so my car went in for an oil change at 5003 miles... it was suppose to go in at 4200.. when i got my car back it had 5005 miles.. now when i got it back, i heard fluttering everytime i hit about 3rpms+ in any gear and it just got worse as the rpms went up... what i think they did was forgot to put oil back in the car.. anyway i drove about 10 miles wiht no oil... i bring it back the next day because they closed the second i picked the car up that day... apparently now i need a whole new short block... the bottom half of the engine... my car is going to be in there for about another week or 2 making the total amount of time about 3 weeks in the shop... now they refuse to admit that they forgot to put oil in the car... their saying i "drove it to hard" and i hang my gears to high and put to much pressure on the car... and that the metal was blue because my oil was dirty and i didnt come back to get new oil fast enough... but i mean ARE YOU F#%KING KIDDING ME? i brought them a perfectly running car with no problems on engine failure what so ever.. i pick it up the same f%#king day and its got 2 miles on it and all of a sudden i need a whole new lower half of my engine... can u guys reinsure me that they forgot to put oil in the car and that me who doesnt drive this thing nearly as hard as it should be driven did not destroy my engine? and is there anything i caan do about this such as maybe getting a lawyer or something, i mean i dont know im clueless... are there going to be any long term effects, anything at all?

 

paragraphs are your friend! don't be afraid to give that enter key a whack or two.

ok first, 800 miles over your scheduled change is nothing.

second, you would've been much better off if you had documented that you checked the oil and found it to be low before you returned it to them. pictures of the dipstick would be ideal. even better than that would've been to bring it to a DIFFERENT shop to inspect it-- of course the first is going to be tempted to conceal their mistake.

 

so do u agree that they forgot to put oil in the car?

 

Did your check engine light, or any sort of red light (pressure/level) come on immediately when you started the car? If it did, then they likely forgot to put oil in the engine (if the drain plug was there) Did they tell you anything about how the oil came out? Perhaps the lower oil line on the turbo or drain plug? I'm trying to recall from my dash, and I could be wrong, but I think there's some sort of pressure/level indicator light since we dont get a pressure gauge in this car stock...


In any case, if you had low oil level or no oil pressure (As would happen with them forgetting to put oil in) then you'd get an indication almost Immediatly.. Not to mention you'd hear that engine making quite a bit of racket almost immediately.. If it was very low, then you might hear racket at 3000rpm as the pan drains.. but you would still get some sort of indicator light..

Did you check the oil level before you brought the car back? Was it low?

Although I doubt the engine failing was your fault, there are several reasons for a failure like this.. the pump failed, debris in the oil cooler, the oil filter not seating fully (and all your oil leaked out) to some sort of catastrophic failure.. If you don't abuse your car at all, its certainly not your fault. Even some abuse is certainly expected on these cars, but the engine would hold up to it pretty well..

Now here's the caveat.. If they can determine that grime or some other gunk plugged up the works, then they do have a case since you went over mileage on scheduled maintainance... However most synthetic oil can be changed every 5000 miles if you drive the car mostly highway.. Their maintainance schedule has something to the effect of a 3500mile or 5000mile recommendation (Again, trying to recall from memory) so you certainly arent OVER it..

HOWEVER was this your first oil change? I recall bringing in my car for its first oil change much sooner, but I don't recall if that was by my own choice or their recommendation.. I'll have to check the owners manual to refresh my memory.

In any case, **EVEN** if your engine didn't have the oil changed for 10,000 miles, its unlikely it would have had problems thanks to the synthetic oils.. Mitsubishi does not reveal if they use a "break in" compound on the first oil that your car comes with..

 

oil was changed at 2200 also.. this was my 2nd oil change.. and i dont beat on this thing anywhere near what it was meant for... i did forget to look to see if any lights came on as stupid as i am.. that would of been a good idea

and i did hear low sounds at about 3000rpms and as the rpms went up higher, the sound would get extremely loud...

 

There was either oil in it or there was not. Did you check your dipstick when you suspected they may have forgotten to refill it. If it was empty, then its their fault and they should replace the entire engine not just the short block. The head gets damaged without oil as well. The thing is can you prove it was their foul up.

The very first thing I would do is get in contact with the district rep. and give him the story. If they still wanna play games your gonna have to get an attorney. It sounds like to me someone screwed up at the dealership and now their trying to cover their a$$. They know it means their job.

 

well i didnt check it myself so i cant say but... this is the only logical explanation.. this was my 2nd oil change and the car only has 5000 miles on it... i brought it in perfectly fine no problems at all and now... the second i got it back, the f%cking engine is fluttering and now i need a whole new short block... i mean lets be serious forgetting to put oil in it is possible the only logical explanation here

 

From what I remember of the Pit Pass, the regular pit pass schedule is at 5000 miles plus or minus 1000 miles, and the carbon fibre one is at 3750 +/- 1000 miles.
So 5,200 is no biggy, it sound slike me they are trying to make you feel guilty, when there is no guilt to be had.
As for the oil level / state when they got your car. I may be way off mark here, but you would think at a minimum when they drained your oil they would have a magnet in there, fine metal mesh filter to see if there are any broken bits of engine in there. Which considering how soon your car failed after leaving the dealer, if you had been running with low oil / no oil, then they should have flagged it and given you a call. They didn't do this, so you would assume everything was OK.
So that brings up to the point where you drive it from their premises. When you drove the car in, they logged your mileage on their service sheet. If the miles you have on it now, and what was recorded are not too big of a difference say less than 8 or 10 miles, I would say you have a strong case to proove that engine failure is STRONGLY linked to then f%^king up the oil change.

Hey if Mistu can argue that some guy who took part in an autocross 2 WEEKS before taking it in for service caused engine failure, why can't you say that an oil change that occured less than 10 miles after an oil change ****ed your motor.

 

mostly irrelevant to the topic at hand since he clearly wasn't over the 5k interval, but you are totally wrong anyway.

there is no grime or gunk just floating around in the engine that is going to plug up anything. small particles are trapped by the oil filter, and the filter is most definitely the reason for the interval of 3,750 or 5,000 miles. I assure you that Mobil1 10w30 will still test VERY high on all metrics after those miles. It will be still better than any *new* standard oil!

Mitsubishi is being extremely conservative on the scheduled maintenance for the Evo because of its high state of tune. Most cars with factory synthetic have oil change intervals in the 7,500 to 10,000 mile range-- which to me does sound a bit scary because of the filter-- *not* the oil.

<-- computer guy for an oil company, plus car & motorcycle enthusiast

 

This doesn’t sound like you took it to a dealership for service,

If they haven't admitted that they forgot to put oil in it at your oil change.

and you didn’t check the oil level or notice the oil light come on,

Its going to be your word against theirs, Theirs being the word of “trained” technicians, and yours being an untrained guess at whether they did or not because you didn’t verify yourself, or through a third party.

Get a lawyer

If they are claming you went over miles, you have a strong argument that they are clueless as to the maintenance requirements of the Evo. Minimum interval is 3750, and if you got your first at 2200 you didn’t need your next until 5950, so you were well below the minimum extreme use / environment interval.

 

the thing is they already are replacing the short block of the engine.. what would be the point in getting a lawyer... the amount id pay the lawyer, there would be no point and what would i be arguing for? the only reason im pissed right now is that they keep blaming this shyt on me and my car is gone for like 2 weeks... my mother wants to get rid of the car totally and either get a brand new 03 evo or just get another car because she thinks its going to have long term effects on the car.. personally im confused right now i just dont know how these f%cking boneheads could do such a thing

 

I used to work at Jiffy Lube and sometimes we forget to put oil back into the car. Mostly on Sundays because the manager is not there. We have a friends and family specials where they bring in a 6 pack of beer and a filter for a free oil change. But minutes later the customer will come back because he is blowing out white clouds of smoke that is larger than the car itself.

So did you see any white smoke as you drove it home? If you didn't then most likely the service guys on their 2 mile drive messed up your engine.

Do not drop your car off at the dealers and leave! Read the fine print where you have to sign. It says anyone working for mitsu may take your car out for a test drive.

I caught a Sear's guy fu8ing my car up in the parking lot because I went in for a break check and he was running my car like he was at a SCCA event. Nothing I can do there cause I signed the papers. I also caught a mitsu guy doing the same on a local road when I went in for a coolent refill (I broke their glass door as pay back and said sorry it was the wind that blew the door out of my hands).

Go to Jiffy Lube for an oil change but watch them work cause some of them may be drunk and don't buy anything they sell you. I used to average $68 per car that came in for an oil change cause we make commission of those air filters and coolent flushes.

I'm sorry but all those papers you've signed must have some fine print on it that releases them from any wrong doing. They have multi-million dollar lawyers to write up those crap I believe.

 

hey man... SAME THING happened to me (except they didn't put enough oil as opposed to none). unfortunately, being a college student i couldn't afford an attorney or time off from school. so i got stuck with a broken car mitsu refused to cover under warranty. I showed them receipts that i had gotten proving i received my oil change from the dealership, and the same dealership voided my warranty giving me the same bull**** reasoning they gave you: there's no way THEIR technicians could have forgotten to put oil in the engine/ you drove the car too hard. To make matters worse, I know I still had at least 1,000 miles until I had to get another oil change. How the **** am I supposed to get to school when all the money i had i spent on what I perceived as my "dream car" as a graduation present to me. I'm sorry you;re going through this too, I was hoping it wouldn't happen to anyone else. Good luck.

 

I know of one engine that had a manufacturing defect where there was gunk (filings and flashing) that had gotten caught in the oil pump or cooler and caused an engine failure. I wasn't specifically referring to junk from regular engine breakin or any sort of normal wear.. I don't know that they could blame it on the owner regardless so in that case, your right, its Irrelevant..

 

completely wrong! are you still working at quik-lube places?

regardless of what paperwork you sign, if you give someone your car for a SPECIFIC PURPOSE, in this case changing the oil, and they damage it doing something else **totally unrelated to the specific purpose** they are absolutely positively liable for the damages.

I mean explain to me how a test drive is needed for an oil change? hmm... that's right, it isn't!

likewise, if I bring my car to a bodyshop and they fail to secure it properly and it's stolen I'm filing the claim with their insurance-- not mine.

sometimes this place gives me a headache... scary.