Thread: edumacate me on the ute thing guys

Mitsi is a little dearer than the local Ford outfit cost-cost (although I haven't been there since they unpinned Ford from Mazda and had to build another service area and showroom). They were only charging a few c a litre more than I could get the oil for for the Ranger (fully synthetic moonbeam and unicorn fart stuff from the pricing). I was on a bloody good rate as a commercial marine type, that was before Covid and the account structures tightened up though. Mitsi for the same thing is decidedly more expensive...

Having said that, I do have a lot more confidence in the local Mitsi dealer than the Ford one which is an unfortunate but true fact. Knowing what I know of the local mechanic outfits, there's a few I wouldn't touch and a few I wouldn't touch with someone else's limbs and appendages and a few I'd shrug and take the risk on but I'm fairly confident with the local Mitsi crew. On older vehicles I am perfectly happy doing my own servicing and mechanical repairs too, I can read codes but don't have the gear to upload and recode if needed which is getting to be quite a limitation with the newer vehicles with correction factors and addressing to worry about.

And on that - some of the mileages getting quoted in this thread seem more than I'd like to be honest. My Ranger is currently returning average of 8.6-8.7L/100Km, and that's combined use highway, around town, towing (both light and heavy), and swinging between unloaded and fully loaded. This is on a slightly lifted front/high load springs rear ute with a fairly unaerodynamic Fleetline Ultra canopy and the towing gear etc permanently hung off it (no tricks to clean it up or anything like that). No special 'economy' driving techniques, aircon running the whole time, use cruise control all the time as well, just get in and drive. People getting over 10 or 11L/100Km have the right to feel justifiably pissed off in my opinion!