Tag Archive for: car repair

VW Beetle TDI with damage

Well folks, it is that time again! We got Shop Shots of automotive service today! This week we have 3 “shots” and one quick video of a smoking Tiguan! 3….2….1…. GO

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What you are looking at here is the result of a Beetle doing some “off roading”. The part that is sticking out is the Tie Rod. The tie rod is part of the steering system. It is the link between the steering rack, and the wheel. As you might be able to guess, it should not be belt at a 90degree angle. The tire you see is the left tire. notice how it it turned all the way to the right. What you can’t see is that the right tire is completely straight. I have seen many bent tie rods, but I don’t think I have seen one ripped from the steering rack. I am pretty sure the damage totaled the car. Sad to see a TDI go out like that.

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This is a picture of the screen of our VW scan tool. We have a program called Guided Fault Finding. This program has several tests for almost every system of the car. If a car has a fault, it can automatically load a plan to test the fault. It usually works pretty good, despite what some mechanics would say. Every now and then, you get some random repair instruction like this one. It is basically telling me to

  1. Check the connection
  2. Find the problem
  3. Repair it

HAHA, Duh! What the heck else would I be doing? I always get a kick out of this stuff. That and when you get a random screen that is in German!

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If you read the post the other day called “Throwing Automotive Logic Out The Window”, you would have read the story about an alternator causing the engine not to start. Well here is the failed alternator. You can see the ball bearings at the bottom of the pulley mount. That should not be that way. I do not really have an explanation as to why this happened. Thankfully it fixed the no start problem. I wish I could have taken it apart, to find the failure. There are some parts that we have to return to VW. They will manufacturer this and resell it after fixing it.

Oh hello pollution! This is a little video of a VW Tiguan that is obviously smoking. The problem here is a fuel injector that got stuck open. It causes way too much fuel to be sent into the engine. The high amount of fuel is not able to be fully burned. The only place for it to go is down the tail pipe. The result is awful smoke coming from the tailpipe. I hope that the customer had the car towed it. I would be mad if I was driving behind that car!!

I hope you all have a really great Wednesday. I am off work, but will be busting my butt to get some flooring finished. Don’t forget to signup for email updates. I know I keep saying “I got things in the works”, but I do, and the email list will get 1st dibsies!

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So you might be thinking, “Why the hell is Charles talking crap about the internet and fixing car”. I spend almost every second of the day working on cars, or working on this site (and some other side projects), why would I say something like that? Heck this community even has its own Automotive Forum.

Well, for one, its true! The internet CAN NOT fix your car. You can not type “replace my timing belt” into Google and expect it to be replaced. That would be stupid right? Well the same goes for everything else. I wish I could count the number of times someone has come in to the dealer and said “Well, (insert website here) said that this is what is wrong with my car”. Oh, and you usually have to say it with a snotty voice. 🙂

Now don’t get me wrong, I think that customers need to be informed. I think the more information that the customer has, the better an experience they will have. Doing research on issues with your car is an important to help from being taken advantage of. I would recommend having the following information.

  • Understand your owners manual.This will also give you maintenance information too.
  • Your service history, Unless you have 1 place you bring your car, always have service information with you
  • If you do find some information about a problem you are having, print it out, and bring it to the repair place. It very well could help gt your car fixed faster and cheaper. Just don’t act like a tool about it.

I rely really heavy on information that customers provide. Researching the issue you are having with your car might help you explain the problem better. Even if it does not apply to the car. I would much rather not need information, than not have it.

I guess what I am saying is it all boils down to attitude. I would like to beleive that when a customer puts a lot of time into researching their car it’s because they LOVE their car. The sad truth is, it comes off like they just want to prove the dealer wrong(sounds like my mother in-law). If you find information that might help your mechanic, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE tell them. Let them figure out if it applies or not.

Just to be 100% clear, I love the internet. I dig all of the really cool social media platforms(I think Pinterest is about to BLOW up), the amount of information is endless. I used YouTube nonstop when building this site. I had no idea how to do any  of this stuff. I am really thankful for the help I got and continue to get. But I would never expect someone to just do it for me. I studied the information, and did the work myself. That is exactly how it works. 🙂