“That looks like ya found it on an abandoned engine lol.”
A car service tech was shocked to find a vintage Kmart oil filter inside a customer’s Ford vehicle. The TN Automotive mechanic published a video showing the antiquated car part, along with some grisly imagery of terrible engine damage.
“Does anybody have the hookup with anyone that’s still in the Kmart automotive? Cause we’ve got a complaint about the quality of their oil filters. They don’t really seem to do their job,” the worker says in a Facebook Reel.
Following this, the mechanic then pans their camera over to the car’s engine. It’s swamped in a mass of black, caked-on gunk.
“Asking for a friend,” he says before his video comes to a close.
Kmart, like many legacy big-box American retailers, suffered massive losses and was all but eradicated from the modern brick-and-mortar sales landscape.
Furthermore, the store’s blueprint for consumer offerings is one that folks may be familiar with today. For instance, if you want to pick up a jug of motor oil for your vehicle, a set of tires, cabin air filters, oil filters, etc., there’s a good chance you could find it at Walmart today or order it from the Arkansas-based retail chain online. Kmart also offered these same products to its customer base, as evinced by this Remembering Retail tribute.
The Facebook post shows a 1967 black-and-white photograph of a section inside a Kmart location. Two men wearing white shirts are seen standing in the aisles of Kmart’s automotive section. Signs on the wall promote that a selection of tires is for sale, along with various other boxed products, neatly lined up for customers to peruse.
What’s more, there’s a sign that reads “Service Center,” indicating that folks can have their vehicles maintained there. This is similar to how Walmart offers the same services for its customers today.
Others online have also showcased their Kmart automotive finds, such as a Reddit user who posted to the r/kmart sub.
A duo of pictures shows a K-3 Oil Filter, which they said they “found in [their] grandparents barn.” Unlike the one in TN Automotive’s post, this unit was marked with a K-3 distinction and looks like it has a shorter profile.
What’s more is that since the oil filter was unused, the Reddit user also had the original cardboard packaging the K-3 filter came with, which touts the filter’s features.
“Removes damaging particles. Prevents sludge build-up. Reverses engine wear,” the box reads. Additionally, verbiage on the packaging also makes mention of Kmart’s automotive service department. A blurb on the box reads, “May we install this item for you at a nominal fee?”
Other examples of these “vintage” filters have popped up online as well. The Binder Boneyard is selling a $10 Motorvator K-11 Oil Filter with a design different from the ones shown on TN Automotive and the Reddit user’s posts.
Motor1 corresponded with TN Automotive via a series of emails to learn more about the vehicle that housed the Kmart filter, as well as the sludge-inundated engine block featured in its social media post.
“The engine is a 1964 Y block that came out of a 64 F-100,” the mechanic shop writes. “It is going in a 1954 F-100, which has been passed around between family and friends for the last 30+ years. It most likely hasn’t moved under its own power in 30 years. The original engine is still in the truck, but it’s seized,” TN Automotive remarked.
Next, a rep from the business stated that the video is a snippet of the restoration process they’re embarking on for the 1954 F-100.
“We have finally decided to get it back on the road. We started tearing the ‘new’ engine apart on a Saturday, and found it humorous that it still had a K-Mart oil filter on it, considering K-Mart hasn’t been in existence in decades,” the service tech commented.
As for the buildup and gunk in the engine block, they said it wasn’t due to a 30-year-old filter but because old-school cars were simply built differently.
“Non detergent oil didn’t exist when this engine was new, so engine sludge was normal, but we were making a joke, and blaming it on the 30-year old oil filter,” they explained. Their comment about working on a “late model” Ford in the caption was also a joke, given the actual age of the vehicle.
According to TN Automotive, they were “surprised by the number of views and shares this has gotten on Facebook.” Furthermore, they provided a picture of the 1954 vintage truck they’re working on making road-worthy again.
A 1954 Ford F-100 that has been passed between family and friends for over 30 years. TN Automotive is currently making it road ready.
Oil filter change intervals are a small point of contention among car owners.
Ideally, drivers should refer to their vehicle’s manuals for the best practices on when to swap out their filters.
However, some folks in this Stack Exchange forum argued against swapping the filter out every other oil change (10,000 miles) in favor of doing it every time you put in a fresh batch of oil (5,000 miles). Many opined that the benefits of putting in a brand new filter far outweigh the benefits of trying to squeeze more life out of your filter.
AutoZone penned a blog piece about oil filters, writing that the importance of these items often goes unmentioned.
“It’s a small inexpensive piece usually priced between $5 to $20 … [and] isn’t given much thought or credit,” the retailer wrote.
However, the business stated that this component is “essential for keeping your engine healthy, so it will last a long time.”
Motor1 has reached out to Kmart via Facebook direct message for further comment. This story will be updated if it responds.
We want your opinion!
What would you like to see on Motor1.com?
– The Motor1.com Team