Lesson Numero Dos

My handyman of a husband has been changing oil in his own vehicles for a loooong time. He has even tried to teach me, but I'm a slow learner in the art of mechanic stuff. Thus, it was a complete surprise (and frustrating time) when the oil leaked out of the filter last night after Grizz had changed it.

Setting: Apartment Garage... messy, oily newspapers strewn about and various oil-changing things laying around

Time: Dusk

During the winter, since we don't have a heated location to change the oil, 300M goes to Wal-mart to get her oil changed. The guys at Wal-mart put the oil filter in there so tight that Grizz had to use an old belt for extra leverage to get the thing out. Everything else went normally, except he noticed that the new filter tightened up more quickly than usual. New oil was poured in and I started the car to check for leaks. Sure enough, oil poured out of the filter on to the garage floor. Lovely.

More newspapers and old towels were used to soak up the new oil. The belt had to be used again to free the filter from 300M. Then we proceeded to sit around and try to figure out what went wrong.

Thought, thought. Ponderings, ponderings.

I was sent to fetch the old filter from the garbage bin. We compared the two. Something just didn't look right... I asked Grizz, "Why does the new filter have that rubber ring where you rubbed oil and the old one doesn't?"

Have you guessed the culprit yet?

Sure enough, the husband put his hand up there and pulled out the old O-ring. That explained it all. The Wal-mart guys put that old filter in soooo tight, that when it was taken out, the rubber ring stayed with the vehicle!!! The new filter tightened up quickly because the old ring was still up there, taking up space. The oil leaked because the new O-ring wasn't where it was supposed to be.

Grizz put the new filter back in and new oil has to be bought to fill it up again.

Lesson learned? Make sure the old rubber-O-ring-thing comes off with the old filter before putting the new one in! :)