil all the way to top of the plug and hook up a battery tender to it. That way you have fresh oil in there all the time and the battery stays at a constant charge. If you start it up every month the battery drains then charges, and the oil gets contaminents in it which cause breakdown.

Posted: 8/30/2005 10:39:51 PM EDT

[#7]

Quoted:
Age and sitting are just as big of killers as abuse. I would seriously consider tune up, definitley change fluids.

+1. Very low mileage cars are worse than high mileage and neglected cars.

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Question about maintenance

General » Cars, Bikes, and Trailers

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