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Tired of feeling intimidated or taken advantage of when taking your car in for service or repairs?
How much do you know about your car?
Most car owners usually know the year, make and model, but knowing the basics such as,
Engine displacement
Number of cylinders
Drive train setup: Front wheel drive, Rear wheel drive, All wheel drive or Four wheel drive
Oil viscosity and capacity
Tire size and pressure
These are some of the common basics every owner should know about their car. Another very important basic to know is the basic warning indicators on the instrument panel. Check out the first video on the maintenance guide page, that knowledge alone could save you thousands of dollars.
By performing proper maintenance on your car, you will:
We're not going to try to make weekend mechanics out of anyone. We're not going to try to make you a diagnostic technician. We want you to learn the basics about your car, or cars that you are responsible for maintaining. We're not going to overwhelm you with the technicalities and intricate workings of the automobile. This is basic auto maintenance 101. While many of you probably know the year and make of your car, but do you know the engine displacement? The number of cylinders your engine has? What type of motor oil it uses? The motor oil capacity? Is your car front wheel drive? Rear wheel drive? Or all wheel drive? Is my automatic transmission the conventional pressure shifting type or is a continuous variable transmission? Is the power steering electric or hydraulic belt driven? What type of coolant does my engine require? How often do I need to replace the air filter? Does my car have a cabin filter for the air conditioning? This may sound overwhelming and technical, but it's not so complex once you learn this basic information about your car. Why do car owner's need to know this information? Well, if you take your four cylinder engine car to a shop to have the spark plugs replaced and on the invoice they charged you for six. Or every other time you take your car in for a oil change, they want to replace the air filter. Or your engine's oil capacity is four quarts but you notice they've been charging you for six. What if your car is all wheel drive and you fail to service the transfer case fluid because you didn't know about it. Failure to service components you didn't know about can lead to costly repairs. Using the wrong transmission fluid will shorten the life of your transmission. If you don't log the date and mileage of maintenance items, you will be losing money by having the maintenance performed again unnecessarily. Learning basic maintenance about you car is not that complicated, but it does require a little bit of effort. Once you've put a little time into it, you will be amazed at your level of knowledge.