Reminiscing - First vehicle & first oil changes

[97f150]

I got my drivers license at 15 in 1997, and saved up to buy my first vehicle. It took me a year to save a couple grand, and my older brother decided he wanted to sell his old truck. So I paid him $400 do it and bought insurance, the rest of the money was saved for repairs that may or may not be needed.

The truck was a 1980 Toyota Pickup (no last names back then I guess), it was a 4 cylinder, 5 speed, power brakes…that was the only power assisted feature. It was 5 different shades of red, brown and rust. But boy was I proud of it. First order of business was an oil, filter, plug and wire change. PYB 10w30, and a Fram OCoD and she was good to go. I wish oil was all I had to change on it, but I learned a lot about fixing on your own car from that truck. Hardest part to change was the clutch, and even that was easy.

 

[GreeCguy]

Originally Posted By: wymi516
First car and first oil change was a 1969 Pontiac Bonneville with a 428ci V8. It was 1976 on the South West side of Chicago. We changed our oil over open man hole covers to drain the oil. I used some Valvoline 10-40 swiped from my brothers stash, don't remember what kind of filter I used. I also remember using Cam-2 oil back then.


CAM-2!!!!!! I used to buy that by the case from K-mart @ 63 cents per quart. That went into my first car, 1969 Buick Skylark 350 V-8. I knew very little about cars at the time other than if you didn't add gas, they wouldn't run.

I had been hot-rodding the car all over the country for about two months after I bought it when one day, my Dad asked me if I had changed the oil yet. "No, Papa" was my reply.

"Well, we probably need to do that now," says he.

We straddled the car over a ditch that ran next to the house, put a five gallon bucket under the car, pulled the drain plug and maybe two quarts came out of the motor.

I still remember the look on my Dad's face as he said, "Don't you know how to check the @*^%&# oil in this piece of #*!^#$?"

I learned and quickly became an oil checking fanatic.

I'm sure we filled it up with Valvoline as he was a big Valvoline fan. I however was a big "keep as much money in my pocket" fan and found the ever popular "Cam-2" motor oil at our local K-mart. I even remember running some "Scotty's" brand SB 30 weight for a while, (it was even cheaper than "Cam-2").

Then one day I read an article in the newspaper from API about detergent motor oils and what the letters and numbers mean on the side of an oil can. After reading that article, my life was never the same.

 

[Revving2Redline]

Got my first car at 17. I had in 1997 an 1985 Pontiac sunbird se with 1.8L and 5speed. I always took to walmart and after paying the extra two dollars for 10w30 castrol gtx and lube chasis it was just around 20.00 . It got 36mph on 89octane and for having 240,000 miles on it i kinda enjoyed it. Even had digital tape deck. Only domestic car i owned that wasnt complete garbage. Wish i would have know about mos2, might not have changed over to imports lol.

 

[Stewart Fan]

My first car was a '79 VW Rabbit I bought at 16 in '89.

It got the same NAPA 30w that all my dad's cars got. He didn't believe in multi weight oils.

You should hear him now about 0w and 5w oils...lol

 

[javacontour]

Originally Posted By: Marco620
Got my first car at 17. I had in 1997 an 1985 Pontiac sunbird se with 1.8L and 5speed. I always took to walmart and after paying the extra two dollars for 10w30 castrol gtx and lube chasis it was just around 20.00 . It got 36mph on 89octane and for having 240,000 miles on it i kinda enjoyed it. Even had digital tape deck. Only domestic car i owned that wasnt complete garbage. Wish i would have know about mos2, might not have changed over to imports lol.


Sad that the best domestic car you had would only do 36 MPH

 

[GumbyJarvis]

Originally Posted By: GreeCguy
Originally Posted By: wymi516
First car and first oil change was a 1969 Pontiac Bonneville with a 428ci V8. It was 1976 on the South West side of Chicago. We changed our oil over open man hole covers to drain the oil. I used some Valvoline 10-40 swiped from my brothers stash, don't remember what kind of filter I used. I also remember using Cam-2 oil back then.


CAM-2!!!!!! I used to buy that by the case from K-mart @ 63 cents per quart. That went into my first car, 1969 Buick Skylark 350 V-8. I knew very little about cars at the time other than if you didn't add gas, they wouldn't run.

I had been hot-rodding the car all over the country for about two months after I bought it when one day, my Dad asked me if I had changed the oil yet. "No, Papa" was my reply.

"Well, we probably need to do that now," says he.

We straddled the car over a ditch that ran next to the house, put a five gallon bucket under the car, pulled the drain plug and maybe two quarts came out of the motor.

I still remember the look on my Dad's face as he said, "Don't you know how to check the @*^%&# oil in this piece of #*!^#$?"

I learned and quickly became an oil checking fanatic.

I'm sure we filled it up with Valvoline as he was a big Valvoline fan. I however was a big "keep as much money in my pocket" fan and found the ever popular "Cam-2" motor oil at our local K-mart. I even remember running some "Scotty's" brand SB 30 weight for a while, (it was even cheaper than "Cam-2").

Then one day I read an article in the newspaper from API about detergent motor oils and what the letters and numbers mean on the side of an oil can. After reading that article, my life was never the same.




Ahh memories of Scotty's, miss that place. Remember when they closed down in 04-05, used to get Christmas trees there all the time too!

 

[rjundi]

1986 Subaru XT. I have to admit the first oil change was my girlfriend in college who taught me DIY including spark plugs, air filter and oil/filter in university parking lot. No idea of what we put in, whatever the local NAPA handed us. The odd thing on oil change was she wore a skirt. She always did and dressed quite well no matter the occasion.

She learned because her dad did not believe in taking the car anywhere for maintenance nor did he actually maintain cars. So she did oil DIY.

My father never did DIY as I grew up with my dad never owning a car but being provided one by his company. The sole car mom owned(AMC Eagle) went to a full serve gas station with a yearly oil change and state inspection and when it broke. Interestingly with ~7500mi OCI we got 280k out of it.

 

[Benzadmiral]

My first car was the venerable '75 Ford Maverick, 4-door with the 250-cid six. I learned a lot on it. At my first oil change, 5K miles, my buddy and I couldn't get the oil filter off! We drained and replaced the oil (Quaker State 10W-30, I think) and I ran the original Motorcraft filter for another OCI. At 10K I took it to a full-serve station near my house and asked 'em to be sure not to tighten the filter too much. So at the next change I could take care of everything. QS and a Purolator filter from K-Mart; I remember thinking, "Less than $10 for an oil change? Great!" (1976: the oil was .60 a quart, the filter about $3.00.)

The car was getting short trips around town, but we ran from Lafayette down to New Orleans about once a month, so it got lots of highway time. It served my then-wife and me quite well for five years and about 60K miles.