"Bring Your Own Bottle" Bulk Oil Purchase?

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Oct 4, 2019
Messages
7
Location
Greater Vancouver, BC, Canada
For a few years now I've been purchasing small quantities (8~10 liters) of bulk Toyota 0W20 from a local Toyota dealership, for DIY oil changes on my own (Toyota) vehicle and one other (non-Toyota) vehicle. I bring in a container (No-Spilll Gas Can), they take it off and fill. I'm both trying to save money and avoid putting oil contaminated bottles in the recycle stream (or straight to landfill?).

For most of that time it was costing me about $3~4 CDN per liter, but in the last year the cost has jumped, and day before yesterday they were asking $9.99 CDN per liter (a dollar MORE than their bottled liters). This price jump is maybe due in part to circumstances beyond their control, but it grates to see bottled oil CHEAPER than bulk purchase.

Too, I look on Amazon.ca, and see "Kirkland 0W20", 10 US qts (two 5 qt bottles), for about $65 CDN. But then, yeah: two very big oil-contam'd bottles, which I'm trying to avoid.

I suspect this bring your own bottle style of bulk oil purchase is very uncommon, but I'm not sure why. Anyone else doing this, or considering this but stymied by the logistics?
 
I had never considered doing that, but I suppose I would consider it for the same reasons you have mentioned. It would need to come from a trusted source.

One hitch for me is that my local recycling centre only accepts fluids like motor oil in their original packaging, so not having an incoming stream of oil bottles to use for waste would be a problem. The municipality I lived in previously had a waste oil tank, so if I wanted to take my emptied waste oil jug(s) home for reuse, I could.
 
At $10/L there's lot of other cheaper good oil to run. I guess someone at the dealership decided not to do any favours like this anymore, or the barrel price has gone way up?
30 years ago, I used to buy bulk 2 stroke injection oil from a local skidoo dealer. I think skidoo jacked the wholesale prices on their bottled oil and the dealer made more money selling it out of a barrel. Probably was a cash deal thing too? :LOL:
If 5l jugs weren't so cheap on sale, it would make a lot of sense for places to sell oil by the liter out of the barrel.
 
Let the oil drain out of the jugs and then recycle them. We must put think in our thoughts..
I've tried that down here, and they won't take them. I mean, they were VERY well drained, like DRY, and the pick-up guys threw them back in my yard.
I'm big into recycling, and usually have more recycles than actual trash.
It's worth a try, can't hurt anything, but it doesn't fly down here.
 
Let the oil drain out of the jugs and then recycle them. We must put think in our thoughts..


You can put those drained jugs in your plastic recycle but that doesn’t mean they get recycled. Stuff like that gets separated out.

Lots of plastics are recyclable but will not be recycled. Prescription bottles is another example.
 
I take my old oil to the oil recycling drop off in the old oil containers and they take the oil and old bottles. Not sure what happens to the bottles after that but I'm guessing they clean and recycle them?
 
Here's it's considered household hazardous waste, which needs to be taken to a community recycling centre for safe disposal. Look into it.
Hazardous waste here, too, but our local recycling center will take it at the designated oil-recycling section. Frowned upon to include it with the regular recycling, though.
 
I am able to drop off the oil "empties" at the place I bring recycled oil (ditto for used oil filters). Still, I'd like to avoid contributing to the number of oil contam'd plastic bottles. It's now very common practice to use refillable water containers, grocery chains offer water dispensers: you bring your own container. Too bad oil can't be sold similarly.

I listened to an radio interview with a recycler maybe a decade back, who dealt with both used oil bottles and oil filters. They used a combo of heat and centrifugal force to clean the plastic, maybe after coarse shredding. But what a sand-pounding chore, compared to bring your own bottle bulk dispensing of oil.

Addendum: this is my workflow, left-to-right. The smaller bottle (also a no-spill) is for waste oil, and the large funnel goes on it's opening, acts as a compact oil drain catching system. I walk that bottle, and the spent oil filters, down a short walk to a quicky oil change place nearby, that's also the recycling steward for the area.

I never need to clean out any of the containers, and just have the recyling place pour out the used oil bottle for me. They used to allow me to do this, but I guess they had problems with unacceptable stuff being poured, so they insist on doing it now.

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That is a huge jump from $3/4 per liter up to $10 per liter! Holy cow!
It is shocking to know how much stuff we put into the recycling stream that gets diverted to the landfill. I can't keep up with what's OK and what's not OK anymore, so if there's a possibility it can be recycled, I just put it in and let them sort it out.
 
This is a good reason to consider the bag in a box packaging like Chevron has done with their Havoline oils. There is far less plastic involved and the cardboard can be easily recycled.

It might be worth checking and comparing the price assuming it is available in Canada.
 
I like the 6qt Havoline packs and and 12qt ST/Mobil1 packs for the reason of not using as much plastic. Oil recycling autoparts stores near me won't take oil bottles. The landfill/recycling center has a separate container to toss empty oil jugs after dumping out the used oil, but the attendant told me those won't be recycled since they're hazardous wastes.

I just checked the Havoline 6 qt packs on Walmart's website, did the price go up by $3 lately? I'm seeing $20 for the synblend ones and $23 for the FS ProDS; or maybe it's just my region.
 
For a few years now I've been purchasing small quantities (8~10 liters) of bulk Toyota 0W20 from a local Toyota dealership, for DIY oil changes on my own (Toyota) vehicle and one other (non-Toyota) vehicle. I bring in a container (No-Spilll Gas Can), they take it off and fill. I'm both trying to save money and avoid putting oil contaminated bottles in the recycle stream (or straight to landfill?).

For most of that time it was costing me about $3~4 CDN per liter, but in the last year the cost has jumped, and day before yesterday they were asking $9.99 CDN per liter (a dollar MORE than their bottled liters). This price jump is maybe due in part to circumstances beyond their control, but it grates to see bottled oil CHEAPER than bulk purchase.

Too, I look on Amazon.ca, and see "Kirkland 0W20", 10 US qts (two 5 qt bottles), for about $65 CDN. But then, yeah: two very big oil-contam'd bottles, which I'm trying to avoid.

I suspect this bring your own bottle style of bulk oil purchase is very uncommon, but I'm not sure why. Anyone else doing this, or considering this but stymied by the logistics?

If you're not getting a new jug with each oil change, what are you putting the old oil in?

EDIT: Oh, never mind, I see you followed up.
 
If you're not getting a new jug with each oil change, what are you putting the old oil in?
Yeah I wasn't that clear: I bring my used oil to collection depot in a permanent bottle I keep. I just pour it out into their tank, take that bottle with me. I would think when people drop of used oil in oil bottles, those bottles are the least efficiently drained bottles on the planets. The employees of that facility likely spend hours pouring out all these bottles, and they're not going to take time to empty them thoroughly.

Bottom line, DIY oil changes create a lot of contam'd oil bottles, vs professionally done oil changes with bulk oil and permanent containers catching the drain oil.
 
Back in the mid 90s I was daily diving a Studebaker Lark. 259 v8 with no oil filter. I kept the oci pretty short. Place near work was very traditional for a once rural area and I regularly brought my own gallon jugs which they filled straight from a 55 gallon drum. Mystic 30. The cost was less than purchasing quarts. Waste oil went to work and properly disposed of there.
 
I take my used oil to the Auto Parts place and they dump it and give me back my container .
 
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