Hello all,

I brought my Mini (2005 MCS) to a local place yesterday and during the service the technician told me that there was a sludge build up in my engine and that I needed to do a flush ($80). I am not the original owner of the car. Can anyone tell me how this happens? Was this just a way for them to get me to spend more money, or does the flush actually help. As you know synthetic oil is needed, and was used, but the on the sticker it still states that I should come back in 3k miles...isn't this too soon for synthetic oil?

I've had the car 6 months now and this was my second oil change...

thanks for any help you can provide!!

 

No to the flush unless the oil was not coming out of the drain oil quickly. otherwise how did he know? Was it a MINI dealer? 3k on synthetic is way to soon IMO. I and many others change around 7.5k.

 

Did you ask him how, without taking a wrench and disrobing the engine block, does he know there is sludge buildup? Sounds like one of the many Jiffy Lube sales techniques to me. Change the oil and filter, regardless of manufacturer's recommendations about every 5K and you should be just fine...unless, of course, he was talking about a coolant flush. Then again, how does he know there is sludge without taking it all apart.

Dang, Bram, you beat me to it.

I do wave and even blink my headlights if I see them far enough ahead.

 

I guess it was just a scam then because I know he did not take apart the engine. He came to me after draining the oil stating there was sludge build up. I've decided that from now on I will go to the dealer for all my oil changes either way, but I wanted to see if this was something anyone heard of before. So change the oil at 7.5k, and the filter at 5k. Is it fairly easy to change the filter, I'd like to just do it myself between changes...

 

This tale is likely a familiar one to those who've frequented one of the quick-lube places. Often, the staff are incented to push various services, "engine flush" being one of them (a container of some substance is poured into your engine, run a while, then drained along with your oil). Yes, without disassembling some of your engine, the tech wouldn't know what it was like in there. As well as, there's no certainty that the elixir being used will accomplish anything. $80? Wow.

Change oil and filter at the same time. 7500 mile intervals with synthetic oil are recommended by several on this forum. 3,000 mile intervals are recommended by the quick-lube places (perhaps others?) and are FAR too frequent / excessively costly if you're using synthetic motor oil. You'd be paying for premium motor oil, but then throwing it out only partially used.

Side notes:

1) My last quick lube visit included the tech walking into the showroom to show me my "dirty" engine air filter, recommending that it be replaced. The same filter I'd installed days earlier (!). They reinstalled it, but "did it wrong", so it tripped the check engine light. Nice. The tech's boss told me "it'll clear up when you drive it awhile". I reset it when I got home, since I had a scantool.

2) I'm old enough to have owned air-cooled VWs back when they were everywhere. We used 3,000 mile oil-change intervals on them, with regular motor oil, back in the day. They didn't even have an oil filter, just a screen / strainer. Modern cars, with filtration, in normal operation, don't require oil changes this frequently.

 

thanks so much...i have learned my lesson as far as the quick lube is concerned...i immediately felt like i made the wrong decision, but my biggest concern was that someone used standard oil when they should have used synthetic and when i Googled it there were horror stories...after it was done i asked if i had to do this a again and the tech said once a year, that's when i thought something was funny.

 

Some dealers run coupon specials on their website under Service or just ask them. It might save you some $ if you do decide to use the dealer for oil changes.

 

thanks!!

 

Go to soopercooperinfo.com and check out the independent Repair Shop section. There is a shop in Queens listed. A little asking around with some other MINIfolk in your neighborhood can qualify that or other shops for you. I've got a great independent about 45 miles away that is THE only guy who wrenches on my motor...except the local alignment shop.