Posted in: Brass by sarahheller on February 5, 2010 | 0 Comments
Taking your car in for routine maintenance has become a time and money consuming ordeal for many people. Long gone are the days when one could drop off their car and expect to be billed for only the services that were absolutely necessary for their automobile. While there are certainly a good number of honest mechanics, there are a number out there who recognize that the complicated machinery that makes up most motor vehicles today means that most of their customers are completely reliant on their mechanic to tell them what work needs to be done on their cars.
While the following services may actually be useful for some cars, for many vehicles they are overpriced and/or unnecessary. If your mechanic says that one of these services is needed, question him or her on the reasons why. If you’re not satisfied with the reasoning, refuse the service.
Image by pedrosimoes7 via Flickr
Throttle Body Cleaning: This service entails the mechanic spraying some brake clean into the easily accessible (yet rarely dirty) throttle body butterfly valve in the engine. While this service is often packaged with other services, a few dealerships will try to charge unsuspecting customers a lot of money for it. In actuality, it takes about five minutes to do this job. Don’t pay more than $10 for the service.
Wheel Balancing as Routine Maintenance: The only time you need a wheel balance is if you get a vibration through the steering wheel at certain speeds. This should be a repair for an actual problem in the vehicle, not something you do every 5,000 miles as maintenance.
Bundled Maintenance Interval Packages: The owner’s manual of your car should come with a list of what is recommended to be done at specific intervals. Call several mechanics and price these services separately. Odds are you can save about 50% off of what the dealership would charge you for the package.
Power Steering Fluid Flush: Since many new cars now have electrically operated power steering systems this “service” may soon disappear. It should be noted, though, that replacing the power steering pump is not a very common service performed by most dealerships. In other words, this could very well be a completely unnecessary procedure.
Transmission Fluid Flush Every 30,000 Miles: Always check your owner’s manual for manufacturer recommended service intervals. Most modern transmissions are sealed units and don’t require any service at all or only need it every 100,000 miles. Additionally, most fluid flush machines can only get about eight quarts of fluid out of the transmission. Most transmissions can hold much more fluid than that; essentially you are just mixing a lot of old transmission fluid with a little new fluid making it pretty pointless.
