ADVANCED
AUTOMOTIVE
SERVICE
PROFESSIONAL SERVICE ON FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC VEHICLES
MAINTENANCE
Regular maintenance is critical to ensure the safety, reliability, drivability, comfort and longevity of your vehicle. Proper routine maintenance can save you from having to deal with costly major automotive repairs. At Advanced Automotive Service, we are dedicated to ensuring that you will get the best out of your vehicle.
ROUTINE OIL CHANGES
An oil change: Sounds simple, but there's some pretty important things to know about preventing oil sludge.
Oil eventually starts to turn into jelly. Literally – petroleum jelly. Sludge clogs up oil passages and keeps oil from getting to some areas of the engine, causing parts to wear out prematurely. And that means expensive engine repairs.
That's why you need to change the oil and oil filter on schedule – to get the old oil out before it turns to sludge. Your manufacturer will have a recommendation for how many miles you can go between oil changes. They also usually have a number of months between recommended oil changes. That's because the detergents and other additives in the oil break down over time.
Your owner's manual will have a recommendation for time and mileage, but you need to remember that it's based on using the recommended weight of oil. And if your vehicle came from the factory with synthetic oil, the recommended intervals assume you continue to use synthetic.
Also how you drive can have a big effect. Most owner's manuals will have a list of driving conditions that are harder on your vehicle. Things like stop and go driving, short trips, driving in very hot or very cold weather, heavy loads and towing. If some of your driving fits this, you may need to change your oil and do other maintenance on a shorter schedule.
This may sound complicated. Some vehicles have an oil life calculator that takes all of these factors into account and tells you when you should change your oil. Otherwise, talk with us about how you drive and get a recommendation for when we suggest to take care of your service.
Finally, if any of the steering or suspension parts can be lubed, your technician at Advanced Automotive Service will take care of that with a lube, oil and filter service.
TIMING BELT
Let's address a very important maintenance item for everyone – timing belt replacement. It's important because letting this one slide can lead to very expensive engine damage.
Your timing belt choreographs the timing of your combustion process. Your pistons travel up and down in the cylinder. Intake valves open at the right time to let in air and fuel, they close at the right time to allow the fuel to burn and then the exhaust valves open at the right time to let out the exhaust.
All this happens thousands of times a minute and it's your timing belt that makes sure the valves are opening and closing at precisely the right time. If the timing is off, your engine won't run. And that's the best case.
The worst case is that a valve is opening at the wrong time and collides with the piston. The result is bent valves and maybe even more damage to the cylinder head. Repairs can run several thousand dollars.
Now, timing belts just wear out naturally so you want to replace a worn belt before it slips or breaks. Check your owner's manual or give us a call to see when it is recommend you replace the timing belt. If you've never replaced your timing belt and have 60,000 or more miles on the clock, talk with us to schedule an appointment right away to see if you're due.
On some engines, the water pump is driven by the timing belt as opposed to the serpentine belt. If that's the case, it's a good idea to replace the water pump when you're replacing the timing belt, and vice versa since much of the same work has to be done for either. The same is true for the timing belt tensioner – it should be inspected and possibly replaced.
Now, replacing a timing belt is one of the more expensive routine maintenance items on your service schedule. But not replacing your timing belt can lead to some of the most expensive repairs you're likely to ever have.
TIRE ROTATION & BALANCE
You can make your vehicle tires last longer with regular tire rotation and wheel balancing.
Let's start with tire rotation. In normal driving, your front tires wear more on the shoulders because they handle much of the cornering forces in turns. Front-wheel drive vehicles have even more force on the front tires.
We rotate the tires so that all of the tires do some duty on the front end as well as getting a little break on the back end. That way, all four tires wear more evenly over their life and last longer.
For most vehicles, tires are rotated front to back. Some manufacturers recommend a cross rotational pattern that includes the spare tire, and some high-performance vehicles have different size tires on the front and rear and may even have uni-directional tires that can only be on the left or the right side of the vehicle. We can help you sort that out and will perform the right tire rotation for your vehicle.
How often you should rotate your tires is based on the tire manufacturer. It's usually somewhere around 8,000 to 10,000 miles.
Let's move on to wheel balancing. That's when there are heavy spots on the tire and wheel that cause it to wobble.
Balancing adds weights to the wheel to balance it out. Now, we are talking about very small weight differences. Variations in the tire and wheel manufacture can cause a slight imbalance. The valve stem, and now the tire pressure monitoring sensors in the tire, also play into the equation.
Even small differences can cause annoying vibrations at speed: the wheel is essentially bouncing a bit as it goes down the road. For example, at freeway speeds, an out of balance wheel can be slamming into the road 14 times a second. That's annoying and can cause your tires to wear out more quickly.
If a front wheel's out of balance you'll feel the vibration through the steering wheel. When it's a rear tire, you'll feel the vibration through your seat. If you're getting bad vibes from your vehicle, schedule an appointment to bring it in to see if it's a balance issue or something else. You should balance your wheels whenever you get a new tire or remount a tire like when it's been removed for a flat repair.
Other maintenance procedures include but are not limited to: alignment service, cabin air filter service, cooling system service, differential service, engine air filter service, fuel system service, power brake service, serpentine belt service, spark plug service, steering service, checking for tire wear, transfer case service, transmission service and windshield wiper replacement.
Call us to schedule your maintenance appointment today: (218)732-1164