The Parthenon, Buckminster Fuller intoned, splendid an edifice as it is, dominating the Acropolis at Athens, a most fitting monument of classical Greece, the very symbol of the best in European culture, makes a damned poor radiator for a supposedly aerodynamic roadgoing vehicle. His own admirably egg-shaped “Dymaxion Car,” however, boasting front wheel drive and […]
Can you expand what you learn from these kinda of hair-pulling problems to help you not only with the unlikely case of repeat of the same automotive glitch, but to learn as much as you can about the best ways to approach unpredicatable and difficult technical problems across the board, wasting minimal time and coming […]
When we talk about CV joint service, it’s usually just a matter of deciding when to replace a cracked boot or a noisy joint. Customers rarely spot a CV joint problem for themselves, unless they drive until a damaged joint fails completely and disables the vehicle. That’s why it’s important to inspect the CV joints […]
Part Two of our “Front Counter Mechanics” series on Business Software (September 2000) described how to create a customer mailing list using Microsoft Excel. If you have built an excel spreadsheet, you know that project is comparatively easy; the real work comes in filling in the data. If your repair business is like most others, […]
Well, not quite. Ever get brake fluid on your hands? Well, natch, a person can’t be too fussy about spilling a little stuff here and there, as long as you keep it off paint that shows. But it does quite a number on your skin. Please log in below to view content. If you haven’t […]
We all used ‘secret codes’ when we were kids. If you wanted to get into my boyhood clubhouse, you had to know the secret code. It didn’t matter who you were – even my father wasn’t excepted. Fortunately, Dad was very understanding about it all. He just yelled for me to come out, and that […]
One of the most troublesome timing belt replacements is on the Mitsubishi double-overhead-cam V6 engines. There’s not much difference, except for fewer parts, on the Mitsu inline fours, but we’ll focus here on the four-cam V6’s. With the timing belt off, not only do the camshafts want to snap out of the position you set […]
Do you remember when the UHV band was added to the television broadcast spectrum? As the old manual TV tuner in our photo illustrates, the new band brought roughly a seven-fold increase in the number of potential broadcast stations (up from the original 12). Later, as cable and then satellite TV gained a foothold in […]
An engine most of us have always found interesting, but (if you’re like me) haven’t worked on enough to know as well as our interest would incline is the Wankel rotary used on Mazdas, mostly in recent years their RX-7 sports cars. The last new ones imported were for model year 1995, and rumor has […]
The subtle control circuits are too bad, in a way, because the traditional, non-electronic Diesel engine was so simple: If you didn’t run out of fuel or oil pressure and if you didn’t overheat or lock up, your Diesel engine kept running. Period. Now with the new electronic Diesels, if certain electronic sensors or actuators […]