Posted on 05/21/2025 4:42:50 PM PDT by where's_the_Outrage?
Ever wondered when your last oil change was and needed to check the oil level? Most of us don't have this problem — when we take a car in for an oil change, the mechanic will usually put a sticker on the windshield to let us know when's the next time to come in for a visit. But let's say we don't have a sticker or any kind of maintenance reminder. So we pop open the hood and look for the dipstick. Wait ... where did it go?!
Once, dipsticks were the go-to method for checking oil levels and finding out if your oil has gone bad. But as odd as it may sound, many cars don't come with dipsticks anymore. Some sources say it's because automakers don't trust us to use them, so why make them? (That's kind of along the lines of rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it, right?) Or maybe it's some kind of conspiracy to keep drivers coming in for oil changes more often. But in actuality, it's because a lot of things are going digital.
"With digital oil level measurement, customers can easily monitor their vehicle's oil level in their vehicle's driver display and receive timely alerts if oil level is outside normal limits," Mercedes-Benz spokesperson Andrew Brudnicki told Automotive News Canada in 2024 (via SlashGear). "This proactive approach helps to avert potential engine damage."
It may just be us, but technology doesn't fix everything. Sometimes, one solution can undo all others. Using the dipstick was fast and easy. Some cars even had dipsticks for checking transmission fluid. Now, drivers are left to rely on a touchscreen to know if their car needs oil.
(Excerpt) Read more at jalopnik.com ...
MUST BE LOAD RANGE E tires.
I have those on my 1 ton truck & on my 4 horse trailer.
You forgot the spare tire.
Not true. I got no ads thru the app.
I am surprised frankly. I use the app for interstate travel to guide me the best route.
True story from 1963. My car was cranking but would not start after work. It was Chicago fall weather. My coworker opened the hood, opened the distributor cap and asked me to crank the engine. He did not observe sparks from points inside distributor. He said the points look shut without any gap. He bent the points with pliers to make the gap bigger. Voila, car started! Today’s car you might need a computer replacement costing arm and a leg.
Come on man. I can not live without my cell phone. Every same person has a cell phone today.
It gets even better. I connect cell phone to USB port of car, and then I see the road map on big screen of car! And as a bonus my phone gets charged! Your 30-60 dollar gadget won’t charge the phone on a long trip.
I have a 2000 Camry with 271,000 miles. It only let me down one time when a coil went out at 253,000 miles.
17 trips to Mexico (bad roads and fuel), sometimes pulling a small trailer.
Keep that older Suburban! It’s a tank.
All these new cars are junk.
A car needs to be practical.
Some of these vehicles get problems where it’s difficult to diagnose the cause (lots of electrical systems and electronics, complex mechanical systems with many dependencies). They are difficult to work on. They are overly complex and with many points of failure, making them LESS reliable than the older cars. They have proprietary parts that are not kept in inventory for very long and there are few other vendors making some of these parts so it will be difficult to keep the machine running long term. Owner maintenance is not even considered today - it is discouraged since the car makers want to cash in on the service where they long term make much of their money.
I do not know what to do since I need a new vehicle, but I do not like ANYTHING out there.
Perfect example: International Harvesters Scout 1960 - 1980 https://silodrome.com/international-harvester-scout-800b/
What abomination they have turned this into: https://www.scoutmotors.com/traveler
Why sell a car that uses a seal-beam headlight for $5.50: https://www.walmart.com/ip/Sylvania-H6024-Basic-Sealed-Beam-Headlight-1-Pack/16913604?wl13=5416&selectedSellerId=0&wmlspartner=wlpa&gStoreCode=5416&gQT=1 If you can sell some fool a car with a headlight that costs $>$300.00
The whole concept of an International harvester (a tractor with a cab on it) has been lost. It’s a electric plastic car for an urban wanna be tough guy that wears his cowboy hat but can’t tell the difference between a milk cow and bull.
I am not interested in making a statement with what I drive. I just want a machine that drives.
Newer cars might perform well on paper and look really cool, but they are junk.
The trend of "dumb" phone (flip phone) users is going upward. A common reason cited is digital fatigue. "Cord cutters" and "cord nevers" realize the smart phone became even more intrusive than television and are drawing a sanity line.
Those addicted to games (and gambling) realize they cannot have such a device on them 24/7. Better to replace it than be tempted.
There is also a diminishing return on trying to make one device do everything. It's going to end up being sub-optimal at a lot of different things.
Dependency risk is another factor - too many users found themselves overly dependent on one device, which when damaged or out-of-date, really knocked them back.
https://softhandtech.com/why-are-people-buying-flip-phones/
https://www.zdnet.com/article/interest-in-flip-phones-is-exploding-among-gen-z-and-younger-millennials/
https://globalnews.ca/news/9598651/dumb-phones-sales-rise-us-gen-z-screen-time/
https://www.tomsguide.com/news/flip-phones-are-making-a-comeback-heres-why
Doesn’t have to be a new car. My 2009 BMW 128i convertible doesn’t have a dip stick, it has a monitor setting that lets one keep track of oil level. It works so well ya don’t miss the dip stick.
I literally see nothing out there which interests me.
They all have gone the way of complex electronics and mechanical systems, lots and lots of sensors, glued, plastic, proprietary parts, without any consideration to maintenance by the owner.
How many USB ports, the size of the display in the car, or if the car can put on a light show, does not interest me.
This is what people care about today? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jyPkg0yXzM
1. Your phone won't need to recharge if you're not using the phone for the driving app.
2. Most driving isn't long distance. For your more prevalent regular trips, it takes far more effort to set up the phone instead of just leaving it in your pocket and pushing the button on the GPS speedometer/odometer (which can also be connected to the auxiliary power and turn on and off with the ignition).
3. Again, the odometer.
Waze sells your data to everyone else who sends you ads on all of your devices.
The app is not the product - you are the product. They know where you stopped, what stores were nearby, your origin and destination, etc. Waze even tracks your trips when you don't have the app open.
“Using the dipstick was fast and easy”
And cheap as hell. And you can see how clean your oil is.
But lets replace that with a series of sensors that are tied into an info system and touch screen. Dipsticks also never fail and get replaced... try that with sensors.
Another solution is to change the display settings to greyscale,to make it less stimulating :
https://www.wired.com/story/grayscale-ios-android-smartphone-addiction/
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/12/technology/grayscale-phone.html
Retardineers strike again, why not have both, so you can also check to see if the sensor is working correctly, on literally the most important gauge on the car. Maybe if retardineers could just stick with what works instead of making new engine changes that still leak, burn, use or drink oil we wouldn’t need either guage.
In this spy film, “The Looking Glass War”, the protagonist starts a balky truck by burning papers on top of the carburetor :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2eNkh3uxsM&t=84s
Wait....so when the mechanical gauge stopped working, you used a gps SENSOR to ensure you were not speeding.......and you lament the use of SENSORS to measure fluid levels?!
Really?!
With all the recalls of the modern vehicle engines (I’m talking to you GM 6.2-liter V-8), the disastrous current recalls of most new vehicles, thinner oil, cheap plastic and crap metal, I think manufacturers and dealers don’t want to do repairs down the road. They make things to get customers safely out of warranty, and then require whole new transmissions or engines with no guarantee those will work, and they often times don’t. All this in order to push people to but more and more expensive shit vehicles.
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