Automotive Blogger

Recently, a friend of mine blogged about the fact that she had never learned to change the oil on her car. At first I was shocked, because I grew up in a family where men and women all learned this skill - it’s one of the essential things you should know how to do on your car, after all, right up there with changing spark plugs and changing a tire - but in this day and age, I guess it’s really not that surprising. After all, even though I know how to change motor oil, I generally pay the nice folks at Jiffy Lube and use the time not taking apart my car and cleaning up the driveway to catch up on hobbies, or play some fantasy football. It costs a few more dollars than changing it myself, of course, but without a NASCAR pit crew at my disposal, it’s the best I can do.

For this week’s Tips on Tuesday, then, we offer this video we found on YouTube that shows you how to change your motor oil (we apologize for the poor spelling the videographers used - we only found it, we didn’t make it):

If you decide to change your own oil, a few tips that bear repeating:
1) Use the right tools. You can strip threads if you force screws, nuts or bolts with the wrong tools.
2) Gloves are your friends, especially when dealing with hot motor oil.
3) ALWAYS let the engine cool before you start working on it.
4) Be sure to safely and legally dispose of old oil and used filters.
5) Change your oil every 3,000 miles.

We all know the obvious ways to save money on auto insurance - good driver discounts, defensive driver discounts - things like that.

Here are three not-as-obvious ways to help reduce your premium a little bit.

1. Pay Annually: Sure monthly payments are easier on the budget at a casual glance, but if you can afford to pay the whole six months, or even a whole year, you’ll be saving that monthly handling fee, if not getting a discount for paying up front.
2. Pay Electronically: Reduce handling fees even further, and help reduce wasted paper as well, by getting your statement sent to you by email, and having automatic payments made from your bank account (electronic funds transfer). They clear instantly, and you’ll have one less bill to open each month.
3. Stick Together: If you have the option for auto insurance through work, a union, a trade organization, or even an alumni association, look into it. It may not always be cheaper, but it can save you money to be part of a group.

What other money saving tips can you think of, for auto insurance? Feel free to share!

Maybe you have a habit of taking “doggie bags” home from restaurants, and forgetting to remove them from your car, or perhaps you had a passenger who smokes, or were transporting a sick dog (accidents happen). Whatever the cause, your car has that “less then fresh” odor going on, and you need to get rid of it. Here’s how:

1. Clean your car as thoroughly as possible, removing all loose items and trash from inside. Make sure you check in the back seat cushion, and under both front seats. Remove the floor mats, if you have any.
2. Vacuum the entire car, including the upholstery. Use a crevice tool where necessary. After you vacuum, use a rag or paper towels, and clean off the hard surfaces: dash, center console, windows.
3. Shampoo the rugs and upholstery, and let the car air dry with the windows open. (If you can do this outside, where air can circulate, so much the better.)
4. If your odor issue was caused by mildew, be certain to find and stop any leaks, or the smell will return. Then spray the carpets with an antibacterial cleaner. Lysol is good, but if you have a different brand that you prefer, it’s probably fine.
5. Park your car in a well-ventilated, flat area, and start the engine. Set the air flow on your air conditioning system so the source is “outside air” or “fresh air,” and set the fan and air conditioner to their highest power.
6. Go to the front passenger side of that car, look under the hood, generally along the bottom edge of the windshield, and find the air intake vent for the air conditioning system. It’s also known as the cowl vent, and it will have some kind of filtering screen or louvers. Spray room deodorizer, such as Oust, Febreze, or Renuzit into the intake.

7. Get back in the car, and smell the air. You should be able to detect the deodorizer moving through the system. Let it run for a few minutes, then switch from full cold to full heat and spray the intake vent again.

You may need to repeat the deodorizing process a few times before your car smells as fresh as you want it to, but even one time through the process will make last week’s leftover tuna salad a distant memory.

Now that Labor Day has come and gone and school is about to start, if it hasn’t already, it’s time to consider the combination of cars and college. Specifically - should your college student bring their car to campus, and what are the insurance repercussions?

While most colleges don’t allow freshman to have their cars, or at least actively discourage their presence, more than 2/3 of the rest of the student population of any given university does have their vehicle on campus. If your son or daughter is one of them, here are some things you need to do when the school year begins:

1. Inform the insurance company that the car will be garaged at a different location. This may or may not affect the premium, but they have to be told.
2. Laws vary from state to state, and liability coverage does also. If your student goes from a straight liability state to a no-fault state, they may not have enough coverage - adding additional coverage will cost more.

To help reduce such expenses, there are three suggestions:

1. Let your student assume title of the car (if they’re over 18). This won’t save them money, but it will reduce YOUR liability.
2. Actively discourage your student from letting friends drive their car - they (and you) are still responsible no matter who is driving
3. Leave the car home. If the car is titled in your student’s name, no one will be driving it during the school year, and campus is more than a hundred miles from home, you could be eligible for a reduced rate.

Your turn: Did you have a car when you were in college, or did you have to rely on public transportation and the kindness of friends?

Whether you’re buying a used car from someone who put an ad in the local paper, or heading to the dealer to test drive shiny new cars, there are a few things you should know before you drive away in any vehicle other than one you brought with you.

1. What’s your budget? Figure out what you can afford before you even go looking, and don’t torture yourself by test driving things that are beyond your price range. Planning to finance or lease your car? Get approved before you go to the lot, and remember that you are not required to use the dealer’s financing. Also, don’t forget to factor insurance costs into your budget.
2. Know what you want. Are you looking for a racy sport coupe for weekend trips to the beach, or a family sized SUV with room for three kids and all their stuff? Figure out what you want before you leave home. It will save you time, later.
3. Trade or sell? Have an old car you need to get rid of? A trade-in isn’t always the way to get the most money. Consider selling it outright, or, if money isn’t an object, even consider donating it to charity.
4. Research, research, research. Arm yourself with knowledge about the makes and models you’re considering, either the old fashioned way (books and magazines) or by reading information on the ‘net. If you’re buying a used car, make sure you research any known issues or recalls, and make sure any applicable issues were resolved. Also, don’t forget to ask for an accident report.
5. Test drive in real world circumstances. If your normal commute involves idling at long lights, make sure you let the car idle. If you usually have kids or computers to contend with, bring them with you when you test drive. (Sadly, you can’t test drive with pets, but you can bring a crate to make sure it will fit).

A few years ago my other half and I were almost relocated from California to England. As part of the process, we investigated the cost of shipping our Subaru Forester across the pond. We learned that if you live near a major port, it’s not that expensive, and that you’re actually allowed to pack the vehicle full (since it’s going in a container, anyway).

For this week’s Top-Ten Tuesday, I’m referring you all to

CanuckAbroad’s Article on Shipping Cars Overseas because it covers pretty much every point I’d planned to discuss.

In the end, we declined the relocation, because we had pets we didn’t want to quarantine, and because we didn’t really want to be that far apart for six months to a year, but the information was still valuable.

Read any auto review, and safety features will be given almost as much attention as engine specs. Either the array of safety systems is lauded, or the lack thereof is denigrated, and sometimes mocked. In either case, the message is clear: driving fast is cool, but getting there in one piece is cooler.

This, then, is a list of ten features or systems that protect us as we’re zooming from point a to point b, or beyond:

1. AirbagsThey prevent you from crashing into the steering wheel (and impaling yourself on the steering column) and also prevent severe cranial injuries. The newest versions are set to “depower” themselves - reduce power after they’re activated - to keep them from causing injuries while preventing fatalaties.
2. Computers Whether they’re the powerful type of computer that aid in the design and manufacture of our cars, or the mini-processors on board, without which many other safety features wouldn’t work, computers are a crucial component of safe driving.
3. Deformable Structure We’re past the days, for the most part, when a survivable crash ended in fatality because the hood of the car ripped off and cut through the windshield, or any other such grisly results, and this is largely because deformable structure allows the car itself to absorb the energy of impact, and not pass it on to the driver.
4. Disc Brakes Not only do they allow cars to make 60 - 0mph stops, something old-school drum brakes couldn’t always do more than a couple times in a row without over heating, disc brakes also allow us to have anti-lock braking systems, and are a vital component of stability and traction control.
5. Divided Highways Driving is simply safer with divided highways, and statistics support this - comparisons based on total numbers of traveled miles show that there are 70% fewer fatalities on divided roads than on old two-lane bidirectional ones.
6. DUI Laws While drunk or (otherwise chemically) altered drivers still account for about a third of fatal driving accidents, that’s down from a 50% statistic from 1982. Across the country, DUI laws have been getting tougher - but critics think they’re still not strict enough.
7. Quick Emergency Response Skilled rescue workers arriving on-scene quickly may not be something drivers can control, but because of EMTs and fast-response teams, less than one percent of the 6 million or so traffic accidents that occur annually end in death.
8. Stability Control Electronic Stability Control, whether it’s known by a set of initials (ESC, DSC, etc.) or a fancy name (”Stabilitrak”) is what helps keep all four tires touching the pavement. It’s controlled by computers, not drivers, so it can’t make panic and make a wrong decision, which is always a plus.
9. Seatbelts When I was a kid, my mother had a rule that the car didn’t move until everyone was buckled in. Thankfully, I’m an only child, so this didn’t take long. The point however is that all the cool technology in the world cannot keep you alive if you’re flying through the windshield. Buckle up!
10. Tires Good quality, well-maintained, pneumatic steel-belted radial tires may well be the most important safety feature there is. Why? Because at any given moment it’s a patch of rubber about the size of an adult hand that is actually in contact with the road. Without tires, disc brakes are useless, and stability control non-existent. Also, keeping the pressure correct helps maximize fuel economy.

Your Turn: My list comes from a week of research, and years of riding in, driving, and owning cars. What would you add to this list? What would you remove?

With May 2007 sales numbers showing 21% of auto purchases being for compact cars, and the Toyota Prius being the best-selling car in San Jose, California last month, it is obvious that more and more consumers are looking at fuel economy as a primary factor when choosing a car.

It’s helpful, then, that the Environmental Protection Agency puts out a list of the most fuel-efficient cars each year. The list for the 2007 model year isn’t new - it came out last October - but it bears repeating.

Ranked in order from highest fuel efficiency to lowest, here is the 2007 list:

1. Toyota Prius (60 city/51 highway): It’s not surprising that this is the front runner, with it’s hybrid-electric engine, as it’s still the poster-child of hybrids. What surprised me was the greater difference between the city and highway numbers. (It’s normal for hybrids to do better in stop-and-go driving, however.)
2. Honda Civic Hybrid (49/51): The Civic has long been Honda’s best seller, and the hybrid version is living up to the name.
3. Toyota Camry Hybrid (40/38): It comes in three different trim levels, but the EPA list doesn’t specify which one they’re referring to.
4. Ford Escape Hybrid FWD (36/31): Proof that a car doesn’t have to be a small sedan, or carry a Japanese label, to be fuel efficient. This is the hybrid version of Ford’s popular compact SUV.
5. Toyota Yaris (34/40): The Yaris is actually listed twice, these numbers are for the manual transmission, while the automatic comes in just a bit less efficient in freeway driving. See below.
6. Toyota Yaris (34/39): And here we have the numbers for the automatic transmission version.
7. Honda Fit (33/38): These numbers are for the manual transmission version of the Fit. The automatic transmission model didn’t make the 2007 top-ten list.
8. Toyota Corolla (32/41): Again, the manual version of a car makes the list while the automatic version does not.
9. Hyundai Accent and Kia Rio(32/35): The manual version of Hyundai’s Accent actually tied with the Kia Rio (also manual), which isn’t surprising at all since they’re twin cars. We listed Hyundai first just to keep them in alphabetical order.
10. Mercury Mariner Hybrid (also the Ford Escape Hybrid, again) (32/29): These are essentially the same vehicle with different badging, and as such share one entry. Numbers are for the 4WD versions.

While reviews and pricing for 2008 model year cars are making appearances on manufacturer websites, and elsewhere on the ‘net, the EPA will not be releasing their top ten for that year until October 2007. When that comes out, be prepared for numbers that may be lower than this year’s. Why? Because the EPA has also revised the way they compute fuel efficiency, making the numbers more reflective of real-world conditions.