Car Maintenance

Car Maintenance Tips

There are times when you really don't have to care much about a car or car maintenance. Take, for example, the classic rental. We're betting that when you rented that nondescript, metallic gray four-door sedan you never once thought about popping the hood to check the fluids or to check the tire pressure. Auto maintenance was the last thing on your mind.

On the other hand, you have the car parked in your driveway. You know the one: It has your name (or your favorite bank's name) on the title. You're paying for it (or you've already paid for it). Cars aren't cheap today, and it just makes good sense to look after them. The day we drove home from the dealership, most of us aspired to keep our new car pristine. But plenty of folks have "memory lapses," or, more than likely, they fall back into bad habits when it comes to car maintenance.

Falling into a maintenance rut can be expensive in some situations, really expensive by causing many common car problems. Here's our top 10 list of car maintenance tips people too often don't follow:

1. Check tire pressure

Upward of 90 percent of all the vehicles on the road are driven with improperly inflated tires, and we suspect the majority are underinflated. Driving with low tire pressure can compromise cornering, braking and stability. In a worst-case scenario, incorrect tire pressure can lead to tire failure. And it should come as no surprise that underinflated tires also affect fuel economy and tire life.

Tire pressure changes constantly. This may be caused by a minor leak, but the most common factor in pressure change is ambient temperature. When tire pressure is too low, friction between the road and the tire increases, which increases tire wear. Driving with low tire pressure also can cause tires to overheat, which usually ends in catastrophic failure.

2. Check the oil

You really can't ignore some car maintenance essentials, such as checking the oil level in your vehicle's engine on a regular basis. That should be a no-brainer. Two conditions can cause drops in oil level: burning oil or leaking oil. Either way, if the oil level becomes too low, you're risking major engine damage. Often, the first thing to go – the bearings – is the worst that can happen. If they're toast, you won't go very far before the crankshaft and the connecting rods weld together (we're talking feet here, not miles, if you run out of oil).

Checking oil level (and condition) is not difficult. For the most part, it's a good idea to check the oil every time you gas up, especially if your vehicle is considered high mileage (more than 75,000 miles on the odometer). It's not difficult to check your car's oil and it doesn't even take five minutes.

3. Change the oil and filter regularly

Okay, we've mentioned checking the oil, but how many people postpone oil and filter changes (engine oil, engine oil filters and coolant as well)? Plenty, we'll bet. Maintaining a clean, adequate supply of oil within the engine is absolutely critical for the long-term life of your vehicle. Operating conditions have an effect upon how often you should do an oil and filter change. Seasons have an effect too.

Many of today's cars and light trucks are engineered so that the condition of the oil is monitored based upon your driving habits. When it's time to change the oil, a message (actually, an "electronic nag") will be displayed somewhere on the instrument cluster. If not, the owner's manual will clearly spell out when it's time for a change. Oil filters should be changed with the fluid, but at some deep-discount oil-change businesses, they use the cheapest filter they can find. When it comes to oil filters, the words "cheap" and "good" usually cannot be used in the same sentence. Ditto with coolant. Coolant does, in fact, wear out. As a result, the system should be "cleaned" and replenished on a regular basis.

4. Replace brake pads when necessary

Stop-and-go driving (including freeway travel), driving in mountainous terrain, hauling loads or pulling a trailer can severely shorten the lifespan of your brake pads. Mix all or some of them together and your brake pads (particularly the fronts, since they get the most use) will usually wear out quicker than you might imagine.

Modern cars and brake pads are virtually all equipped with audible wear sensors. Once worn, the pads will emit healthy squeals, and not only when the brake pedal is depressed. The squawking and squealing will go on continuously, which tells you it's time for a brake pad replacement. If you don't, the rotors will eventually be destroyed. A routine (and inexpensive) brake job then becomes costly.

5. Use the right tires for the season

Unlike some of the fortunate few, many of us live in snow country. Car maintenance in winter is no fun, but neither is being stranded in the cold. Living in cold country means you need the right tires for the season, particularly in the winter. Up north, you'll need appropriate rubber (usually marked "mud and snow" or with a snowflake logo on the sidewall), or you won't get far. Proper tires are mandatory. The same applies to summer driving. Tires engineered for cold weather don't last long in the summer. In fact, they'll wear out in a heartbeat. And that means wasted money.

6. Check the lights

How many times do you take a walk around your car or truck to check the lights? You're not alone. Plenty of folks neglect vehicle lamps, which should be a routine element of car maintenance. Lamps are (obviously) incredibly important, and there's no reason not to check them regularly, since it's a simple process. Turn on the headlights. Check park lamps, high- and low-beam lamps and the license plate light. If your vehicle is equipped with fog or driving lamps, inspect them. Examine the turn signals (all four corners) and follow up with an inspection of the emergency flashers. Back up against a wall where you can see the lights, apply the foot brake and check the brake lights. Place the vehicle in reverse (with the park brake on) and check the backup lights. If any bulbs are burned out, or if there is a lighting problem, it's obviously time to repair. And the repairs aren't difficult or expensive.

7. Don't overload the vehicle

Drive down any road, in any part of the country and you'll see it soon enough: An overwhelmed car or truck filled to the brim with someone's "load" and/or yanking a trailer. Most frequently, you'll see the results at the side of the road, with the hood raised. Often, it's simply a matter of an overtaxed cooling system, but in other cases, we've even examined buckled frames and broken axles.

As you can well imagine, those things cost plenty to fix. It's a lot less costly to simply figure out what load you're carrying (or towing), then cross-reference it against the load capacity decal on the door jamb of your vehicle. Keep in mind that passengers and their luggage are also included in the total "load" figure. If the load is too big, then either reduce the size or rent something more capable of handling it. This is a serious safety issue and shouldn't be taken lightly.

8. Replace worn-out wiper blades

Windshield wipers need regular inspection, because rubber (no matter the blend) deteriorates over time, due to sunlight, ozone, cold weather and other factors. Once the deterioration begins, wiper blades lose the ability to flex and flip over in use. They also crack. Additionally, normal use simply wears down the blade. Once the sharp edge is gone, the squeegee effect of the blade goes away as well. All of those factors prevent the blades from making full contact with the windshield. Wipers can chatter against the glass and, in most cases, the result is a blade that can't clear the windshield effectively. There's only one fix: replace the blades.

9. Repair windshield cracks

Driving with a cracked windshield is an invitation for trouble. Little cracks soon become big cracks and before long, visibility can be impaired. The reality is that windshields suffer damage in varying degrees. Often, car owners ignore a small crack caused by an errant stone, but this small chip can spread on a windshield, particularly in very cold weather. Manufacturers make laminated windshield glass under intense pressure. The glass has very high density, which causes cracks to widen progressively. That means the trouble increases with the extent of the damage.

It's far easier (and cheaper) to simply have stone chips and bruises fixed before they spread and become cracks. There are various techniques out there where resins are injected into the cracks with or without vacuum. This process can take a few minutes or last as long an hour, depending upon the chip size. When complete, you can't spot the repair. With cracks, you have no option but to replace the glass. They'll only get bigger with time.

10. Use the right octane fuel

Plenty of drivers overdo it on octane, usually falling for the "if some is good, more is better" line of thinking. In this case, the real rule is to supply whatever octane the engine is rated for nothing more and nothing less. Higher-than-required octane doesn't improve mileage; nor does it yield more power. It only costs you more money.

Using poor quality fuel in a vehicle that calls for high octane gas isn't a good idea either. With this approach, the engine management system will sometimes decrease ignition timing, which in turn will decrease your fuel economy (sometimes dramatically). And if it can't decrease the timing enough, there's a chance the engine will experience detonation. The result? Major engine carnage.

Rust treatment: How to neutralize car corrosion

Car rust starts with a benign-looking bubble and grows, like the malignancy it is, into a metallic carnivore with the potential to consume a Hummer and then go looking for dessert. It's rust, the bane of anything metal and one of the greatest challenges for auto restorers.

No one is truly safe from car rust. It first rears its bumpy head in regions with high rainfall and urban areas where salt is used on icy streets. But even high humidity or beach communities in relatively arid Southern California feel the sting of rust.

To most vehicle owners, rust is annoying at best, and at worst it's a total automotive meltdown. For those hearty souls in the midst of restoring a classic that's suffering from long years of neglect, the bubble patch on the surface may be the symptom of terminal problems ­­– like the proverbial tip of the boat-sinking iceberg.

The science behind rust

In any discussion of car corrosion, it's important to understand exactly what it is, in scientific terms. The vehicle's steel is a combination of iron, metal impurities and negatively charged free electrons that are attracted to the iron atoms under normal conditions. All that changes when moisture is introduced – moisture in the form of actual water or simple humidity. Through electrolysis, the electrons abandon the iron and head straight for the metal impurities, forming rust.

When you encounter car rust, the conventional approach is to keep poking at it until you hit uncontaminated metal. But in the most serious cases, that just doesn't happen. You scrape and sand and finally see the daylight through the metal. That's when it may be time to call on companies that specialize in providing replacement sheet metal for body panels and floor pans. That's the extreme case. For now, we're going to take a more optimistic approach: car rust can be stopped, despite Neil Young's declaration that "Rust Never Sleeps."

Different types of rust treatment

Car rust treatments generally start with elbow grease, removing the bubbles and pock marks with grinders, wire brushes, sandpaper or sand blasting, and taking the infected area down to bare metal. The more deep-seated the rust, the more aggressive the tools. Fortunately, there are some helpful methods that can reduce the amount of physical labor involved when fighting rust.

Working with rust converters

Rust converters represent an excellent do-it-yourself option for rust removal. For modern automotive applications, rust converters come in the form of primers designed for use directly on the rusty surface, with no scraping, grinding, sanding or blasting. In fact, the product has to be applied to rust in order to work. The two components of converters are tannin and an organic polymer. Tannin, a water-soluble natural product derived from a variety of plants, reacts with iron oxide and changes it to iron tannate, a stable blue/black corrosion product. The polymers provide a protective primer layer.

Like anything else, proper application with the best rust converters is key to a rust-free future. While you can toss your grinder and sandpaper, you still have to start with a clean, dust-free surface. A soft wire brush is the best tool to remove any errant particles, followed by a thorough vacuuming of the impacted surface. Soluble salts, like those used to de-ice winter roads, should be rinsed with water, and road grease also needs to be removed.

Converters can be either brushed or sprayed on the surface in an environment where the metal's surface temperature is between 50 and 90 degrees. Check your weather forecast before starting, choosing a day where there's no chance of rain for a full 24 hours after application. Even if the procedure is done in a closed garage, avoid days that threaten any form of moisture.

Once the converter is applied, it takes about 20 minutes for the rust to turn coal black. The reaction is completely cured after 24 hours, but it may take longer if the humidity is higher than 75 to 80 percent.

Rust converters should not be sanded. Instead, the treated surface should be covered with a compatible topcoat. It's vitally important to fully read and understand the manufacturer's directions and recommendations. Like any creeping disease, the best time to deal with rust is immediately. It won't heal itself, and the longer the bubbly patch is allowed to feed on your vehicle, the more radical the procedure that’s required to neutralize it. Catch rust early so your car doesn’t slowly corrode while you're sleeping.

Trying rust paints, acid rust removal and more

There are also rust paints available that seal or encapsulate the rust. These products are highly flammable and include toxic chemicals that require professional application. Acids can also dissolve rust, leaving a thin oxide coating on the surface. Like the paints, acid rust removal necessitates special breathing equipment.

For high-end restorations, metal panels (or the whole car) can be submerged in a hot bath of caustic soda, stripping all the paint down to the metal. The panel is then treated in a tank of alkaline solution and the rust is removed electrolytically. Again, a professional will need to apply these methods, but they’re still great options if you’re short on time or don’t feel confident enough to take on rust removal by yourself.

Understanding the origins of rust treatment

Prior to these modern methods, the first "professional applicators" of the oldest method of rust treatment were probably blacksmiths. To protect their tools, the smithies would coat them with oil and heat them in their forges, not unlike the method of seasoning a cast-iron skillet.

This treatment process creates a hard coating, called magnetite, on the metal surface. The coating is chemically inert and will not react to oxygen or moisture. The path from the blacksmith shop to auto parts counter ran through the mining, construction and agricultural industries as scientists attempted to solve the problem of preserving metals exposed to the elements.

Manual transmission maintenance

Is your manual transmission getting harder to shift? Does it feel like it just doesn't grab like it used to, or maybe it's starting to chatter or vibrate? Is your clutch slipping? A worn clutch may be the culprit here, or it could be the result of something else, such as a transmission misalignment. One obvious sign that misalignment is the problem would be rust residue on the disc and pressure plate.

Pinpoint the problem

In the case of the driveline shown to the right, one of the two transmission dowel pins was missing, which allowed the transmission to tilt down on the passenger side of the vehicle, causing the misalignment. The input shaft on the transmission was also heavily worn where it rides on the pilot bearing, due to the misalignment.

Correcting the cause of the problem was simply a matter of making a new dowel pin for the transmission and installing it. Although this relatively simple fix is just one example of many possible problems that might need to be addressed, the procedure for service and reassembly applies to clutches in general.

Make adjustments

Prior to putting the clutch back together, it is always recommended to resurface the flywheel and install a new pilot bearing. You should also apply a drop of adhesive to the threads of the bolts prior to bolting the flywheel to the engine.

Then, clean the flywheel and pressure plate with acetone to ensure an oil-free surface (this is one area where you don't want any lubrication at all). Make sure to use the correct alignment tool when placing the disc up to the flywheel. Once again, before bolting and torqueing the pressure plate to the flywheel, apply a drop of adhesive to the threads of the bolts.

Inspect for wear

In the case of the driveline shown to the right, one of the two transmission dowel pins was missing, which allowed the transmission to tilt down on the passenger side of the vehicle, causing the misalignment. The input shaft on the transmission was also heavily worn where it rides on the pilot bearing, due to the misalignment.

Check your manual

Before beginning any clutch removal and installation procedure, it's a good idea to start by checking your factory-approved service manual. Use only factory-recommended fluids in transmission and clutch release hydraulic systems to ensure proper release and maximum life of the clutch components. Also, be sure to check the bellhousing and/or engine block dowel pins for wear. Using all proper dowel pins helps ensure proper bellhousing alignment, including parallelism and concentricity.

Clutch assembly

Remember to always resurface the flywheel prior to installing a new clutch disc and pressure plate assembly. This ensures the clutch disc friction material seats into the flywheel properly for maximum holding capacity and service life. Also, check the flywheel for runout prior to and following the resurfacing process. If excessive runout is found, check the flywheel for proper balance.

Examine the clutch disc on the transmission input shaft before installing onto the flywheel to ensure fitment. It's a good idea to scrutinize your vehicle for prior clutch problems.

Often, clutch chatter, vibrations and premature wear are not related to the clutch disc and pressure plate. Problems such as misalignment, flywheel resurfacing, pedal/freeplay adjustment and runout are responsible for the majority of clutch failures, premature wear and poor performance. By following the tips mentioned above, though, you can keep your vehicle's clutch out of spin city.

Car maintenance FAQs

Why do you have to change your motor oil on a regular basis?

Motor oil breaks down over time. When it breaks down, it loses its effectiveness and can no longer properly protect your engine.

In addition to lubricating an engine's moving parts, motor oil is designed to carry combustion byproducts away from the pistons and cylinders. It is designed to deal with the small amounts of water that form as the engine heats and cools, and to collect the dirt and dust that enter the engine through the air-intake system. It also handles acids that are formed by the reaction between water and other contaminants. Sometimes there are even fuel leaks (fuel dilution) or coolant leaks that get into the oil system.

As a car is driven, the level of contamination in the motor oil constantly increases. The oil filter removes particles as the oil passes through the filter, but over time an oil's additives are used up and the oil itself can start to degrade (oxidize or thicken). At that point, the oil can no longer do its job and must be changed.

The rate at which contamination and additive depletion occurs depends on many variables. One of these is driving conditions, which vary greatly and have a direct effect on the useful life of the oil. Other factors include the precision of ignition, fuel injection or carburetion adjustments, air cleaner service, and the general mechanical condition of the engine.

Oil should be changed before the contamination level reaches the point where engine damage can result. Because it is difficult for the individual motorist to determine when the contamination level is too high, automobile manufacturers provide recommended oil change intervals. These change recommendations vary by model year and manufacturer. Recommended intervals and mileage limits also vary with the type of service under which a car operates. More frequent oil changes are recommended for severe service.

Is a "straight weight" oil synonymous with a non-detergent oil?

Not necessarily. "Straight weight" refers to an oil's viscosity and usually indicates an absence of viscosity index improvers. "Non-detergent" refers to the absence of detergent additives that are used to handle combustion byproducts.

What role does viscosity play in a motor oil?

Engineers work to establish an optimal viscosity for an oil, based on load and speed conditions. They balance lighter – or low-viscosity – oil, which provides little resistance to motion thereby saving fuel and efficiently transferring horsepower, with a heavier – or high-viscosity – oil that resists being squeezed out of the contact area between metal surfaces, or leaking.

The complicating factor is that the viscosity of an oil varies with changes in temperature – thinner when hot, thicker when cold. At low temperatures, we need the motor oil to flow readily (not thicken too much or gel). At high temperatures, we need the motor oil to keep from becoming too thin and allowing metal-to-metal contact. Therefore, engineers developed multigrade motor oils.

What does viscosity mean?

Viscosity is a measure of a fluid's resistance to flow. A fluid with low viscosity flows easily and is often called "thin." Water is an example of a fluid with a relatively low viscosity. A fluid with high viscosity is often described as "thick." Maple syrup is an example of a fluid with a relatively high viscosity.

My car emits smoke when I start up. What does the smoke indicate?

If the cloud is relatively blue or blue/black, it may indicate that oil is being burned along with the fuel. The possible cause may be either worn piston rings or an oil viscosity that is too low.

If the cloud is black, it indicates that excess fuel is being burned.

If the cloud is white, it may simply be the moisture in the cold engine and exhaust system being burned off. If there's a lot of white smoke and it continues for a long time, you may have an internal coolant leak.

What is the SPI service category classification system?

Engine oils are currently classified by a two-letter code. Gasoline engine oil categories start with the letter S (originally designated "Spark Ignition" engine oils, we now associate the S with "Service"). Diesel engine oil categories start with the letter C (originally designated "Compression Ignition" engine oils, we now associate the C with "Commercial").

The second letter is simply a sequential designation of improving quality levels over time. In other words, when a new industry quality level is established, the next letter of the alphabet is used (so SM replaced SN). The letters "I" and "K" were purposefully skipped to eliminate potential confusion with other commonly used designations.

What does a viscosity number mean?

The viscosity index (VI) number is a measure of the relative change in viscosity of oil over a temperature range. The HIGHER the viscosity index, the SMALLER the viscosity change over temperature. The VI is not related to the actual viscosity or SAE viscosity, but it is a measure of the rate of viscosity change.

The VI number is typically used only as an indicator. The actual performance results of low-temperature pumpability tests and high-temperature wear tests of a motor oil are better predictors of good performance in an engine.

Generally, multigrade oils (0W-40, 10W-30, etc.) will have high viscosity indexes. Monograde oils (SAE 30, 40, etc.) will have lower viscosity indexes.

What causes my vehicle's oil warning light to go on?

Your oil warning light can come on for a number of reasons, including low oil level, a failing oil pump, a faulty oil-pressure sensor, blockage in the oil system, excessive foaming of the oil and more. In all cases, you should shut down your engine as quickly as it is safe to do so. Continuing to operate your engine with low oil pressure can result in serious engine damage.