What is 'Oil Flush Treatment' apart from money-grabbing

Why have you paid for it?

This seems to appear on the list of itemised work done on three garages that I have used in recent years.

Neighbour who used to have his own backstreet car repair and MOT business just smirked, and said that it's how you sting the punter for another £10 for doing nothing.

Has anyone else noticed this on their garage invoice ?.

Andrew

I think "Andrew" might be a troll who lives in North America.

Sussex actually. Never been to America.

Why not answer the question ?.

Why do garages charge for mythical work ?.

Because people pay them and don't question it.

I think it depends.

I'm someone who tends to be dubious re garages and I use a couple I trust when I need to. One in particular I used for 20+ years, he's recently retired, and I always felt I could rely on him.

I mentioned flushing once to him some years back. Mostly not needed, at least if you've changed your oil and filter regularly etc. If not, flushing can be worth it. In addition, some engines are prone to issues, and those can benefit.

He shown me something they used, I forget what it was called, but I believe it was about £5 a bottle at the time. I didn't need/use it, it was just mentioned in passing. £10 wouldn't be a surprise. (It was that long ago.)

Well, my garage which I have used for 10 years charges ?6 for one oil flush. I dunno what he actually does. But he has looked after me for 10 years. He came out to me and my sick wife when the car broke down. I trust him.

but you are not questioning it and are presumably happy with being charged for it, the OP has paid it, yet is clearly unhappy to have paid it, yet has not questioned it with the places that charged it!

He tips a can of engine flush in with the old oil before running the car for a while before draining it. According to some car manufactures such snake oil treatments may damage the engine, or more correctly some exotic synthetic rubber seals or alloys used in modern engines.

Sadly, you need to check what you are going to have to pay for before going ahead.

I remember one place who insisted on using a snake oil injector cleaner at every service. Which you had to pay for. So just find another better garage and tell them you've done so.

I don't know what an oil flush actually is. ????? My days of crawling under cars have long gone. I'm too bloody old for that sort of thing.

Well, he has been doing that for the past 10 years and the car still runs well. Thanks for the info. I may not sleep well tonight.

Isn't it just a lighter / thinner / cheaper(?) oil that is really only used for flushing the engine out, after say a rebuild or big service?

You replace the old oil with it, run the engine gently up to temp and the drain and fill with proper oil?

Cheers, T i m

That is one type.

There is also a type you add, I assume some kind of 'cleaning agent', to the old oil.

On YouTube, people use various things- I'm not sure I'd trust.

While it could be because I tend to keep my engines 'clean', I'm dubious how much 'gunge' a short flush would remove going by the fact that when I change my oil, it still looks clean for some time- weeks at at least- so it isn't absorbing any muck left in the engine.

Would the car manufacturer recommend an oil flush as part of a normal service if it was required. Cynic mode: Recommending an additional stage to a normal routine service would maximise the revenue for their franchised dealers.

Wouldn't filling an engine with 4 to 5 litres of flushing oil cost more than £10 especially when considering the labour costs for anpther fill and drain? To be effective it may also need a replacement oil filter for the flush which is discarded once the flush oil is drained. This is assuming that an aggressive cleaning (thin) oil doesn't damage the engine while its being run.

Running the engine in the garage, at low revs, with no load, for long enough to warm up the flushing oil etc, isn't likely to do much harm- certainly if balanced against the removal of any 'gunge' in the case of a dirty engine.

Whether such a short period is enough to be effective is another question- at least if the flushing oil doesn't have some good solvent properties.

It may well loosen some flakes of crud from the inner surfaces of the engine which can then clog the oil strainer, leading to starvation of oil pressure and a wrecked engine (this was quite a common fault on early cvh engines)

Regular oil changes as per maker's schedule using good quality oil is the correct solution.