Image courtesy of TitanTalk.com

The Internet has many oil leak stories from customers that have had bad experiences at Jiffy Lube and other auto repair shops throughout the country. Sometimes the oil leak is due to an inexperienced oil lube tech making a rookie mistake, like double gasketing a filter. Another common mistake is not cleaning the mating surface of the gasket or using the incorrect oil filter to begin with. These can be horror stories no matter which end of the spectrum you are positioned in. It’s horrible public relations for any repair shop to have a previous patron telling everyone who will listen, how awful their experience was. In their mind if the repair shop was the last one to touch their car, they MUST be responsible! Sometimes this is the case, but other times the repair shop is NOT at fault. The following is what happened several years ago when a customer had his car towed to us after all the oil leaked out, following a Jiffy Lube oil change.

The car was brought in on the hook with no oil. After adding oil and briefly starting the engine, oil streamed from the base of the filter. My first thought was that it must have a double gasket. To my surprise the oil filter was tight and there was only one gasket. It was too late for the engine though, it obviously had severe top and bottom end damage. After pricing a used engine replacement for the customer, they were determined to have Jiffy Lube pay the bill. To make a long story short, a hearing was scheduled and I was subpoenaed. I really didn’t know the cause of failure , I could only assume since the filter was the correct one, it was tight and there was no double gasket, there must have been dirt on the mating surface. I reluctantly went to court for the hearing. I must say, Jiffy Lube was very professional and was able to provide a very reasonable explanation for the problem. The lesson that they provided that day is what I want to pass along to other repair shops that may be accused wrongly of faulty work or using an inferior or incorrect oil filter when doing an oil change. 

A little exaggerated, the end of the filter can round with excessive pressure. 

I recommend that all shops that routinely do oil changes bookmark this page in case they are ever faced with this situation. After-all, auto repair shops get a bad rap too often and are usually assumed guilty until proven innocent. The pdf linked here along with a diagram, shows what happens when there is excessive pressure from a stuck oil pressure regulating valve. This document along with a damaged filter (one that shows signs of bulging) can be enough evidence in court to prevent a verdict that would require the shop to replace an engine. Note that canister type oil filters, regardless of which brand, always have a flat portion on the end. If exposed to too much oil pressure, the flat portion will bulge and make the filter more rounded on the end. If an oil filter cannot be placed on the surface of a level table without tipping over, it has been exposed to too much pressure. The technical service bulletin I’m talking about is provided by filtercouncil.org  – TSB 83-1R2.

One final note, I’ve never personally used oil filter wrenches to tighten an oil filter. I’ve always justed tightened them by hand, but here is another interesting TSB regarding using filters that have either been dropped and dinged or that might have creases from someone thats gone a little crazy using a wrench to tighten a filter.