My mother drives a vehicle with a highly tuned SB 350. The thing gets washed and waxed weekly, the interior is immaculate.
She knows nothing about anything mechanical. Everything is a whoosewhhaatsie or thingamagiggie. But she keeps meticulous records of her gas consumption, when air was added and how much to the tires. Anything that gets done gets recorded.
The thing uses about a quart of oil every 1000 to 1500 miles, depending if it is mostly highway or around town driving.
Now she desperately tries to understand maintenance aspects, she knows that running low on oil is bad, too little air in the tires is bad, ect. But for the life of her, she cannot open the hood pull out the dipstick, wipe it, reinsert it pull it out and check the level.
I enjoy driving the vehicle and perform all the checks whenever I visit, and over the holidays I saw she was a quart low. There was a quart of m1 5w 30 in the garage, and I topped it off.
Knowing of her record keeping I tell her that It took a quart of oil.
"Which oil?"
-Motor oil mom
"But the light was not on yet!"
-You never want to see that light come on Mom
" But how do you know when to add oil?"
-We've been over this, you open the hood and...........
"Is that the thimagiggy with the blue handle?"
-No it is the yellow thingamagiggy that says engine oil on it
"I'm gonna call my mechanic."
Headslap
-You do not need to goto your mechanic
"Because when the light comes on, I make an appointment and he takes care of everything, are you sure?"
This went on for 30 minutes until she was reassured I did not mess anything up.
She's not a dumb woman by any means but anything mechanical is simply beyond her grasp.
I tell my father about it.
" I go through this every month" I keep that mechanic on retainer so I can get some peace and keep that dang car running.
What a waste of money.
