Category Archives: In The Shop

Found in Tire: Key

Posted on December 21, 2015 by Dan

This last week I had a bunch of newly purchased cars come in with flat tires. Two only had 2-3,000 miles on it, and my last car on Friday only had 200 miles on it.  

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Painted Brakes

Posted on December 10, 2015 by Dan

Many high-end performance cars have brakes that come painted, often red, so a popular appearance modification people do is to paint their brake calipers themselves. There’s paint sold specifically for this purpose, in spray form.

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Torching Bolts

Posted on December 7, 2015 by Dan

Up here in the rust belt, everything gets rusty, especially exhaust systems. And when we need to replace part of the exhaust, it often requires heating up the nuts and bolts that hold it together so they’ll come apart.

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Fueled by Dog Food

Posted on November 30, 2015 by Dan

So far the only dirty air filter pictures I’ve posted were the cabin air filter, but once in a while I do find something in the engine air filter.

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Lost & Found: Golf Clubs

Posted on November 23, 2015 by Dan

One of my neighboring techs was doing a used car inspection, seeing what was needed to get it ready to sell. Once in a while we find interesting items left behind in cars, but this one was the biggest I’ve … Continue reading →

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Do We Have Parts?

Posted on November 19, 2015 by Dan

It can be really hard to guess whether we’ll have the parts we need for some jobs or not. A car needed a new glove box and we had it, which I didn’t expect at all, but then something I … Continue reading →

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Bad Design in Brakes

Posted on November 16, 2015 by Dan

So many times I’m working on a car and run into problems doing so because the engineers don’t expect you to ever work on them and put things in the worst locations. Brakes are a frequently serviced part of the … Continue reading →

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Off-Road Prius?

Posted on November 9, 2015 by Dan

This is the time of year when people get snow tires put on their car, sometimes on a second set of plain steel wheels. A lot of times this looks to me as if they have off-road tires, because of … Continue reading →

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Suspension Carnage

Posted on November 5, 2015 by Dan

Our collision center is right next door, so we do all the mechanical repairs to the cars they do bodywork on. A lot of times this means we get to see some nicely destroyed parts.

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Time For a New Truck

Posted on November 2, 2015 by Dan

The repair order said something along the lines of “customer states frame is broken”. As it was being pulled into the bay I looked underneath and saw that, yes, the frame is broken.

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