Doing some of the maintenance yourself

[peter78]

Cars are getting harder and harder to work on yourself. I still do some work myself such as tune ups, oil changes and some repairs. I think by looking at the car yourself you do have an advantage.

I recently got my parents 91 Previa and I just changed the oil. The bottom of the engine was filthy. There was no washer on the drain plug. The bolts on the oil pan were loose. The old oil filter was something I never heard of. I added some windshield washer fluid and the filter on top of the washer container was full of gell and did not work. The battery teminals were corroded and the battery holder was rusting away. All little things for sure, but who takes care of these little things. Certainly not the Quick Lube Guy or evidently not the Toyota dealers who did the tune ups and repairs. Also the front engine bay were the battery and fluids were kept was filthly. This is the first used car in a long time for me and I was not use to I guess the lack of detail.

My 30 minute oil change turned in to two hours. Bottom line, even if you don't do most of the work, it may be worth it for you just to take a look at your engine bay and maybe underneath your car. With mechanics at $80 a hour they are simply not worried about the little things and the oil chage places are looking at things to sell you like wipers. They could care less if the washer nozzle is glogged up and needs a Q-tip to clean it. :dunno:

 

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If you have right tools and the Service Manual you can do almost any repair and all maintnace in your own garage.

 

[peter78]

I tried changing a timing belt once and realized it was a little over my skill level. Also, newer cars have all those dang little plastic boxes that need a computer to figure out what is wrong. I guess I need a little of both, doing some of the work myself and letting the pros do some of the work.

The trick is knowing what you can do. I wonder if I can replace the brake pads on the car with ABS brakes? I have no idea. All I know is I will keep trying to repair and work on my vehicles until their is a legal warning label to stay out of your vehicles. Which may come in a few years.

 

[SteveM]

I tried changing a timing belt once and realized it was a little over my skill level. Also, newer cars have all those dang little plastic boxes that need a computer to figure out what is wrong. I guess I need a little of both, doing some of the work myself and letting the pros do some of the work.

The trick is knowing what you can do. I wonder if I can replace the brake pads on the car with ABS brakes? I have no idea. All I know is I will keep trying to repair and work on my vehicles until their is a legal warning label to stay out of your vehicles. Which may come in a few years.

If you can do brakes on a non-ABS equipped car, you should be able to do brakes on an ABS equipped car. The only difference is the procedure for bleeding the brakes could be different.