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Is Oil for High-Mileage Engines Worth the Extra Cost?

Most major oil brands market motor oil made specifically for engines that have more than 75,000 miles of wear, claiming that additives help reduce engine wear and provide anti-aging benefits. They are often a blend of synthetic and petroleum-based oils, and they typically cost at least a couple of dollars more per quart than conventional oils. But are they worth the extra dough?

Some oils may be more beneficial than others because they contain conditioners purported to rejuvenate seals to prevent or stop oil leaks, a common ailment in engines with high mileage.

Internal seals and gaskets become brittle and shrink as they age, allowing oil to seep by. Sometimes this becomes visible as streaks of oil on lower engine parts or oil stains on a garage floor or driveway. When valve-guide seals wear out, motor oil can leak into combustion chambers and the engine will literally start burning oil. With small leaks, blue smoke from burning oil may not be visible from the exhaust, but your oil level will probably drop below the full mark on a regular basis.

The seal conditioners found in some high-mileage motor oils may reduce or eliminate small leaks and seepage by rejuvenating seals to their original size and shape. If an engine isn’t burning or leaking oil, or if it uses, say, less than a quart over 6,000 miles or so, switching to high-mileage oil may not be worth the extra cost for you.

It’s really a judgment call if you should pay more for high-performance oil when your vehicle has 100,000 miles on it but is using little or no motor oil. High-mileage motor oil doesn’t hurt and it could prevent leaks from starting. Most vehicle manufacturers would say it’s normal for an engine to consume some oil between oil changes.

In addition to having seal conditioners, high-mileage oils usually boast more detergents designed to clean out sludge inside the engine, plus other additives meant to reduce wear on moving parts. Every motor oil, though, makes similar claims that it does great things inside an engine.

Some mechanics recommend switching to a thicker (higher viscosity) oil — such as 10W-30 full synthetic oil instead of 5W-20 full synthetic — or using oil additives to stop leaks. Thicker oil makes an engine harder to start in cold weather, reduces oil circulation around the engine and increases oil pressure, which means there will be more pressure trying to push the motor oil past seals and gaskets.

How I Can Tell What That Leak in My Driveway Is?

Whether you spot a puddle under your car or just a few drops, there are several possible culprits, and color alone might not explain what it is. How can you figure it out? To be sure, you’ll need to pinpoint where it’s coming from using your eyes and your nose.

Ways to Identify Leaking Fluids

Engine oil can be amber (if it’s fresh), brown or — if it hasn’t been changed for 10,000 miles — black, and it will leave slickness on your fingers that’s hard to wipe off. Oil can leak from gaskets and seals on the front or rear of an engine, from valve covers or from the oil pan underneath, so there are several possible sources of an oil leak.

Transmission fluid is usually reddish and slick, though some come in other colors and can be thicker or thinner than engine oil. If you suspect a transmission fluid leak, consult your owner’s manual to see how to check the fluid level. If you can get a clear look at the transmission, check for leaks around the seals or gaskets.

Power-steering fluid is usually reddish, and on some vehicles it’ll be the same fluid that goes into the transmission. Check the fluid level in the power-steering reservoir and look for leaks in the reservoir and the hoses coming from it.

Engine coolant can be green, yellow, pink or another color, so check your coolant overflow tank to see what’s in your radiator. Is the overflow tank empty? Maybe you’ve found your problem. Coolant usually feels like slimy water and has a sweet smell. Leaks can come from the overflow tank, the radiator, the water pump, coolant hoses and elsewhere. For your own safety, wait until your engine is cold before opening the radiator cap.

Brake fluid can be light brown or even clear when new, but it typically darkens as it ages. It’s also slippery — and vital to stopping your car. That’s a good reason to treat a brake fluid leak as an emergency. Check the brake fluid level in the reservoir (usually near the firewall on the driver’s side) and see if you can see any leaks there. The fluid gets pumped through brake lines to the wheels, so leaks could be much further downstream and out of sight.

A few drops of fluid on your driveway isn’t reason to panic, especially on an older car. Seepage and minor leaks are par for the course on vehicles with several years and thousands of miles on the clock. That said, any leak should be a wake-up call to keep an eye on things before it becomes a gusher, and to regularly check fluid levels (all of them) to make sure you aren’t running low anywhere.

If you’re losing sleep worrying about a fluid leak, ask your dealership or local repair shop to take a look. Draining fluids can be a drain on your wallet, but the earlier they’re caught, the better.

AAA: Synthetic Oil Outperforms the Cheap Stuff

Synthetic oil may lighten your wallet during an oil change, but a new study by AAA finds significant benefits under the hood. In an independent evaluation, synthetic oil outperformed its conventional counterpart by almost 50 percent, the agency announced today.

AAA’s 59-page report documents a range of industry-standard tests. The agency evaluated synthetic and conventional oil in eight tests that analyzed things like deposit formation, low-temperature performance and oxidation viscosity. AAA found synthetic oil protects critical engine parts 47 percent better on average than regular oil. With superior resistance to deterioration, synthetic oil should benefit newer cars, as well as those with turbocharged engines and anything driven in a lot of stop-and-go traffic, towing conditions or extreme temperatures.

A few cars require synthetic oil, but AAA says all cars can benefit from it. The agency found nearly half of all drivers don’t know if synthetic oil is any better for their engine or think it isn’t. Some think it’s nothing more than upsell gimmickry, a factor that may boost already-high distrust in repair shops. Still, 45 percent of drivers use the stuff, according to AAA.

The difference in price is nothing to sneeze at. Oil changes cost $38 on average with regular oil and $70 with synthetic, AAA found. But if you change your own oil, you can recoup some of the difference. AAA found five quarts of synthetic oil averages $45 — only $17 more than the cheap stuff. Synthetic oil also resists breakdown better than conventional oil, so you may be able to drive farther between oil changes. (Check your car’s owner’s manual, as well as the labels on the oil itself, for specifics.)

“It’s understandable that drivers may be skeptical of any service that is nearly twice the cost of the alternative,” said John Nielsen, AAA’s managing director of Automotive Engineering and Repair, in a statement. “While a manufacturer-approved conventional oil will not harm a vehicle’s engine, the extra $30 per oil change could actually save money in the long run by protecting critical engine components over time.”

Why Is My Muffler Rattling?

Most exhaust problems can be diagnosed by paying attention to unfamiliar sounds or taking a look underneath the car. One of the most common exhaust problems is a rattling sound. When you hear a rattle, it could be caused by numerous things. Is your muffler rattling? If so, let’s take a closer look at some of the possible causes and your repair options.

What Causes a Muffler to Rattle?

In most cars, the muffler is installed in line with the exhaust pipe, and its job is to minimize the noise that comes from a car’s engine. Mufflers contain perforated tubes or baffled chambers that create opposing sound waves when sound waves from the engine travel into the muffler. These opposing waves partially cancel out most of the original loud noise. In most areas, hitting the road with a missing or damaged muffler is illegal. This exhaust component is required by law to keep vehicles operating at acceptable noise levels.

If you are hearing a loud sound like pieces of metal contacting each other, it usually means that something is touching the exhaust pipe. A loose bracket, rubber hanger or connector, or one that is badly corroded, can allow a muffler to rattle as the exhaust pipe bangs against another part of your vehicle when you accelerate or drive on bumpy roads, or even when you first start the car and it’s stationary and idling. When the components that hold your exhaust together fail, they can cause misalignment in the system. When this happens, a rattling noise is common. If the rattling is caused by your muffler, it will most likely originate near the rear of your vehicle.

A loose muffler can allow excessive movement in other components as well and increase the stress on those parts, so it can become more than an annoying noise if left unattended. If the muffler is hanging lower than normal, there’s also a risk that it could be broken off by hitting a bump or going over railroad tracks. As a result, it is extremely important to repair muffler problems as quickly as possible.

Signs of Muffler Damage

If you suspect that your car is making a loud noise due to a muffler problem, take a look at your exhaust system. While a loud rattling or rumbling sound is the most common sign, there are a few other things to check for. Get under your car and inspect the pipes that make up the exhaust. Do you see any rust or other damage? Pay close attention to the muffler itself and the heat shield. Are there any visible signs of damage? Also, pay attention to how your car is running. If you start to notice decreased efficiency, you could have an exhaust leak in a pipe or a damaged muffler.

Do Cars Have More Than One Belt That Needs Replacing?

All cars have an accessory belt that drives features such as the alternator and air-conditioning compressor, and perhaps the water and power steering pumps. This belt is usually mounted externally so you can see it on the front end of the engine (the engine is mounted transversely on most front-wheel-drive cars), and it usually is a serpentine belt that slithers around various pulleys. It needs to be replaced when it shows wear, such as cracks, fraying or stretching.

Some car engines also have a timing belt that is hidden from view but connects the crankshaft on the bottom of the engine to the cylinder head on the top; it controls when valves open and close. Many engines have a timing chain instead of a belt. A key difference is that a timing chain is usually considered a lifetime part that doesn’t require periodic replacement. A timing belt does require replacement, though the manufacturer’s maintenance schedule may not call for that until as much as 150,000 miles, as with some current Ford engines.

If either belt breaks, a car is going to soon come to a halt. Once a timing belt breaks, the engine shuts off and you won’t be able to restart it. With many cars, you might be able to restart the engine after a serpentine belt breaks, but you won’t get far if it drives the alternator. Without the alternator, you’ll be relying on electrical power from the battery, and once that’s gone, you’ll really be out of luck.

Though serpentine belts can last more than 100,000 miles, they should be inspected by a mechanic periodically (if you know what to look for, you can do this yourself). Consult your owner’s manual or service schedule to find out how frequently it should be inspected. This varies by manufacturer: Hyundai, for example, says that on some current four-cylinders, this should be done after six years or 60,000 miles and then every two years or 15,000 miles; Volkswagen calls for it every 40,000 miles; on some Ford vehicles, it isn’t until 100,000 miles.

Serpentine belt replacement costs also vary, and we’ve seen estimates from less than $75 to more than $150 for the accessory. The best approach is to have it inspected before the recommended interval, and if you decide to have it replaced, you’ll have time to shop around. You may hear warning signals that a serpentine belt is on its last legs, such as squealing noises when you start the engine or accelerate, or rattling noises from a pulley or tensioner.

Replacing a timing belt is a more involved and costly procedure, typically running from at least $500 to more than $1,000 depending on what kind of car you drive. Even worse, on some engines, if the timing belt breaks, the pistons may continue to move up and down, and in the process the piston can hit and bend valves that have lost their timing mechanism. That can add up to big bucks — possibly $3,000 or more.

That makes timing belt replacement more critical, but because it isn’t visible, you can’t easily check it. That involves removing the accessory drive belts, the engine cover and other hardware just to get a look at it, and no repair shop is going to do this for nothing (they also have to reassemble everything). That is why you should pay close attention to the manufacturer’s recommended timing belt replacement schedule. Here, too, recommendations vary: Some Honda V-6 engines call for timing belt replacement at 60,000 miles, for example, but the 1.8-liter four-cylinder used in some Chevrolets lists it at 100,000 miles.

With some engines, the timing belt also drives the water pump, so repair shops may recommend that the water pump be replaced at the same time as the belt. That makes sense because if the water pump breaks a few months after the timing belt is replaced, a mechanic is going to have to go back in there, disassemble everything, replace the coolant and charge you at least a few more hours of labor — again.

In both cases, these serpentine and timing belts can and do fail prematurely. The key is to not wait too long to replace either belt because you could wind up stranded and at least be inconvenienced, if not forced, to shell out more money.

How Can I Tell If My Radiator Is Leaking?

How can you tell when your car’s radiator is leaking? When the temperature gauge on your dashboard reads high or a temperature warning light comes on, you have a cooling system problem that may be caused by leakage — be it in the radiator itself or some other component.

First, make sure it’s coolant that’s leaking, not another fluid. (Coolant is often referred to as antifreeze, but technically coolant is a 50/50 mix of antifreeze and water.) You can easily check the coolant level in your see-through overflow tank. If it’s empty or low, the next step should be to check the coolant level in the radiator, but that should be done only when the engine is cool. Having too little coolant in the car’s cooling system can cause engine overheating and/or make your cabin heater blow cold air.

Once you know you’re losing coolant, the radiator is a good place to start. Some radiator leaks will be easy to spot — such as a puddle underneath the radiator — but others not so much. It’s best to check the radiator from every angle, not just from above, and pay particular attention to seams and the bottom. Rust inside the radiator or holes from road debris also can cause coolant leaks. Your vehicle may have an aluminum radiator that technically can’t rust, but aluminum can corrode or develop pinhole leaks too.

Antifreeze comes in different colors — green, yellow and pinkish-red, for example — feels like slimy water and usually has a sweet smell. If you can’t see coolant dripping or seeping, look for rust, tracks or discoloration on the radiator. Those are telltale signs of where it has leaked.

If the radiator appears to be OK, the cooling system offers several possibilities for leaks, including the hoses from the radiator to the engine, the radiator cap, water pump, engine block, thermostat, reservoir tank, heater core (a small radiator that circulates hot coolant into the dashboard for passenger-compartment heating) and others. A blown gasket between the cylinder head and engine block is another possibility, allowing coolant inside the combustion chambers — a problem that must be addressed immediately by a mechanic. (Thick white smoke coming from the tailpipe is actually steam, a telltale symptom.)

If you can’t find a leak, have it checked by a mechanic. Coolant has a way of escaping only under pressure when the car is running — possibly in the form of steam, which may not leave a trace. If the culprit continues to evade detection, you might consider a radiator stop-leak additive, available at auto parts stores, which seals small leaks — but it’s always better to find and repair the problem’s source, especially in the case of faulty head gaskets, which can lead your power supply to overheat and cause catastrophic engine damage.

How to Protect Your Car’s Interior

Try to add up the hours you spend in your car. It’s a lot, isn’t it? Commutes, errand runs and road trips can have you sitting in those bucket seats for hours on end, and during that time, you and your passengers are actually living in the interior. That means smudges on the windows, scratches on the dash and food in the seat crevices accumulate and leave you wondering what happened to the spotless interior you swear it had when you first bought the car.

A Quick Clean

Luckily, it’s not that difficult to keep a car’s cabin from looking a little too, well, lived in. First things first, get something to stuff your trash into. Just use a plastic bag or a container you don’t use around the house and throw it in the backseat. You can even affix a temporary hook to the door or seat to keep things even neater. Every once and awhile, take it out and relish in the fact that you haven’t spent an hour cleaning up. Keeping trash off the floor also preserves your carpets, which can get stained from any number of items.

The idea of taking a rag to your dash and leather seats is made easier if you have them on-hand. The key here is to just use a little bit of soapy water to wipe the surfaces of your car – some cleaning products contain alcohols that prematurely dry and age the materials by reducing the flexibility in the vinyl. Store a small spray bottle of your homemade cleaning fluid and a rag under your seat or in a storage bin for access when you’re waiting for your kids to get out of school or sitting in that crazy-long drive-through line. This will also come in handy when an emergency spill happens. Lastly, keep your car smelling like roses (or at least a laundromat) by adding dryer sheets under the seats.

Weather Resistant 
You can’t discount the impact weather has on your vehicle either. In summer, sandy feet can quickly make a mess of an interior, and dare we mention the destruction caused by mud and snow? If you spend a lot of time ducking in and out of the elements, you might want to grab some all-weather floor mats. They’re easy to clean and do a great job of keeping the muck in one place.

The sun’s rays can also wreak havoc on your car’s surfaces, causing vinyl to crack over time and materials to fade. A simple solution is to regularly put a sunshade on the windshield. They’re inexpensive and help to keep your interior looking new.

Saving money on repair work and cleaning comes more easily when you take the time to make preventative care a priority. Not only will these tricks make your car a nicer place to be, keeping grime out of your ride will cut down on large maintenance costs in the future and will help to retain its value over time.

Four Easy Ways to Go Green with Your Car

Looking for ways to become more environmentally friendly with your car? Motorists can help protect the environment by following four simple steps from the non-profit Car Care Council.

1. Follow a vehicle service schedule including steps like checking engine performance, keeping tires properly inflated, replacing air filters regularly, changing oil regularly and checking your gas cap. Routine maintenance helps reduce emissions and fuel consumption, saving money at the pump.

2. Keep your current vehicle longer and limit the number of new cars you buy over the course of a lifetime. Extending vehicle life is as simple as taking care of your vehicle properly. You’ll gain years of reliable service without monthly car payments and higher insurance rates.

3. Recycle or properly dispose motor oil, tires, batteries, fluids and other vehicle components to help protect the planet when performing vehicle maintenance or repairs.

4. Repower your engine when faced with serious engine trouble. A remanufactured/rebuilt engine can give your vehicle new life and make it more fuel efficient for about the cost of an average down payment on a new car.

“Being car care aware and performing basic vehicle maintenance go a long way toward protecting the environment and improving fuel economy,” said Rich White, executive director, Car Care Council. “The Car Care Council’s free customized service schedule and email reminder service makes it easy to stay on schedule and keep your car running efficiently.”

To help motorists “go green,” the Car Care Council’s newly redesigned Car Care Guide features fuel economy and environmental awareness tips to help motorists “go green.” Available in English and Spanish, the 80-page Car Care Guide uses easy-to-understand language rather than technical automotive jargon, fits easily in a glove box and can be ordered free-of-charge at www.carcare.org/car-care-guide.

Anti-lock Braking System (ABS) Problems?

Guide to understanding, troubleshooting and diagnosing your ABS

Evolution of ABS

Anti-lock braking technology has been around for nearly a century. Since World War II, aircraft have had anti-skid braking systems, and the earliest anti-lock braking systems on automobiles date back to the 1920s. Anti-skid or anti-lock braking first became more commonplace on cars and trucks in the 1990s as a positive step toward improved safety and vehicle control during hard braking in slippery conditions.

Although ABS seems complicated, it’s actually quite simple in function. If you encounter a skid while braking, the ABS control module senses a slowdown or pause in wheel rotation, modulating brake application to help you steer out of trouble. In a conventional skid, steering control is lost and the vehicle continues to travel in the direction of the skid. Then, anti-lock braking pulses the brakes, which results in an improved measure of control out of the skid.

A typical ABS consists of four wheel sensors (sometimes two or three), an anti-lock electronic control module and a hydraulic control unit. Under normal conditions, this system applies master cylinder hydraulic pressure to all four brakes, and pulsing pressure to each brake when a skid is detected.

ABS function

Early anti-lock braking systems were non-electrical, hydromechanical models. They were mechanically controlled to modulate brake application. Contemporary anti-lock braking systems are computer-controlled, electrohydromechanical brake hydraulic systems. The ABS electronic module or controller can be integral with the hydromechanical braking controller or it can be separate. There can also be electrical relays that fire when the system is called to duty.

Anti-lock brake sensors are typically magnetically triggered. As the reluctor’s teeth pass the sensor, the normal pulsing rhythm of wheel motion indicates normal operation. It is when the reluctor speed across the sensor changes dramatically (wheels slow down or stop) that the ABS will pulse brake application. When the ABS pulses, it pumps hydraulic pressure to the brakes in rapid-fire succession, sometimes as rapidly as 15 times a second depending on the system. This function produces intermittent braking and some level of steering control.