The boys and I decided to become car guys. We’ve all been through a lot together lately and needed to do some good old fashioned man stuff. None of us had really a ton of experience working on vehicles, and we had 4 vehicles amongst all of our households that needed some basic maintenance run.

These are skills I think one should have in their back pocket, even if you don’t do them yourselves on a regular basis. Kind of like riding a bike or changing an outlet. Not to mention this saves a bit of money since you don’t pay for labor. Granted, you’ll want some tools for this, but it’s mostly nothing too specific and you may already have most of it lying around.

One of my vehicles, a 30 year old truck, needed an oil change. We only had to jack it up a little bit (the 30 year old shocks likely need replacing), but this was mostly for comfort under the vehicle. The oil filter had seized up, so we used a universal tool to remove it. After it had all drained, we replaced the filter and oil, made sure it didn’t eat too much of it, and then got on our merry way. Once we had the ratchet fitted it took all of 10 minutes, and that was mostly for draining the oil and triple checking the dip stick.

Next was my SUV. This one we had to get jacked up all the way. Luckily we picked up one of these so that we didn’t need to use the provided jack that comes with the emergency kit in the car. It made things much faster for us, and I highly recommend getting one. It costs about as much as a basic oil change at Valvoline does, and if you’re ever going to do anything to your vehicles, this and a few jack stands from Harbor Freight will go a long way. I also highly recommend a Subaru, as they’re generally pretty reliable and incredibly easy to maintain for something like this. The oil filter is accessible under the hood on most of them, front and center, right next to the engine oil cap.

Next we did one of the guys’ sedan, which was low enough where we had to jack it up on all fours pretty high! I think we have a better process for doing this next time, but it was a bit trickier than the other two so far. This also has a shield to remove on the bottom unlike the other vehicles. Easy, just annoying. Once that was done, it was as simple as a quick drive to an auto parts store to pick up the oil needed for this vehicle and we were home free.

The last one for the day was the other guy’s old pickup. It needs an oil change, but we didn’t do it today. Instead, we changed his transmission fluid (easy), installed a working driver side seatbelt (lol), and removed some broken spotlights that were mounted on the hood. This was a good time, as it involved us un-splicing some wiring. We obviously disconnected the battery to do this, which tripped his security system and gods was that obnoxious. Not to mention it started the crap out of us, as we were under the hood when the horn went off.

So was the infant. She was not amused. She may never wear that little mechanics outfit again.

These things were all easy to do, and we still have a lot more to work on. My wife’s car still needs an oil change, and the truck has some other cosmetics that need be applied.

If this is something you would consider doing, whether just to acquire a new skill or save a buck (or just have an excuse to hang with the boys) I would like to encourage you to do so. It’s an easy skill to pick up, Youtube is your friend.

Take care of the things you own and they’ll take care of you, too.