Unexpected car maintenance can throw a real spanner in the works when it comes to your personal finances. Up and down the country, more and more people are finding that the cost of living crisis is leaving them in a difficult position when it comes to paying their bills. It is possible to cut the cost of future car maintenance appointments by learning how to make simple repairs yourself using your own tools.
Before you start learning how to fix your car yourself, you first need to get yourself some essential tools. Here are 5 of the most useful car repair tools that you need to invest in if you want to save money in the future.
OBD Scanner
You don’t want to start dismantling parts of your car without truly knowing what’s wrong in the first place. Whereas before you may have relied solely on your mechanic to diagnose any issues, you can now use an OBD scanner to help you to identify problems. Once you’ve got your diagnosis you can decide whether this is a job you can fix yourself, or whether it’s best left to the professionals.
Spanner Set
Sometimes things come a bit loose, or sometimes things are too tight and need to be moved in order for you to see what’s really going on. For times like these, you definitely need to invest in a spanner set. Make sure that you purchase a full set as you don’t want to rely on a collection of mismatched tools when you want to get the job done. My advice (from a person whose husband has spent his whole life working with cars) is to avoid adjustable spanners. These tend to slip, hurt your hands, and round off the nuts.
Screwdrivers
Just in the same way that I recommend purchasing a complete set of spanners, I also recommend investing in a set of screwdrivers. Make sure to keep the sets together and look after them well, that way, when you need to do an emergency repair, you can be sure that the right tools will be there for the job.
Car Lubricants
Cars are essentially tin cans on wheels – yep, even the most expensive ones. This means that underneath the chassis, lots of pieces of metal are all interlocked and work by rotating and rubbing against each other. When these parts aren’t adequately lubricated, they rub together to cause friction – this in turn leads to damage. Therefore it’s imperative that your car repair kit contains various lubricants. You’ll need to make sure that you have plenty of antifreeze, engine oil, brake fluid, clutch fluid, etc if you want to maintain your vehicle yourself.
Torque Wrench
When putting nuts and bolts back in place after working on your car, you need to make sure that they’re tightened just right. If you leave them too loose, they can cause issues and even unscrew. If you leave them too tight, the bolts could break and cause you even more problems in the future. In order to prevent this from happening, manufacturers specify a particular torque setting for many of the critical fasteners, such as the wheel nuts and bolts etc.
In conclusion…
It is possible to save money by diagnosing mechanical issues yourself using an OBD scanner before using your own tools to make repairs. There are plenty of tutorials online for simple jobs you can do at home, taking anywhere from 10 minutes to a few hours. For more complex jobs, jobs that require special software or machinery, or repairs you simply do not feel comfortable carrying out yourself, always seek the advice of a professional mechanic.
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