Oil leaks, or anything else leaking out of your car is not just messy, it could be dangerous. Stepping on your brake pedal and having nothing happen, is not the time to realize that all that fluid leaking out of your car must have been the brake fluid.  Yep, no brake fluid, no stopping the car!

So what should you do when you start noticing a leak?

Of course the first thing you need to know is “what’s leaking?”  Sometimes the color of the fluid is a good clue, but a lot of the fluids in your car today look very similar.

Anti-freeze used to be an easy fluid to identify, it was almost always a bright green.  But that’s not true today.  Different manufacturers use different colors for most of their fluids.  It would be nice if they would all get together and standardize the colors of all the fluids.  I like this idea, anti-freeze could be green, engine oil could be blue, power steering fluid could be red, differential oil could be purple, brake fluid could be bright orange!  This would make it so much easier to identify what exactly is leaking out of your car.

OK, so that’s not going to happen.

So if you do see a lot of fluid on the ground then of course you should have it looked at right away.  But if it is just a few occasional drops, just mention it the next time you bring the car to Northwest Auto & Tire for service.

When we service your vehicle, it is part of our job to look for any suspicious fluids leaking underneath your vehicle.  Sometimes there are some small seepage leaks can be just left alone as they are not causing any serious problems, and to repair them may be very costly.

Fresh leaks are much easier to pinpoint than old ones.

After any fluid has leaked for a period to time, they tend to spread and collect dust and dirt.  It can then be very difficult to pinpoint the exact source of the leak.

Years ago we use to spend a lot of time cleaning the engine of all the old oil that had accumulated, so we would have a better chance at finding the source.  It was a very messy job and took a lot of time.  Today we have many dyes that we can pour in the fluid, drive the car for a bit and then examine it with an ultra violet light to see where the leak originates from.  being able to add dye is a real time saver.

Now if we could just get them to standardize the color of all those fluids!

If you suspect you have a leak and need an oil change, take advantage of our oil change coupon by clicking HERE.

You can also schedule an appointment to have your vehicle serviced by clicking HERE.