Brake Warning Light

What does it mean when the Brake Warning Light is ON?. This light could be on due to several reasons, the most common reason is as a result of you driving the vehicle with the braking system not fully disengaged. There are two types of braking system for when the car is parked, there is the Hand Brake and then there is the Floor Parking Brake.

Hand Brake should be completely lowered

Floor Parking Brake needs to be OFF

If the brake warning light comes on when you are mashing the brakes, then  this could be a sign that you are loosing hydraulic pressure in the braking system

Engine Check Light

Engine Check Light

When driving your vehicle it is a good idea to scan your dashboard every so often, especially at a traffic light and when it is safe to do so. If you ever notice the - Engine Check Light come on, it either blinks or stays solid depending on the problem, either way, you need to have the vehicle checked by the mechanic. If the light is steady, it means that the problem is not an emergency, but it is a good idea to check your vehicle immediately.

Driving your car with your engine check light ON for an extended period of time, will cost you more in the long run. When the Engine Check light comes on, the car's E.F.I. goes into "LIMP" mode. LIMP mode means that the car becomes less dependent on input signals from sensors and runs off of pre-programmed parameters on the CPU which will help get you to the the nearest garage or destination without causing further damage to your vehicle.

Before you take your car to a mechanic to have the issue with the engine check light resolved, it is important to get confirmation that the mechanic has a diagnostic tool to perform the checks specific to  your vehicle. The mechanic will need to interface with the cars E.F.I. either through a hand held device or laptop / tablet. This will allow him to see exactly which codes are coming up so he can further analyze the data and get to the root cause of the problem.

There are five possible reasons why your engine check lights comes on, this should be used as a guide, only when the diagnostic is performed on the car's E.F.I. you can confirm.

1. Failing Oxygen Sensor - Measures the Air/Fuel ratio through the exhaust and maintains optimum combustion.
2. Bad Fuel - Water in fuel normally leads to something called  - Engine Knock or Engine pinging, this results from combustion taking place before the piston reaches Top Dead Center.
3. Failing Mass Air Flow Sensor - Measure the amount of air flow that enters the engine.
4. Damaged Spark Plugs or Wires - A damaged plug or wire can cause a leak in the electrical system that creates a ground fault.
5. Damaged Catalytic Converter - The catalytic converter converts the toxic gases from combustion into a more environmentally friendly discharge from the vehicles exhaust.

Changing a Flat Tyre

Many of us including myself, hate to have to change a flat tyre, even worse is when the tyre change is required in a very odd location, hopefully this blog will help provide some support in this much dreaded area of vehicle maintenance.

STEP 1 - Loosen the wheel bolts, this step of the process takes some effort since the wheel bolt would have been properly secured. It is most time advisable that you use your foot to assist in this process. You will need to ensure all wheel bolts are slack, but do not remove the nuts entirely.

STEP 2 - Raising the Car, in this step it is important that we understand at which part of the vehicle the jack is placed, it is normally on the undercarriage close to the wheel that you would need to change. This would require some manual labor to effect. 

STEP 3 - Removing tyre, firstly we need to ensure the surface is flat and solid enough to jack the car, install a chuck behind the wheel of the car, place the car in park and pull up on the hand brakes. In this step we remove all wheel nuts and take the entire wheel off of the car, there is no special order to remove the wheel nuts, but we want to keep them safe.

STEP 4 - Replacing the tyre, the spare tyre is normally found in the trunk of the vehicle. The spare tyre is installed in place of the tyre that was on the car previously, once the spare tyre is installed, we then need to replace the wheel nuts and catch all up by hand tightening.

STEP 5  - Lowering the car, the car is slowly lowered making sure your feet are out of harms way, the car is lowered all the way to ground until all the load is on the suspension of the car and no longer on the jack, once this is completed, the jack can be removed.

STEP 6  - Tighten the wheel, it is important when you tighten the wheel you follow a particular order - 4, 5 or 6 bolt. The purpose of following the wheel nut tightening order is to allow the wheel to be evenly secured thereby ensuring that there are no issues with misalignment of the wheel . 

Once completed you are DONE, Congratulations......

See the video for a summary of the 6 steps that have been shared 

Internal Car Care Tips

Your car is normally something that you take pride in, a clean vehicle is so much more inviting to drive. Many parents who have kids have all been faced with the challenges of keeping the car cleaned internally. 

With the recent advent of Covid-19, most people have resorted to cleaning the internals of their cars themselves in order to reduce to risk of cross contamination with the car wash agent.Cleaning of the inside of the car can be broken up into three main areas:

• Upholstery - Seats, floor mats and interior upholstery
• Vinyls - Dashboard, Door Panels, Center Console panels
• Glass - Front, Side and Rear

Cleaning Interior Upholstery

Vinyls - Dashboard, Door Panels, Center Console panels

Glass - Front, Side and Rear

Tyre Shelf Life

               

When purchasing tyres for a vehicle, it is important that you are aware of the manufacture date of  the tyre prior to purchasing. Most times we assume the tyre dealer is looking after our best interest......think again. 

This article will teach you how to recognize the manufacturer date of the tyres on your vehicle which will give you some form of assurance that the tyres are probably road worthy and should last you throughout the entire life cycle

Tyre indicating the manufacturer date of the 26th Week of 2013

Old tyres tend to crack and loose their ability to provide proper traction on the road surface. These potential issues can lead to accidents or in worse cases even death. Please do not risk your life and pay less for tyres with a overdue shelf life as opposed to buying a newly manufactured tyre.

You have the tools now....apply them to save your own life.