5 Car Care Mistakes You Should Avoid This Winter
In an effort to save money, some car owners are starting to avoid certain maintenance tasks and that can certainly become a problem in itself before anything gets too serious.
As the winter weather starts to creep in, you’ll need to make sure that your car is properly taken care of so it reduces the chances of an unexpected breakdown, leaving you stranded on the roadside.
To avoid such things you need to make sure you don’t make the basic car maintenance mistakes. Most motorists are guilty of the following mistakes when they’re trying to save money:
- Ignoring their engine warning lights
- Neglecting and not taking their tyres seriously
- Skipping services and fluid changes
- Attempting to service their cars themselves
- Not replacing their wipers
Engine warning lights:
An engine warning light is a warning – the clues in the name. So why would you want to ignore it, leaving you vulnerable to breakdowns and roadside repairs.
Most people see a warning light appear and think to themselves ‘everything seems OK’ I’ll just carry on until I have time to get it checked out. Unfortunately, by the time you get it to the garage you’ve probably already broken down somewhere.
If you notice a warning light appear you should pull over in a safe place and check in your car owners manual to see what it means. If its red, you need to stop immediately and call roadside recovery who will be able to tow you to a nearby garage.
Checking your tyres:
Neglecting your tyres can become costly, but some people end up making tyre related mistakes simply because they have no idea what they’re doing when it comes down to checking them over.
You should be rotating your tyres a couple of times in between replacements as this can help to spread the natural wear evenly and save you money on new tyres.
If you find that your using a lot of fuel you should get the alignment checked as well as check the pressures yourself. Most small cars tyre pressures come to around 34psi with an average load – larger loads will mean that the pressure may need to be increased.
Tyre pressures change depending on how many passengers there are and how much luggage is in the vehicle. You need to check your owner’s handbook for the exact pressures to avoid confusion and incorrect inflation.
Skipping services and fluid changes:
Although an annual service isn’t a legal requirement like the MOT in Milton Keynes – you should still have it completed to ensure that the vehicle is in safe condition.
During an average service, the garage will replenish any fluids and replace the engine oil. If the oil isn’t replaced annually, the leftover oil in the reservoir could start to damage the engine and cause some major issues.
The oil is used to ensure that the moving parts and components don’t grind together and overheat; it’s a form of lubrication to prevent ongoing damages.
Trying to service your car yourself:
Modern cars aren’t like they used to be ten or even fifteen years ago as a lot of them are built with on board computers to help manage the vehicle, fluids and components.
These on board computers are designed to monitor certain parts of the vehicle when in use too. Areas that tend to be checked over by the computers include the vehicles idle speed, spark plugs and the status of fuel injectors.
These computers can be incredibly complex which makes servicing them and repairing areas of the car yourself extremely difficult. Avoid servicing your car yourself and use a local garage.
Not replacing your wiper blades:
Wiper blades are one of those parts built into a car that we take advantage of on a daily basis. Whenever there’s rain, snow or sleet the wipers come on and everything is fine.
However, as soon as those wipers start to show you signs that they’re not able to clean the screen effectively anymore – its time to replace them with new ones.