Great experience at Jiffy Lube

that facilities that sell oil and perform oil changes should be required to accept waste oil. Perhaps some form of break point criteria based on volume of oil sold. My local Advance accepts oil for recycling even though they don't service cars. That being said, they do a tremendous business selling oil & filter change "bundles".

On the other hand, facilities that only sell oil would not be required to recycle oil except at their option. Giant, Acme, ShopRite for instance sell oil as a convenience; no expectation that they should accept used oil.

Back in the late 70's, I managed a Sunoco service station. We were paid by Oil Recyclers for our used motor oil. They would take the used oil and sell it to a refinery.

Not so now! You have to pay to get it hauled away. I guess the fancy new EPA approved trucks cost a lot.

Also, have you noticed that the major highways don't have a big black strip down the center of the lane? It's much less noticeable now as vehicles leak oil less.

One bad thing is that many differentials and transmissions don't have drain plugs (Cost Saving by manufacturer) and a cover has to be removed to drain the oil which increases parts and labor cost. I have a 4 X 4, and the dealer wants $400+ to change the differential and transmission fluids.

Here in CO you can have your oil filters recycled too.

You don’t have to be a member of AAA to get service at these locations but if you’re a member, you get a discount. All of their work is guaranteed. I take my own oil and filter to them and they just charge me for labor, plus they recycle the used oil and filter. Win-win. It’s like $37.00 for the labor including a tire rotation. And, I only put full synthetic oil in my vehicles.

He burns it in his shop furnace in the winter time.

Did not know that some vehicles do not have a drain plug, unless Ah, the trans, yes, all Toyotas have what people call sealed transmissions, but they are not literally sealed. However, in a practical sense, it's tricky to drain and refill to the proper level. No dipstick.

I've always been "concerned" that if doing a differential, must be certain the fill can be opened, prior to draining.

The other thing is I've always been told it's critical to be level, so now, especially on a RWD car, it's near impossible to get under, and not practical to put on 4 jack stands...SUV maybe, then the level part...

I really do think that places that sell oil and service vehicles, should be required to accept a small amount for recycling, when it's DIY in nature. To be the Three Stooges and flat out say we do not accept it, is probably why they're one step away from being out of business for good.

The Pep Boys near us (Exton, Chester County PA) no longer sells oil. However they do oil & filter change services. The building became a joint Advance Auto and Pep Boys about 2 years ago.

They're on their last legs imho, as Sears was. Hopefully their employees can find better. It's a bit hard to fathom why anyone would transact with them, other than easy credit at some crazy interest rate.

I'm glad someone has had an exceptionally good experience at Jiffy Lube. I stopped using them after my dentist had a disastrous incident.

He took his new Subaru in for an oil & filter change and the inexperienced minimum wage employee drained the automatic transmission fluid by mistake. He refilled it with motor oil which caused the trans to fail on the freeway a couple of days later.

Subaru would not cover the $6000 repair bill under warranty since it was considered driver error.

In effect, Jiffy Lube told him to get lost. He had to sue them for the damages, which took over a year.

in all fairness, this is likely not a common experience but it's enough to make me look elsewhere.

Your comment was very insightful.

In Montgomery County, we can bring up to 5 gallons of motor oil, most other oils, hydraulic fluids, and kerosene at no charge to our Shady Grove Processing Facility and Transfer Station. Used oil filters, too.

I've never had a problem getting a qualified place I'm doing business with to accept used motor oil, but I'm just recycling oil from lawnmowers, not cars. I take it to my auto oil change facility when I'm getting my oil changed, and they add it to the pan.

O'Reilly Auto Parts stores take used motor oil and more:
https://www.oreillyauto.com/store-services/free-fluid-and-ba...

Like the above happened to my roommate in the 90's. The engine in his Dodge Diplomat slant 6 seized and had no oil. He last took it to a quick change place. Truth be told, the above happens at dealerships too. Nobody should let anyone else change their oil, it's simply too vital. If one goes to a dealership, how do they know the work was even performed? Trust? lol That's exactly what stopped me from letting anyone else handle, on any vehicle in my garage, in 2011.

Let me put it this way--it wouldn't be a bad idea to put a mark on the oil filter, idea being when you get your vehicle, that mark is not there, because the filter was changed. If you have a vehicle that has a cartridge type oil filter like 1/3 of our cars, you'll have to be even more creative.

Some processes in life, unless the process removes human nature from the job, there will be both mistakes and fraud. It is altogether different, when a "part" can be seen to have been replaced. Example, a quick "blood draw" facility would be the same, if it could be. But there are huge diagrams and labeling in the process, so the associate knows what to draw, and what type and size of container to use. To eliminate mistakes, and fraud. How do you know the needle wasn't reused? Just trust? lol In PA, the blood tube holder is absolutely reused. This is against the law in Canada, but not here. I told this to my physician--he said h*** yeah, I'm reusing it, it costs money, and it's not even his own practice. He works for a health plan whose name is also the 3rd potus.

These days, since everything is recorded in 1080p, faking jobs is a real "show." They have examples on YouTube where a mgr fake hands off parts to a tech, because they know it's being recorded. Humans are crafty.

But living in PA, I realize no law, means those who accept used motor oil seems to be for the most part, no dice. lol

I watch. When I first got my Jeep I had some free oil changes, so when I took it to the dealer I would not sit in the waiting room, I'd watch them do the job. Thru an open garage door, window whatever, I'd do it at a Jiffy Lube too, pretty easy to watch there.

I'm not the mechanical type when it came to cars, all thumbs. Now I have a friend who owns a professional garage who does the job, and if I feel like it, I can watch him too.

Another way to sort of watch, or at least hear, is have a dashcam and leave it on, I've done that too.

Generally you can tell that your oil's been changed by the color change from dark to light amber. Now did they use the right oil? That's a different question. I have a car that requires synthetic oil, which is quite a bit more expensive than regular oil. I don't really trust the dealer to use synthetic oil for the "free" oil changes offered, which of course are really a come-on for service upsells anyway. Fortunately I do have a local car repair shop that has proven very competent and trustworthy. They do my oil changes.

Between Autozone, O'Riellys hundreds of places accept used oil. Several times have tried to drop off and waste container is full but sometimes they'll still accept.

I change my own oil. Cost me $46 for Mobil 1 Extended Protection and Mobil 1 filter. If you don't wanna do it yourself between Groupon or several sites you can buy discounted cash cards for Jiffy Lube you can save almost 50%. Jiffy lubes have a coupon for $10-$20 off on their site and places like Gift Card Wiki
https://www.giftcardwiki.com/gift-cards/
you can save 25% or more on a cash gift card. I use these mainly for radiator fluid changes but you can use for anything.

Many vehicles today have no dipstick. And generally speaking, it would be a very unscientific determination by looking at color. Why not put in 2 new quarts and pocket 5? It's endless.

Just like when a new car is under warranty, it's the same as having good health care coverage. Lots of claims made against it, no work done.

Once my wife had alcohol, drug, and mental health claims by an unscrupulous doctor. Let me assure you--if you contest it, and let the insurance co know, the services were never rendered, they could care less. They're nothing more than an entity handling the employer's deep pocketed self-insurance. Providers know this, nothing will become of a few thousand of fraud. Now imagine the auto business?

But to my original point, it's just plain darn common sense. You sell or change oil, 4-7 quarts, maybe 4X per year, is a drop in a bucket and the least you can do is to recycle it. Not to have a blanket policy like the Three Stooges, we don't accept any. In New York State? You accept 20 quarts per day by law.

Is honest. He ran that oil change place at Grays Ferry and 76E. When a customer wanted synthetic, they poured it from bottles, not the bulk hose, and customers could watch. Now they could have filled the bottles with something else but it's really getting far fetched, right? Some dealers are setup that way. I don't like dealing with coolant--good luck having anyone accept that in PA. One dealership had windows and I saw a tech roll a machine up to my car to exchange the coolant. My Japanese and American cars are not flushes/exchanges like the German one, and the service is not called an exchange nor a flush, they are drain/fill, so no machine is used.

One benefit of managing that shop is it's super busy--there's a red light cam there. My uncle got 2, not 1, but two, free, Audi A6's. About 12 years old each. They limped in, and when they got the estimate, the owners told my uncle he could have the cars. One was a very sweet 1998 fully loaded, had a coolant leak that was mostly labor. I get it, with Audi, everything must come off for repairs (front clip). I hear more and more Japanese have adopted this disposable concept today (new Mazda CX90 is a $61k example). It will cost so much to repair anything at all, likely the car will be tossed lol

Comical with my uncle, the headlamps were so expensive, he actually moved them from car to car. Eventually, he got tired of doing that, and he had to buy aftermarkets that were simply halogen, not HID xenon like the originals. This is another topic, today's headlamps are LED and blind oncoming traffic, unlike 15-20 years ago, most of the HIDs swiveled and leveled so as not to do that.

Learn something every day. I had not heard of this new "exciting" trend.
https://www.motorbiscuit.com/oil-dipsticks-disappearing-at-a...

Or do you trust the garage to put in the correct amount. What if he puts the dial on 5 qts by "mistake" and it should be 4? Too much error for no dip stick.

Similar circumstances many years ago; neighbor drained the transmission by mistake but then added 4-1/2 quarts of oil to the engine which now likely had 8 to 9 quarts. When he started the car it was laying a smoke screen. Fortunately he shut it off immediately. We drained the engine, put in the proper amount of engine oil and refilled the transmission. It took several days of driving before the car stopped smoking.

New fangled 17 years ago, was the notion you really can't change a car battery yourself. That is the most basic job that even an 8 year old could do when I was a kid. If you did attempt yourself, at minimum, special software is needed to tell the car that the battery has been replaced.

Interestingly, with said car, I said oh my goodness battery is 5 years old, I better get it replaced before I'm stranded (old thinking). There was a "special" coupon at the dealer in 2011, I could get this done for $280, not $400. So I did.

Here it is about 12 years later, and that battery is still fine. At the time, the dealer actually said why do you want a new battery, you don't need one. But I insisted.

Here's a real life example of having the car manage the battery and increasing its lifespan (it has an algorithm to charge it less aggressively as it ages).