Handy Tools: No Longer Out of Sight or Out of Reach
Have you ever dropped a nut or a bolt into an open intake manifold? Or dropped a fastener and watched it disappear into a crevice in the engine compartment? Or tried to find a wiring connector, plug or fastener by feel on the backside of an instrument cluster up under the dash? These are all
Tech Tip: School Bus Inspection and Maintenance
Now that school is out, school bus inspections and maintenance is taking place in preparation for the next session in the fall. Many school districts are outsourcing the maintenance of their buses. This could be your chance to increase your shop’s customer base. While the coach work (body) of buses is changing to incorporate features like air conditioning, the tires, wheels, brakes and suspension the have not change much in 20 years. The biggest changes are under the hood ….
Tech Feature: Servicing Brake Rotors
For most import repair shops, brake pedal pulsation or brake vibration is one of the most frequent brake performance complaints coming through the door. If a customer complains of pedal pulsation or steering wheel shimmy when the brakes are applied, the most common assumption is that heat, wear, corrosion or mechanical stress is causing a variation in braking torque to occur that’s directly proportionate to wheel speed. ….
Tech Tip: Becoming Attuned to Engine Sounds
Can you pinpoint abnormal noises coming from an engine? More often than not, internal engine malfunctions will reveal themselves first as an unusual noise. This can often happen before the problem affects the driveability of the vehicle. Unless a technician has experience in listening to and interpreting engine noises, it may be hard to distinguish one from another ….
The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round
Now that school is out, school bus inspections and maintenance is taking place in preparation for the next session in the fall. Many school districts are outsourcing the maintenance of their buses. This could be your chance to increase your shop’s customer base. While the coach work (body) of buses is changing to incorporate features
Transmission Service and Clutch Replacement Essentials
You’ve probably all heard of the 15-minute clutch replacement time for a classic Volkswagen Beetle. The “fact” that you could pull the engine, change the clutch parts and reinstall everything with just a penknife and screwdriver and do that on the side of the road. Then there are the tall tales of pulling the engine
Diagnostic Solutions: Servicing Brake Rotors
Providing A Remedy For Pedal Pulsation Through A Methodical Diagnostic Approach For most import repair shops, brake pedal pulsation or brake vibration is one of the most frequent brake performance complaints coming through the door. If a customer complains of pedal pulsation or steering wheel shimmy when the brakes are applied, the most common assumption
Inspecting Belts and Hoses For Your Customers
Everybody wants a reliable vehicle to drive, but not many people are forward-thinking enough to practice preventive maintenance beyond the barest of basics. After all, preventive maintenance costs money and nobody likes to spend money “unnecessarily.” We put unnecessarily in quotes because we want to emphasize the fact that most consumers do not appreciate the
PCV Service: Helping an Engine Catch Its Breath
I’m certain that each and every one of you have, at some time in your life, experienced the horrific event of having the wind knocked out of you. If you can remember back to the first time it ever happened, before you knew that you would, in fact, breathe again, it was like you were
Getting a Fix on Piston Diagnosis and Inspection
Piston failures in late-model engines are relatively uncommon thanks to computerized engine controls that keep a close watch on the air/fuel mixture, and knock sensors that back off spark timing advance if detonation is detected. Pistons are also lasting longer because many engines now come factory-equipped with stronger hypereutectic alloy pistons that can withstand higher