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Car Maintenance Tips

Learn what you can do at home to help maintain your vehicle’s longevity and value in between your visits to Jiffy Lube®. Click Here to visit our Jiffy Lube Resource Center

Scroll through this page to read and learn about some of our most essential tips for improving your fuel economy and maintaining your vehicle.

Understanding how your vehicle works is one of the first steps in maintaining its value and longevity. Just as quality service is key to a healthy vehicle, so is education. Take a fun trip through the Jiffy Lube® How Cars Work, an interactive tool to learn about your car and its parts in.

Jiffy Lube Car Maintenance TipsFuel Efficiency Review
Want to improve gas mileage? Come in for our Fuel Efficiency Review. It’s free with a Jiffy Lube Signature Service® Oil Change and can help improve your gas mileage by 1-10% per gallon. *Save up to 55 cents per gallon, based on $3.72/gallon

As part of your Jiffy Lube Signature Service® Oil Change, we will evaluate the following items free of charge that help improve fuel economy:

  • Tire Pressure Check
  • Inspect condition of engine air filter
  • Usage of the proper grade of motor oil

Gas Saving Tips

Here are some gas saving tips that can help you get the most out of every gallon of gas you buy:

Drive Sensibly – Aggressive driving (speeding, rapid acceleration and braking) wastes gas. It can lower your gas mileage by 33 percent at highway speeds and by 5 percent around town. Sensible driving is also safer for you and others, so you may save more than gas money.

Observe the Speed Limit – While each vehicle reaches its optimal fuel economy at a different speed (or range of speeds), gas mileage usually decreases rapidly at speeds above 60 mph. As a rule of thumb, you can assume that each 5 mph you drive over 60 mph is like paying an additional $0.20 per gallon for gas. Observing the speed limit is also safer.

Remove Excess Weight – Avoid keeping unnecessary items in your vehicle, especially heavy ones. An extra 100 pounds in your vehicle could reduce your MPG by up to 2%. The reduction is based on the percentage of extra weight relative to the vehicle’s weight and affects smaller vehicles more than larger ones.

Avoid Excessive Idling – Idling gets 0 miles per gallon. Cars with larger engines typically waste more gas at idle than do cars with smaller engines.

Use Cruise Control – Using cruise control on the highway helps you maintain a constant speed and, in most cases, will save gas.

Use Overdrive Gears – When you use overdrive gearing, your car’s engine speed goes down. This saves gas and reduces engine wear.

Keep Your Engine Properly Tuned – Fixing a car that is noticeably out of tune or has failed an emissions test can improve its gas mileage by an average of 4 percent, though results vary based on the kind of repair and how well it is done. Fixing a serious maintenance problem, such as a faulty oxygen sensor, can improve your mileage by as much as 40 percent.

Check & Replace Air Filters Regularly – Replacing a clogged air filter can improve your car’s gas mileage by as much as 10 percent. Your car’s air filter keeps impurities from damaging the inside of your engine. Not only will replacing a dirty air filter save gas, it will protect your engine.

Keep Tires Properly Inflated – You can improve your gas mileage by around 3.3 percent by keeping your tires inflated to the proper pressure. Under-inflated tires can lower gas mileage by 0.4 percent for every 1 psi drop in pressure of all four tires. Properly inflated tires are safer and last longer.

Use the Recommended Grade of Motor Oil – You can improve your gas mileage by 1-2 percent by using the manufacturer’s recommended grade of motor oil. For example, using 10W-30 motor oil in an engine designed to use 5W-30 can lower your gas mileage by 1-2 percent. Using 5W-30 in an engine designed for 5W-20 can lower your gas mileage by 1-1.5 percent. Also, look for motor oil that says “Energy Conserving” on the API performance symbol to be sure it contains friction-reducing additives.

** Source: The Department of Energy. For more information, visit their website at www.fueleconomy.gov

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