Recent content by Oscar_Ruitt

Haha yes! My wife is gas or brake, no middle ground, all the potholes. Gas mileage is astonishing - 16-17 mpg in a 4 cylinder little Mazda5. She's never been in a wreck, so she is technically a safe driver, and I have learned to accept that as good enough! Glad she is happy to let me drive...

Shoot - you'll find out soon. Main reason I use synthetic oil and a nice filter in my minivan with the Chrysler 3.6 is to limit the total number of times I change the filter over the life of the car, since it has a notoriously fragile cartridge filter/oil cooler assembly. I'm pretty sure most of...

I put a gates kit from Rock Auto on a 2013 3.6 caravan a couple years ago at 170k miles. It's been 50k miles, still quiet and no noise on wet morning startups like it was starting to do before I replaced it.

I have had Maxlife in our 2012 Mazda5 with the 5 speed auto for about 50,000 miles, and I never noticed a change in transmission behavior, and haven't had any problems. That service bulletin from Mazda that says never to use a multipurpose fluid still makes me nervous though! The car has 112k...

Oh one more on the '19 Grand Caravan. On cruise control, when I start going up a grade, the car looses about 3-4 mph, then eventually it downshifts and accelerates up to the speed the cruise control is set to. Definitely a waste of gas, and probably extra wear on the engine and trans.

Every time I turn the car on the stereo reverts to radio, not the source I was using when I turned the car off (whether it was CD, Bluetooth streaming, or the internal hard drive source). Googled it and it is definitely a design issue, cannot be changed. 2019 Grand Caravan.

I had this exact thing happen on a 2013 grand caravan with 170k miles on it. I had been religious about fluid changes, torque converter just goes out sometimes I guess. I had a local transmission shop rebuild it for $3000. It's still going strong with my brother, at around 230k miles now.

The Best Western in Bonners Ferry is really nice. Right on the river.

Director of preventive maintenance, from the car talk show. They used to do made-up staff members (aw, screw it)

If the shocks were replaced recently, they will rattle if you don't tighten the bolts enough. Also, look for the exhaust pipe or resonator sitting close to something else and rattling over bumps, the exhaust is so low on these it gets banged and bent pretty easily. Maybe grab and shake the...

I drive 30 to 35K miles/year, mostly for work. I use Napa synthetic and Napa Gold filters every 10K miles on my 2013 Dodge Grand Caravan. It's at 216K miles right now, not burning any oil and running well. The only things wearing out are the armrests from where I rest my elbows, the carpet where...

It seems like serpentine belt material has gotten really good the last decade or so. I just did a gates belt component kit on my '13 grand caravan a few months ago because the last year or so it had a very minor squeal on cold start some cold mornings. It was at 200k miles and the belt really...

Working in a closed school yesterday, all the extra hand sanitizer and disinfecting wipes. Pretty tempting I'm getting a little low!

Originally Posted by nobb Originally Posted by Oscar_Ruitt The only time I ever had CV boots go bad was a few months after I used some rubber protectant on them, thinking it would he a good idea. Maybe spraying something on them is the problem. I am only a sample of 1, so hard to say it's...

The only time I ever had CV boots go bad was a few months after I used some rubber protectant on them, thinking it would he a good idea. Maybe spraying something on them is the problem. I am only a sample of 1, so hard to say it's certain, but I have always figured I killed those boots. Maybe...