Well, the OEM parts I bought for today's oil change (from a local VW garage) it appears are not entirely suitable for my car! I've had the parts from them several times before, by quoting the registration plate of my car. So I drop the oil, clean everything up, remove the old oil filter, get the new oil filter out of it's box and think . . . hmm, something doesn't look right here. I have no idea what engine it's designed for, but it's most definitely not mine!

Anyway, I need my car tomorrow so cannot afford to have the car sat on the axle stands until such time I could arrange to get the correct filter and I didn't want to even contemplate running the car on the old filter either, so I made an emergency visit to Halfords (the only place open at 15:45!) to buy a 'Halfords' oil filter. It appears to be almost identical to the OEM one that came out, other than it doesn't fit quite as easily as the OEM one (the Halfords one has a soft almost felt-like material around the centre hole - presumably some sort of token gesture towards a seal, anyway, it's fitted now).

I obviously intend to go and get a refund for the wrong filter I've got, but should I replace the Halfords one ASAP with an OEM one, or are the Halfords ones as good (or close to) the OEM filters?

Cheers.

Genuine is better but not going to hurt in the short term

It'll be fine mate. Halfords stuff is usually OK, and made by one of the major players, so I would just leave it until the next change.

I think Mr RK696 is right on that one. They're still made to a decent standard, but if you're completely set on getting it replaced go for it.

Halfords filters are made by FRAM so perfectly good and just as good as OEM spec stuff

Cheers guys

Halfords filters are made by FRAM so perfectly good and just as good as OEM spec stuff

Yeap +1

Ended up in the same situation as you with SWMBO's Leon, ran it with Halfords filter for a year without problem.

If it was a FRAM Toughguard one, then they are very good indeed - no need to change early. There was a comparison test 2-3 years ago and these came out better than OEM.

If it was a FRAM Toughguard one, then they are very good indeed - no need to change early. There was a comparison test 2-3 years ago and these came out better than OEM.

Fram are OE spec so will be no problem