Okay, now that I own all three of my autos, I think that I need to learn to do some routine maintenance on them. So, today I decided to change the air filters in all three of my autos. The station where I usually have my oil changed charges a pretty high premium for this service, so I wanted to see if I could do it myself. The manufacturer recommends changing the air filter every 12,000 miles, and all three of my autos were do. Here is how things went.
1st Auto…2000 Chrysler Town and Country LXI 3.3 Liter V6
(This is not my actual van…this is a stock photo from a review of the 2000 T and C.)
Okay, I purchased the filter for this van, for a cost of just under 6 dollars. I purchased from a local auto parts place. I have since located this same part on the web for a few cents cheaper, but I wanted to do this project today.
Well, for some reason, Chrysler decided to make changing the air filter in this particular van rather difficult. What should have taken about 2 minutes took about twenty, because the filter is “below” another part, and the other part had to be moved before I could change the filter. All in all, though, this was a pretty simple task. On to the next auto…
2nd Auto…1994 Ford F150 XL
(Again, not my actual truck, but same year, color, etc.)
Okay, this one was pretty simple dimple… I simply opened the hood, removed 4 screws from the air filter cover, took out the old filter, and put in the new filter. Again, about 6 bucks. This air filter took all of about 5 minutes to replace. On to auto number three…
3rd Auto…2001 Honda Accord LX
(Again, not my auto, but just like it)
Well, leave it to the good people from Honda to make everything extremely easy to work with. This is all I had to do, and it took, literally, 25 seconds:
Pop the hood.
Un-snap 4 metal latches.
Pull off air-filter cover. Discard old air-filter. Place new air filter.
Put air-filter cover back on. Snap 4 metal latches back.
Close the hood.
That’s it. No screws, no bolts, no mess, easy, easy, easy. Now, I will note this: The filter for this auto cost 4 bucks more than the other 2.
Well, this was my first attempt at “self-maintaining” my autos. Tomorrow, I will change the oil in my F150. I hope all goes well. Quick summary:
Total Cost: 3 Filters: 22 bucks
Total Time: 30 Minutes
Was it worth it? Yes, yes, and yes.