I think Ford is not terribly excited about consumers working on their (our) vehicles. They hide the oil filter between the front driver’s tire and the bumper, and don’t tell you where it is. (Don’t you think the oil filter belongs, oh, I don’t know, somewhere near the oil pan?) They scramble the engine layout, and for somebody whose brain’s already scrambled, it just makes it that much harder to do my own maintenance. (Surely that’s the whole idea.) And they cleverly disguise the drain for the transmission fluid as the drain for the oil pan.

Guess who fell for it.

I crawled under the BGF last rainy Saturday, wrench in hand, pushing the oil catch pan in front of me, and came up under the biggest, obviousest drain pan I could see. Never mind that I’ve changed the BGF’s oil successfully in the past (otherwise, how would I know where the oil filter is hidden?). No, I wrenched open the drain plug and watched the used oil pour out in a solid pillar of red fluid.

Wait a minute. Red? It should be filthy black! And it doesn’t even look dirty. Oh well.

I let the whole pan drain out, replaced the plug, and went to fill the oil. Hmm, not even five quarts in and it’s already full. What’s going on? I wonder if the fluid I drained  wasn’t …even …oil.

I called the surly locals at the car-parts dealer. “Was it red?” ask the surprisingly non-surly woman on  the phone. I sheepishly acknowledged that it was. “Yup,” quoth she. “Transmission fluid.” So tonight if I have time I’ll replace the missing fluid and hope I get the level right. Better $25 for replacement fluid than $4000 for a replacement transmission.

Good one, Ford. Good one, me. I haven’t yet learned that it never pays to hurry. But at least I haven’t tried to drive the BGF yet.