Practically Classics Forum

If it moves turns and or slides, then it needs lubricating.
I lub door locks seat slides hinges wheel nuts. Every bolt I fit will have some type of lub. Grease for outside the car and petroleum jelly on trim stuff Inside the car. If oil and grease is allowed to dribble down and oil the inside of the door skin this will help stop corrosion. So when oiling too much does not hurt.

Oil does degrade rubber so wipe off oil on rubber bits, oil gives rubber a shine ( not tyres please use shoe polish instead and keep off the tread. Should a mistake be made wire brush lightly the tread)

Exception. Nylon does not like oil and can go furry. Nylon sleeved cables are best left dry. However should a nylon cable get stiff then lots of WD40 helps.

My sister had her VW Galaxy serviced by a mobile guy and I was pleased to see that he had oiled everything. He even greased the battery clamp bolts.

Because I oil stuff I rarely get seized bolts. It makes life much easier.

Drive belts. Both my Jeep and Shadow get noisey belts from time to time. I use a squirt of engine oil on the belt. This seems counter intuitive. The oil cleans off the glaze and softens the rubber a bit. The oil flicks off the belt after a few mins.

Oil is the life blood of any machine.

Ball joints with no nipples.
Carefully lift the rubber boot squirt oil in, refit boot. Ball joints are usually greased but some are oil. Oil will mix with dryed up grease and turn to grease.

If the ball joint is off the car then remove rubber boot. And soak ball joint in melted motorbike chain grease.

Gloss black enamel is best colour to refinish ball joints so they look nice. I use Wickes exterior grade gloss enamel. White spirit for cleaning and thinning. £5 a litre. Which lasts for ages. But does take 24hrs to dry. Touch dry 2 hrs.

Regards
Bob Reddington.

So when oiling too much does not hurt.

It does if some imbecile has filled their car's sills, door frames, chassis legs etc. with the stuff and you're the innocent person on the motorcycle who uses the road a few seconds after they drove along it!
Yes, I know pedal cyclists are just as much at risk from such things but haven't fallen off a device that had no engine so cannot comment on whether that hurts more, less or about as much. Finding oil on the carriageway isn't much fun in a horsebox either, especially if the cargo gets spooked. Horses will blame the driver. Why so? Because they didn't see the registration number of the person who was really at fault.

Wasn't the answer i was quite expecting John .

I should have added that the car is best left till the following day to allow excess to drip off into the cat litter.

Then a wipe down of any obvious about to drip bits.

One has to use common sense I can't micro explain everything.

However as pointed out oil on the road will throw a biker off.. I used to ride bikes but gave it up due to me driving silly fast. I didn't want to be a donor.
So I apologise for the omission.


Incidently oil leaks are an Mot failure if the tester sees the car drop oil bigger than 25mm diameter in a set time which I can't remember. I think its 25mm.

My cars don't leak anything and my man cave floor is quite clean.

The Shadow engine is not oil tight ( all Shadow 1 are like this and modern gaskets can be fitted but mine still has 41 year old gaskets I don't fix what isn't broke ) does not drop oil. The jeep engine is oil tight. Modern gaskets I guess.

Regards
Bob Reddington.

I am always cautious about "oiling everything" as oil itself attracts dust and this can cause more problems than not oiling in the first place! My tractors both need 140 oil in various steering joints/pivots and the front wheel bearings. As they are both 40+ years old, some of the joints are rather worn (!) and oil comes pouring out!! However, the main reason the joints are loose is that they attract dust (neither were local, so saw dry weather) that has acted like carborundum paste. I make a "gloop" of grease and oil to make a thin grease (or thick oil) that will stay in place and I'm careful to stop greasing before it breaks through the seals.

Excessive greasing causes a similar problem. One of the first farmers I worked for insisted that his tractors were greased daily and couldn't understand why he needed to adjust the front wheel bearings on a monthly basis! I would add that these tractors used grease where mine uses oil - and that all the gaiters on the ball joints had long since perished.

I would be cautious with ball joints as some have a "plastic" cup between the moving parts. As it happens, I think I have only replaced one track rod end and one lower wishbone ball joint on my car since I bought VWs (the first was bought on 12/5/90) and never changed a track rod end on my previous cars! Part of the trick is not to turn the steering wheel when the car isn't moving - a non-mechanically minded farmer taught me that!!

I only know the date for the VW ownership because I wrote the Montego off on my sister's birthday and bought the Golf two days later! Happy birthday sis (she's over 65 now).

I note the comments about oil attracting dust.
In dusty conditions then extra maintenance will be needed.

In normal UK road conditions dust is not so much of a problem.

My cars are kept well oiled but not so much that they leave oil every where. The oil does attract dust but it takes quite a while. Even then it does no harm because joints have boots and gaiters. Every year I have a good oil up cleaning as I go.

I find this therapeutic, it makes me happy.

My Shadow does get used its no garage queen.