Nearly 4 months ago, I brought my wife's car to get the oil changed because my apartment does not allow car maintenance in the parking area. When I took it there, at first the oil change took over an hour and only my car was being serviced. Everything seemed fine when I brought my car home and I did not notice anything for a week.
Me and my wife went out of town and took her car because it just got the oil changed. Almost exactly a week after getting the oil changed, the car started making some funny vibrating sounds coming from the engine. We headed back home cutting the vacation short.
To our surprise the coolant had a dark, oily looking residue. The first thing in my mind was that the car a blown head gasket. I looked at the oil and it was completely dry. There were no way all of the cars oil could make it into the reservoir for the coolant and fill the entire coolant system if it was already filled before the trip. Once we got home, smoke starting pouring from under the hood and the meter ran hot. I pulled over and turned off the car.
Under the hood, the top radiator hose burst and spilled an oily residue all over the inside. I took the car to my friend's house and cleaned out the system the best I could.
From the looks of what happened, Wal-Mart put the oil into the coolant. To find out the real problem, I filled the coolant back up and filled the oil up as well. I took it to a good friend of the family who is a registered mechanic in the state of PA. He took a look and said that it was a serious problem but it was not a blown head gasket because there was no coolant in the oil compartment.
My wife and I took the car after getting inspected back to Wal-Mart to tell them of the mistake they made that could have arisen into a big problem and that the car will now need some extra work done to it. I had to replace all the radiator hoses, get a complete flush, change the thermostat, get some new misc. Parts for the system, and an inspection over the problem.
Bringing this to Wal-Marts attention, they quickly jumped to the conclusion that it was a blown head gasket and that they have experienced personnel trained to put the oil where it belongs. When I showed them the container with the remainder of residue in it, they told me that there is no proof that was in there before I got it fixed.
I showed them the receipt of the hose I had to buy and had them look at the car, this was before I paid to get everything else fixed. They continued to tell me it does not look good for me because there is no proof besides a container of liquid I had outside the car that it was actually in it. They also questioned it because it was more than a week since I had the oil changed.in the end, the management staff and the insurance team told me that I cannot process this claim without bringing the car to them immediately when it had the first problem.
They expected me to look under the hood right after they finished changing the oil to be sure everything was done right before taking it away. Since my wife and I never drove her car till our trip, we did not find out for a week. NEVER take your car to Wal-Mart to get serviced. I do not even trust them with the tires which they did not fill up with enough air when I got those replaced before the oil.
0 comments