Rotate Those Tires, Change That Oil!

2023 Ford Maverick Hybrid. Ask me about getting 40+ MPG!
Don't ask about the Aston Martin F1 flag, they aren't looking too good this year. 

Car manufacturers always recommend rotating your tires and changing your oil, so recently that's just what I did on the Ford Maverick. The truck just hit 30,000 miles, so whether that was due to hitting that number, or that I was 7,000 miles past the tire rotation, my Ford app told me it was time to get to work. You can always do this the easy way and just take your car to a shop and have them do it, but what fun is that? You'd hardly get dirty and have to spend money!

Well heck, with the wheels off, go ahead and inspect the shocks and brake pads. 
This one has the coil over the shock. They're still there!

I admit that I did check the owner's manual to make sure I was rotating in the right direction and got the right type of oil, so other than that, it was straightforward. Ha, ha, just a little tire rotating humor there, "Straight Forward!" Only the rear tires could possibly get rotated "straight forward" if you think about it! My little book said that the rears move straight forward to the front, but that the fronts crisscross and go to the back. 

In the wheel well on the driver side rear, what's that green thing?
It's the backup fuel door opener, if the regular door opener button on the dash doesn't work, so you can still put gas in the truck. Some cars will have a backup thing like this in the trunk, or even in the door jamb area close to the fuel door. 

At first, this moving tires was very difficult, so let me give you a PRO TIP: JACK UP THE VEHICLE FIRST! Hey, that's two hilarious jokes already, you're welcome! Yes, jack up the vehicle safely and use jack stands to make removing and installing the wheels easier. It really is a great tip!

When the wheels were removed, I checked the suspension, brake pads, and just kind of in general looked for any problems. This also let me measure my brake pads for wear, and measure the tire tread depth to see how they are doing. As far as I know a lot of cars come with cheaper tires if you buy them new, so I'm curious how much mileage these Continental tires will last. With 30,000 miles, they are all around 5/32nd, so I'll keep watching them and replace them down around 4/32nd. 

Sometimes the shock and coil are separate.

Brake pad wise, things are still good there, although I noticed the rears were down to 8mm and the fronts were better off with 10mm. Normally this would be all backwards, but with hybrid vehicles that use regenerative braking, it is common for the rear pads to wear faster than the fronts. That's just some good to know info. 

Oil change, and showing off my nifty cart!

Another excuse to write on my truck, reminder on what size the drain plug uses.

 

Removing the oil filter was also easy, but sure, I dripped a little bit on the garage floor, so no world record there! The Maverick came with the first oil change included for free, so I've now done two others. The easiest part of this oil change is going to the dashboard and changing the oil change setting, since it's very user friendly with the computer menu. No tricky "hold the key with your toe, stick out your tongue, turn the key 27.5 times, and say There's No Place Like Home."

In the NMS Oil Change Department (OCD I guess!) we tied a WORLD RECORD by draining the oil with exactly NO DROPS of oil on the ground! This was easy with the truck jacked up high enough to get a 5 gallon bucket right under the oil pan, remove the bolt, and BOOM the oil just flowed into the bucket. 

I was going to remind you to SPRING ahead, but that's just too corny.