Surprisingly, Vegetable Oil’s not the worst lubricant you can use at least in lawnmower engines for a short time. Brownie probably didn’t put enough in the car engine or left the oil filter with an arrow in it.

@Background Pony #2911
 
I wrote some of this comment days ago and didn’t post it. I haven’t gone through all of the list but here’s something:
 
Going through your list, I put these up to question:
 
1960-65 Ford Falcon: Side windows on Falcon are nearly next to each other so I don’t think it would work?  
1960-65 Chevrolet Corvair: Rear glass is curved on sides;  
1952-66 Rambler (all models, excluding Cross Country and Metropolitan) - Though I haven’t gone through the whole catalog, some of these have curved glass in the rear and this car looks more like it has a fairly straight piece of rear glass, not “The Ghostbusters’ Car’s Curved Windshield” type.  
1947-66 Studebaker (all models, excluding wagons and line-topping models) - I didn’t go through all of these but there were some that had glass support in the middle so it’s not just one piece of glass, it’s two.
 
Possibilities ( :) ) :
 
1960-66 Plymouth Valiant: Possibility if it’s not a two-door or wagon model;  
1960-63 Pontiac Tempest, Oldsmobile F-85, Buick Special: Good suggestion.
 
Didn’t go through but wanted to post the rest of the list to keep this nice conversation going:
 
1952-66 Rambler (all models, excluding Cross Country and Metropolitan)  
1947-66 Studebaker (all models, excluding wagons and line-topping models)  
1951-55 Kaiser  
1952-54 Packard  
1951-53 Henry J, Allstate  
1952-54 Hudson Jet  
1949-56 Plymouth/Dodge (cheaper models only)  
1949-54 GM Car (Chevrolet, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick, probably too small to be Cadillac)  
1952-56 Ford or Mercury (’55 and ’56 must be cheap models I.e. Customline)

@Background Pony #2911
 
The detail you put into this is amazing and I’m laughing in delight. Gotta go though, sorry.

@BarryFromMars
 
This comic actually has a key clue: the car has a front-mounted bench seat. These were out of style in most cars by the mid-1980s, and were almost never seen in import cars. So, unless the Buns have a Panther-platform Ford or a Caprice, which the relatively small rear window seems to suggest is not the case, then their car is pre-1985.
 
As far as the side mirrors are concerned, my guess is that they were added either at the dealer or well into the car’s life, as those appear to be towing-package truck mirrors. I don’t know of any passenger cars that came from the factory with side mirrors that large.
 
We get two other major hints: the steep slope of the roof and the relatively small back side windows. Those side windows, to me at least, seem to suggest that this car is compact in size, or a VERY old model. The “bubble” shaped roof shown in the comic you supplied was a common trait on domestic passenger cars up until the middle-60s.
 
When combining all these factors, I came to the conclusion that these are the possibilities:  
1960-65 Ford Falcon  
1960-65 Chevrolet Corvair  
1960-66 Plymouth Valiant  
1960-63 Pontiac Tempest, Oldsmobile F-85, Buick Special  
1952-66 Rambler (all models, excluding Cross Country and Metropolitan)  
1947-66 Studebaker (all models, excluding wagons and line-topping models)  
1951-55 Kaiser  
1952-54 Packard  
1951-53 Henry J, Allstate  
1952-54 Hudson Jet  
1949-56 Plymouth/Dodge (cheaper models only)  
1949-54 GM Car (Chevrolet, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick, probably too small to be Cadillac)  
1952-56 Ford or Mercury (’55 and ‘56 must be cheap models I.e. Customline)
 
Of course, the most likely truth is that it’s not any specific car, but an amalgamation of a variety of vehicles.

@1984strat
 
I’m aware and I agree, Synthetic is all I prefer to use. However, there are times to not use it. In severe cases of oil sludge where the owners didn’t know their engine was sludged and switched to synthetic the better oil worked too well and removed the sludge too fast, blocking oil passageways and starving the engine of oil. I’d also never use it on this old Dodge engine in the garage unless it’s rebuilt first, the engine hasn’t been turned on for over 10 years and the truck hasn’t been on the road for at least 42 years (legally, at least.) I also started using Synthetic in my 1984 Caprice and now it leaks a few drips after shutting it off, maybe it’s because the oil I’m using (Pennzoil Platinum 5w30, not the High Mileage formula) is thinner than the conventional oil which was previously used when at operating temperature; however, it could have also cleaned the engine up so well that if there was sludge holding the broken gasket together it is now leaking. I love Synthetic oil but in some cases it could be death to an engine.

@BarryFromMars  
Conventional was okay, but synthetic dominates it. A synthetic filter with synthetic oil produces a better engine. Especially older cars.

@Lucky Shot  
>”brony are virgin lol”  
>draw clop  
>glass houses and all that jazz

@1984strat
 
That would have been a much better choice. even a conventional straight 30 would have been an improvement.

Should have used that Mobil 1 5w-30 Synthetic

@Nightweaver20xx
 
Heh. Thanks for the little laugh.

@BarryFromMars  
He drives a car-flavored car.

I was hoping we’d be able to see what car Richard drives (or drove) by this older comic, but there’s not a lot to go on:
 

 
At least it has a passenger-side mirror and looks like a Sedan, going by these two comics. I’m not sure what year, make or model it’s supposed to be (or if it’s just fictitious.) And also note; cars even in the 1980s didn’t always have passenger-side exterior mirrors.

@Jim Prower
 
Actually this comic really doesn’t give a lot of context to what’s going on with the engine; Richard just says “There’s something wrong with the engine” and he doesn’t say if it’s turning over or is accelerating with much difficulty or if it sounds like it’s seized or something else. Even if the piston cylinders were stuck to the engine block they might be fixable by letting penetrating lubricant in the cylinders (or ATF) soak in there; people do that to engines that haven’t run for a long time. (Think 1950s engines that have been in the field for 40+ years, which don’t have any crankshaft movement.)

@Jim Prower  
Right, but Richard is American and his car looks nowhere like modern or tight-tolerance. There must be at least several miles difference between “just” and “something wrong”.

@Background Pony #EC93  
I still imagine that cooking-grade oils wouldn’t be too good in a modern, tight-tolerance car engine. It’s probably deader than the 4.3 Roadkill recently pulled out of the Rotsun.

Early IC engines mostly used castor oil, that’s actually very good lubricant but not too stable. Still in use in model 2T engines.  
Olive oil is a lubricant too, thought it’s mildly corrosive and eventually turns to tar thanks to linoleic acid.  
Anyway, comic is true to life with exception of “just”.

@Pagan
 
@Background Pony #B0FB
 
Biodiesel, although it’s more expensive than petroleum diesel, does have its own properties:
 
>Burns cleaner with exception to NOx emissions;  
>Lubricates the engine fuel system better;  
>Cleans out the fuel system, which can cause issues if done too quickly; clearing sludge fast = may clog an injector;  
>Eats up rubber, so if the fuel comes in contact with rubber (most cars after some year in the early 1990s don’t) and it hasn’t been repalced already\ it needs to be replaced with a synthetic rubber called “Viton” so it doesn’t rot;  
>Doesn’t have as much energy content, so MPGs are lower according to what I read; however, if the vehicle was running dirty in the first place and it’s then run gradually up in percentage up to 100% the fuel may clean up the fuel system so well that it’ll increase mileage (this is one I’m not sure of, it’s a guess;)  
>Can’t be used above a certain percentage with newer Diesel engines from 2007 and post-2007 because of the emission reduction system (Biodiesel is too thick for it, ironic that the system which is meant to REDUCE emissions doesn’t allow use of 100% biofuel which would reduce them itself without the system)
 
@Background Pony #B0FB
 
I knew about a few types of biofriendly grease (Renewable Lubricants’ and Ultralube’s) but not Rydon or that other lubricants were available before WWII, thank you for that.

Up the ziggurat lickety split!

@Nightweaver20xx  
extra no

@Blissey1  
What about a quote ziggurat?

@Alex Vostox  
@Eeveeinheat  
@Dirty Bit  
no quote pyramids please

@Eeveeinheat  

@Dirty Bit  

@Cyborg_pony  

@Lucky Shot