First I want to say I hope this is the right place for questions about maintenance. It doesn't appear any of the boards here are too maintenance specific. If I'm out of line please point me to the right area.
Last night I did my first oil change. It didn't go as smoothly as I'd hoped. But practice makes perfect.
The first issue was my 08 XB is too low to drive up on my ramps. Combine this with my brother having my jack stands and I was forced to use only two regular jacks and I wasn't about to crawl under there to scope it all out. Everything I learned was from peeking at an angle, reaching and feeling. I know this was a probably a poor choice but the car is up to 15,400 and I wanted to get the oil changed.
I have the 2" thick Scion manual and according to that, removing the underpanel is a snap. Remove 3 bolts and presto, you're at the filter. Well that's not how it worked for me.
There are two underpanels. A front one and the second one that should be removed or at least freed enough to get at the filter. The problem is the second panel that I wanted to remove (it's shown to be removed in the Scion Manual) is held in place by about 6 or so bolts and also a number of snaps that have sort of a barb to hold the snaps in place. One must pry out these snaps to remove them.
As far as I can tell these snaps might have a lifespan of about 3 to 5 removals depending on how lucky you are. They seem to undergo some significant trauma when removed and reinserted. The snaps I removed appeared to have been removed and reinserted by the dealer on the first two oil changes and are now on their last legs. And since this is the first time I've done this, I wasn't prepared to have any extra on hand. It also appeared my panel was missing one snap to begin with.
My question is, did I remove more than I was suppose to? Are the snaps not meant to be removed on an oil change? Is there some way I can get to that filter by removing only bolts and flexing the panel that covers the oil filter?
Is there someone here that can pass along a trick or two and maybe put me on an easier course to removing the underpanels. Everything ended up working out fine but it wasn't as easy as I suspected it would be.
I've learned that next time I'll need my either my jack stands or somehow modify my ramps. I imagine if I can drive my car up on a flat 2x8 before starting up the ramps, my ramps will work. As it is the car's bottom clearance was about 3/4" shy of clearing the ramp. The boost of 1-1/2" from climbing up on a 2x8 board should be sufficient. Which ever way I proceed I've learned that for at least a couple of oil changes I need to be able to get fully under the car to scope it all out.
Last night I did my first oil change. It didn't go as smoothly as I'd hoped. But practice makes perfect.
The first issue was my 08 XB is too low to drive up on my ramps. Combine this with my brother having my jack stands and I was forced to use only two regular jacks and I wasn't about to crawl under there to scope it all out. Everything I learned was from peeking at an angle, reaching and feeling. I know this was a probably a poor choice but the car is up to 15,400 and I wanted to get the oil changed.
I have the 2" thick Scion manual and according to that, removing the underpanel is a snap. Remove 3 bolts and presto, you're at the filter. Well that's not how it worked for me.
There are two underpanels. A front one and the second one that should be removed or at least freed enough to get at the filter. The problem is the second panel that I wanted to remove (it's shown to be removed in the Scion Manual) is held in place by about 6 or so bolts and also a number of snaps that have sort of a barb to hold the snaps in place. One must pry out these snaps to remove them.
As far as I can tell these snaps might have a lifespan of about 3 to 5 removals depending on how lucky you are. They seem to undergo some significant trauma when removed and reinserted. The snaps I removed appeared to have been removed and reinserted by the dealer on the first two oil changes and are now on their last legs. And since this is the first time I've done this, I wasn't prepared to have any extra on hand. It also appeared my panel was missing one snap to begin with.
My question is, did I remove more than I was suppose to? Are the snaps not meant to be removed on an oil change? Is there some way I can get to that filter by removing only bolts and flexing the panel that covers the oil filter?
Is there someone here that can pass along a trick or two and maybe put me on an easier course to removing the underpanels. Everything ended up working out fine but it wasn't as easy as I suspected it would be.
I've learned that next time I'll need my either my jack stands or somehow modify my ramps. I imagine if I can drive my car up on a flat 2x8 before starting up the ramps, my ramps will work. As it is the car's bottom clearance was about 3/4" shy of clearing the ramp. The boost of 1-1/2" from climbing up on a 2x8 board should be sufficient. Which ever way I proceed I've learned that for at least a couple of oil changes I need to be able to get fully under the car to scope it all out.
