Halfords

[Grogger]

Hello, Just had my oil warning light come up in my car. Too late to go to a garage now and need the car for the weekend so I need to top it up, only problem is I don't know what oil it needs? Obvious choice I can think is to go to Halfords first thing in the morning. Would this be a good choice? and would they be able to tell me exactly what oil I need or better still would it be better to take the car too Kwik-Fit???

 

[Lump]

Hello, Just had my oil warning light come up in my car. Too late to go to a garage now and need the car for the weekend so I need to top it up, only problem is I don't know what oil it needs? Obvious choice I can think is to go to Halfords first thing in the morning. Would this be a good choice? and would they be able to tell me exactly what oil I need or better still would it be better to take the car too Kwik-Fit???

What car/engine pal? I wouldnt let a muppet from halfrauds fit a wiper blade nevermind tell me what oil I should be using (thats if they even knew)

 

[brendy]

Dont go near kwikfit, they are con merchants.
What model of car is it? Halfords oil itself is grand though. Make sure you know what oil you need before going in.

 

[Grogger]

Its a BMW I'd normally take it to my local specialist here in Warrington but he's not open on a Saturday. I don't have the option of waiting to book it into the garage on Monday either as I have to drive back to work on Sunday night.

Ive looked online for the right oil but there's so many people recommending different ones

 

[brendy]

What year, model and engine? You really shouldnt let it get to the point the light comes as it is only there as last warning rather than notification that it needs some. Chances are you might need at least a litre to get it back to the right level.

 

[Grogger]

Sorry it's a BMW 330d year is 2005

 

[drawboy]

The make is unimportant just the viscosity 10/40 etc. Get that info and just buy a quality brand like Castrol you cannot go wrong then.

 

[Grogger]

The problem is finding out which one i need though

 

[brendy]

5w/30 fully synthetic oil matey. Is it due a service soon?
When you are low on oil avoid revving the engine too hard.

 

[CliveW]

If all fails, read the vehicle handbook!

 

[Revolt]

I went into halfords and they whack your registration number into a system, guy told me my oil type, the size of the oil tank in my car and a lot of other useless information, got the right oil though

 

[Doon frae Troon]

If all fails, read the vehicle handbook!

Just what I was thinking!
I would not recommend driving it with the oil warning light on.
Know sod all about cars but I know that one.

 

[Grogger]

5w/30 fully synthetic oil matey. Is it due a service soon?When you are low on oil avoid revving the engine too hard.

Cheers Brendy, top bloke!! Yeah it's due one soon I'm in the navy and drive down to Portsmouth every weekend so I'm averaging about 2000 miles a month. I'm off for Easter leave soon so I'll book it in soon

 

[brendy]

Buy two litres and keep what is left in the boot. Doing 2k a month you need to be checking the oil level every week. I top my washers up every few weeks and check mine at the same time.

 

[USER1999]

If all fails, read the vehicle handbook!

Often not useful these days, as manufacturers want you to take it to a stealership. Wife's BMW used to have a big sticker under the bonnet, on a massive plastic cover, saying only remove if you are a trained BMW mechanic. To make it doubly difficult, they used tamper proof screws to hold it down.

The manual for my hearse (Chrysler) does not say what oil it takes, or what the capacity is. That said, in three years of ownership I have only lifted the bonnet once, just to have a look at what was under there!

 

[Grogger]

Looked in the manual before and all it says is ring the dealership. I never take it to them anyway I've always used my local bmw specialist cheaper and I find them to be very honest

 

[brendy]

I have an impreza wrx and an x5 family wagon, best advice I can give is join a couple of owners forums, the amount you can learn from them is fantastic and saves me a fortune in service and maint costs when I can do a lot of the work myself.

 

[GreiginFife]

Per Brendy 5w30 although 0w30 is recommended if its the E90/E92 model. Halfords own make is decent enough for your purposes. I have a 320cd* and only use Miller XTech 0w30 which is great.

* until next weekenx when I will have an Alfa GT

 

[chrisd]

The only dipstick in my car is the one driving it ........... I wait till it tells me to feed it with some oil!

 

[brendy]

* until next weekenx when I will have an Alfa GT

Lovely motors but deffo join the owner forums... and buy a sparkly new toolkit!