Complicated Cars Put A Dent In An Old Father-Son Ritual : NPR

Most cars don't have dipsticks anymore. You can't drink a six-pack with your friends and change the oil in front of your house.

For me, it wasn't so much my dad as it was time with my older brothers, who were constantly working on British roadsters and motorcycles. I was the ready assistant, like a well trained monkey, handing ratchets, allen wrenches and cold drinks to my very cool brethren.

Easy solution, keep driving old cars

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$60 OM617 Blank Exhaust Flanges
$110 OM606 Blank Exhaust Flanges
No merc at the moment

I went test-driving with a friend last week. Most cars (expensive over-engineered crap aside) do in fact have dipsticks. If anything, changing the oil in some cars is easier than it was years ago.

I liked how the FR-S/BRZ had the oil filter with the threads facing down, surrounded by a little lip so you could unscrew it a bit, let the oil run back down into the engine, bag it up, then finish unscrewing. No oily mess.

Cars are not black boxes the same way phones and tablets are. Which one will a child see more of by the time he/she reaches driving age ?

Fathers and sons can still fix cars together (I need to clean out the intake on my new '2001 Jetta TDI...) but its tough...
...almost as tough as a father and son programming computers together (which I'd also happily do with my son)


Note: I'm also not considering the safety hazards of letting your 12y/o drive customer cars around a parking lot (as cited in the article....).

On one level, I'd rather he brick the laptop before he brick his car...
On another, I wish I could give him the feeling of satisfaction derived from replacing 2 subaru headgaskets and seeing the car run again


Being a parent is tough, no matter what year it is.

-Daddy

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2009 Kia Sedona
2009 Honda Odyssey EX-L
12006 Jetta Pumpe Duse
(insert Mercedes here)

Husband, Father, sometimes friend =)

There are still a lot of choices in cars that can be worked on by the average human. And thanks to the internet, even some of the more high-tech and complex problems can be tackled.
But personally, I wouldn't even own any car that makes it difficult or impossible for me, or a typical shop, to check fluids. For a manufacturer of cars costing 50K to well over 100K, eliminating the dipsticks, and specific vehicle fluid requirements from the owner's manual, is the height of arrogance!

Happy Motoring, Mark

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DrDKW

Who needs a dipstick when you have idiot lights?

I think that most complicated cars still have brakes that the average shade-tree mechanic can work on.

But I'm way set in my ways. I kept my flip phone for a long time and I'm liable to keep my '87 325i even longer. Already have kept it much longer. The '81 300SD will run again, I swear.

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1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

Har, har... I was thinking along the lines of: "Who needs a dipstick under the hood when you have one behind the wheel...?"

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-Evan


Benz Fleet:
1968 UNIMOG 404.114
1998 E300
2008 E63


Non-Benz Fleet:
1992 Aerostar
1993 MR2
2000 F250

I hear that Mercedes requires their StarTech computer to reset the system whenever the brakes are serviced.

Happy Motoring, Mark

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DrDKW

I believe that only to be true of SBC or EBC or whatever it was called, cars.

As for the lack of dipstick, the Mercedes that don't have them, you put in a an amount of oil, allow it to settle, key on the car. It says on the readout "add X.X litres of oil" you add an extra litre and your done. Wow that was easy. A friends BMW had a nifty digital dipstick on the iDrive on his 745Li.

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68 280SL - 70 280SL - 70 300SEL 3.5 - 72 350SL - 72 280SEL 4.5 - 72 220 - 72 220D - 73 450SL - 84 230GE - 87 200TD - 90 190E 2.0 - 03 G500

Nissan GTR - Nissan Skyline GTS25T - Toyota GTFour - Rover Mini - Toyota Land Cruiser HJ60 - Cadillac Eldorado - BMW E30 - BMW 135i

And someday the poor fool trying to keep that car running as the 2nd or 3rd owner is going to wish he had a dipstick cuzzin the readout done broke. I can see how it might be an attractive feature. I don't like being lulled into casual complacency by oil warning lights. It's a bad thing to miss. Low oil that is.

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1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

I believe M112/M113s have a dipstick tube with no dipstick in them. There is a dipstick considered a factory tool. Its not pricey.

I see what you mean though.

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68 280SL - 70 280SL - 70 300SEL 3.5 - 72 350SL - 72 280SEL 4.5 - 72 220 - 72 220D - 73 450SL - 84 230GE - 87 200TD - 90 190E 2.0 - 03 G500

Nissan GTR - Nissan Skyline GTS25T - Toyota GTFour - Rover Mini - Toyota Land Cruiser HJ60 - Cadillac Eldorado - BMW E30 - BMW 135i

Stop having kids, the world is over populated as it is.

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With best regards

Al

There has to be some penalty for sex.

My youngest drove a 240D first and now drives an 84 Land Cruiser. He likes getting greasy and is better at it than I ever was. Today he decided all his zerks were crudded up and spent the afternoon taking them all out and cleaning them and regreasing everything. I personally would rather eat lint than do a chore like that, but I have to wonder how many 20 year olds even know what a zerk is....

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You're a daisy if you do.
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84 Euro 240D 4spd. 220.5k sold
04 Honda Element AWD
1985 F150 XLT 4x4, 351W with 270k miles, hay hauler
1997 Suzuki Sidekick 4x4
1993 Toyota 4wd Pickup 226K and counting

I foresee a market for dipsticks coming. Add on kits to give your car something that others don't.

Find a place in the lower block, drill a hole, tap it out and install a dipstick tube and stick from an old 240D.

Fifty years from now kids will look at old cars from the early 2000's and point to the dipstick. Then they will ask their Fathers, "Hey, what's that thing for?"