Rub your hands together. Faster. Press them together as you rub. Feel the heat?

Now put some olive oil (it’s healthier than vegetable oil) and rub your hands together the same way. Feel the difference?

That’s the principle of oil in your engine. The difference is that instead of the soft, supple skin of your hands, your engine has metal-on-metal rubbing together. Additionally, unless you’re the $6-Million Man or Woman, there’s no way you could rub their hands together as fast as engine parts rub together. But imagine if you could.

If you could rub your hands together as fast your pistons slide up and down in their cylinders, you’re liable to start your hands-on fire or, at the very least, suffer serious burns. This is why engine oil is so important.

If you used the same olive oil and rubbed your hands together for hours and hours, can you imagine what would happen to the olive oil? No doubt, it would become dirty and the properties that make it slippery would break down until it was thick and sticky.

As the olive oil became dirty, the dirt would serve as abrasive elements in the oil. The heat when you rub your hands together would increase. Translation: engine oil is a remarkable element. It’s developed with refined additives and detergents. It can protect your car’s engine for months and miles upon miles of operation.

If you drive your car for one hour at 2,000 rpms (Revolutions Per Minute), your crankshaft spins 120,000 times. That means each piston travels up and down in its cylinder 120,000 times.

Look at this way: according to the U.S. Department of Transportation, people in Illinois spend about one-hour driving every day. With 2,000 rpms as a reasonable average, that means our engines spin close to 44-million times each year. That engine oil had better be good.

Of course, you can help it out and protect your engine; change your oil on a regular basis and your car’s engine will have a chance. It will last longer and run better and more reliably.