First Oil Change done -- the good & bad

[sugarpants41]

Good day all!

Just did my first oil change yesterday at 1708 miles. I must say, it was a very good experience.

I’ve wrenched on a lot of cars over the years, mainly the easy to medium DIY level. I save heavy lifting for those with higher quality tools.

There are a few things I enjoyed about the Maverick’s setup:

• Under shield retention! It’s held in place by 3 cleverly placed indents on the shield so you don’t have to hold it up by hand while simultaneously attempting to put all the screws back in. Much easier this way.
• Shield screws! I had a fitting for my cordless power drill which matched, so putting these back in was far quicker than using a wrench/socket combo like all my other vehicles.
• Filter location! Some vehicles place their oil filters in a PITA spot. Not this truck.
• Dipstick location! Same as with the oil filter. It’s in broad daylight, right on top. But, not all is well in

There were two things I didn’t enjoy, however:

• Dipstick readability. This stick is challenging to read. When are you full? It was difficult to say whether I was actually full, or whether some residual oil from filling was running down the stick from above. I’m hoping this will settle out within a day or so and I can get a clearer reading.
• Under shield oil pan access hole. It appears there is a precut access hole for the oil pan drain plug. This is good! It also appears the cover is missing, as there are precut slots for cover attachment points. This being the first oil change on the vehicle I can only assume it was not installed at factory. Or, the truck Does anyone else have theirs ‘missing’?

All in all, great experience! I’ll be doing again at the 5k mark, and every 5k thereafter.

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