Was doing weekly maintenance on my  K5 Blazer (check fluids, tire pressure, lights, etc).

When it came to the backup lights, I had nothing. hmm. So I started at the back and worked forward, kinda, Since it was both lights, figured the odds of it being the bulbs would be nil, but gotta do the simplest things first.

First things first, checked the fuses, all good, moved to the back and checked bulbs, they looked fine, check the outlet, no voltage, checked the plug/play connections at tail lights, nothing. hmmm. So, I know im not getting voltage to the Backup lights but everything else is good

Off to the manual/net. I found that the Neutral safety switch also houses the backup light connections. So, off to find out where that is on my truck, I found it (lower part of column near firewall). It looks fine, but I call up Napa and order one (10bux). Now to figure out how to get it out,,hmm, not sure about that one, thinking its just some plastic clips, but Ill wait til I get the part in hand tomorrow.

So, as I sit here, decide to research some more. Well, come to find out, this is an Adjustable piece and low and beyond, someone had an issue with no backup lights, they said they moved the adjustment a few clicks and it was good to go. So, I ran down and moved it a couple lights and BOOM!!!!!!!!!! I know have backup lights. Ill still pick up the Neutral safety switch just because, it is a 30year old truck.

But I couldnt imagine what a garage wouldve charged or told the customer had they brought something like this in. Im guessing they wouldve just wholesale replaced the switch and call it good.

I realize not all vehicles will be fixed this easily but Im glad it worked out. lol

In before ARFCOM tells you how poor/stupid/unimportant/not CEO level you are because you actually work on your own shit.

I used to go to the dealer or other places for oil changes and chassis lube and I had very short life spans for ball joints and idler arms now that i do this myself this is no longer an issue.

or sometimes not.
went to change out the air filters in my wife's car.
broke the part that holds both maf sensors. integrated into the part. cost me 400 bucks to get a new one from the dealer.

she got a pack of gum stuck under the sunglasses holder inside the center console.
broke the top trying to get it out. new console was 150 bucks.

being able to work on your own stuff has nice benefits, such as not being SOL if you can't get someone else to work on it.....if you can do it yourself, you are never without a mechanic.

I've learned to wrench more and more since I started driving in 1978...lots of motorcycles included.
Have a good set of tools now that I have scratch and enjoy doing most everything myself...all newer cars with the exception of a 2000 Camry...

Thanks to the interwebs you can usually find a solution, or path to a solution, to the problem with some searching and patiences (sp?)

I never, ever take my vehicle to a shop anymore without having a solid understanding of what is wrong with it and what I want done.

I've saved so much money working on my own vehicles that if I had to move, I'd come out ahead getting a place with a garage vs. one without, even if it cost a couple thousand a year more.   And that's just direct savings in labor, not counting the few thousands of bucks of damage I've had done to vehicles by shops doing half assed work.


I'm not against having work done if it's something that's a pain in the ass, but I'm tired of shops that won't even give you a ballpark estimate for specific jobs.   Say I want to get X and Y done.  Yes, I know you might also have to replace Z as well.   The labor costs should not be some sort of mystery - don't sit there and tell me you can't tell me how much a specific job will cost until you look at it.   I'm not taking a day off and sitting on my ass for a couple of hours just so they can yank things apart and try to bullshit me and tell me 3 hours of book labor and $40 in parts is going to cost $1500.


Instead, I'm steadily building up a collection of specialized tools, shop supplies, and practice.  Most of these jobs you can get the parts and any additional tools you need for much less than the cost of having the work done; all you need is an afternoon to do the work in.

Some stuff I do myself and some stuff I don't.

I don't come out ahead on oil changes and routine maint., so I let the dealership do that. Various part replacement I do because I can save money and time (which is more valuable, in my opinion).

You can save a fortune by working on your own stuff.  

I just did new heads on my T100 pickup with the 3.4.  Cost me $850 in parts (including rebuilt heads) but that same job at a shop would have been over $2000.  

I did a new water pump and timing belt on my wife's Highlander.  Cost me less than $200 in parts and about 6-8 hours of labor.  Same job at a shop would have probably been $800+

Because I work on my own stuff, I can have older vehicles.  That means lower insurance, property taxes, and low or currently no monthly payments.  Yes my vehicles aren't the newest but they run reliably and my cost of ownership is FAR lower than many other people.  I also replace certain parts before they go bad...meaning no getting stranded roadside.  

Google is a great source for searching problems.  Usually I have been able to find the solution online before ever diagnosing the problem.  

I also have been building a nice shop building full of tools.  I have a lot and am always buying more.  Tools end up paying for themselves many times over.  

The list of things I pay others to do for me is very short and working on cars is not on that list.

I maintain a fleet of 4 cars currently. At one time it was 6. My Mustang got totaled and replacement is sitting in Flat Rock MI waiting to be delivered and we bought a new Pilot for the wife almost two years ago.  I let Honda maintenance it.

Same here.  I do a lot of my own, but five quarts of oil at $4-something a quart, plus a filter, makes a $28 oil change at the local mechanic look pretty good.

My jeep needs tie rod ends (made a thread about that ) and a new brake caliper.

Shop wanted $1150 for a new tie rod end and two new calipers / pads / rotors.

I'm going to do the work next weekend, and the parts will cost less than half of what they wanted to sell to me

About the only thing I won't do is rebuild a transmission.



With the advent of the internet and Youtube, it makes it a lot easier to be a shade tree mechanic.

Ha! Ive got two for you..  

2002 BMW M3 convertable.. At 80k bmw reccommends full coolant service for the vehicle..
Water pump, fan clutch, upper/lower radiator hose, new radiator, thermostat, O rings, and coolant temp sensor. Changed spark plugs and adjusted valves at the same time. 940 bucks in parts and five hours total for teardown and rebuild..  BMW in FWB FL wanted 5400 dollars to do all that, parts included.. Sold it for more than I bought it for 3 years ago..  I do miss that car though

My current daily driver is a 2001 crown vic. Bought it at 148k.. It's at 156 now.  In that time,  I have put 956.96 cents into.  Heres where it gets really interesting..

I have replaced the timing chains, tensioners and guides, new intake manifold, reOringed the injectors, changed the spark plugs,  put a new thermostat, new raw temp sensor, new temp sensor,  new valve cover gaskets,  new cam cover gaskets and crkshft seal, water pump, idler pulley, belt tensioner, belt, flushed the tranny, new tranny filter, drained the rearend, new imput seal, axle seals and cover seal..
Plus two oil changes..

I called ford here in vegas, 6600 dollars for that exact list.. That's worth twice what the car is worth!!

I do LOVE knowing how to work on vehicles!! Made a lot of money doing it to..  

It's worth it learn,  best thing to do is fix it yourself.   Trust me,  if a redneck from SC can do it,  you can to..  Hell PM if you need help!!

i do all my own work, so far as i've even completely assembled one....after completely disassembling a coupe others.
doing most of the actual work is easy, remove a couple bolts, remove part, reverse order with new part. the real skill set in doing your own work is learning what noises mean what and knowing what sound needs attention right now, vs being able to get a few more days out of it till you have time to get to it.
my dd just turned 28yrs and 234000miles this month. it's getting a new coil, plug wires and cap&rotor tomorrow just because....well it needs the coil.
wife's ride just had the suspension redone and a complete overhaul of the brake system, as well as a full service of the front axle.
no way would i be able to afford a fleet of 20plus year old vehicles paying somebody else to work on them....i hate having to pay someone once a year to put a silly sticker on the windshield.

A transmission rebuild is the last thing on my "list", and while the idea of it is intimidating, I'm just saying "fuck it" and jumping right in.  No reason to bolt a ratty transmission with 156k on it to a freshly rebuilt engine.



Luckily the car the engine/trans is going into has a 95% similar transmission in it still, that is busted.  I'll open that one up first and play around with it before I scrap it.



Also, any excuse to buy more tools is a good excuse...



 

I have found this to be especially true with motorcycles.

I had the same problem with my 89 blazer! I was just about to go to the parts store to get new bulbs when I saw this post. I moved my switch over a few clicks and  now I have reverse lights! Perfect timing. Thanks!

Also had the heater core go out on my 06 taurus, the dealership wanted 990 total to change it. Cost me less than $100 for the new core, new coolant reservoir and new coolant. Took 8 hours to get done though.
My 03 F250 diesel needed a new oil cooler, cost me $300, mech wanted over $1000. 15 hrs, but I did a few other things too.

Tomorrow morning I'm going out to replace the rear struts on my 02 Forester.  I didn't screw around with suicide bars or anything like that, I ordered the complete assemblies from Rock Auto and it'll be a whopping 5 bolts per side and for $260 I'll have replaced everything vs. the $450 my mechanic wanted just to replace the struts.  

This summer is when my wrench turning really took off out of necessity really.  However, I gradually get more comfortable with each repair.  At this point I ONLY pay my mechanic to do what requires special tools that I either can't get or would have no clue how to use and could screw up my vehicle.  Other than that, I do all my own work.

I've easily saved a few grand this year alone just by doing my own work.

-Emt1581

The best part of knowing how to fix anything is that I'll never have a car payment, or get hosed buying a new car.

It's even better if you know how to do this stuff and can afford a new car anyways.   Most vehicles are pretty damn reliable when you actually follow the maint. schedule.

It has nothing to do with what I can "afford".  I invest enough to buy a brand new midrange car every single year, and have for a decade+.  I really enjoy watching my money make me money, and not pissing it away on depreciation.

The only thing I've paid a mechanic for is alignments and tire mounting/balancing. Kind of had to teach myself these things when I was younger and couldn't afford to pay someone ~$100/hour.

Don't like working on other people's cars as much though, I'm sure we all get asked "Hey can you take a look at my car?" way too often.

Discount does lifetime balance and rotation, I do oil changes, spark plugs, diff fluid changes, brakes and anything not pertaining to the inside of the engine. Can't even tell you how much $$$$ I've saved.  I only messed up 1 oil change in about 350 when I forgot to put the washer on the plug. Caught it right away.

My time is way too valuable to waste fixing my own stuff, so I wait in a dealership while they fix it for me. Time is money you know.
j/k
One of the best things about working on your own cars is that you can use better parts than the bottom-grade mechanics typically use. When I did my brakes and rotors I put in EBC parts. All the fluids I've replaced have been with Amsoil or OEM stuff. Suspension parts were upgraded when they were replaced. My cars end up being much better then they'd be had I taken it to a shop.

This. Very, Very much this.

Anything that gets replaced or fixed on my mustang gets something better.

My jeep is a beater, I'll admit it. The parts that go in it are mid grade at best. I figure I'll get a couple more years out of it before its toast

Just wait until your ignition switch goes out and you are in town, your power  windows are all down, and a summer pop up thunderstorm is coming.

Driving older vehicles it is a necessity to know how to fix them yourself.

Had my upper rad hose burst on my way to a customers location.
Got a lift to the nearby napa and bought a new upper rad hose, borrowed a pair of pliers from the customer and filled system back up with water.
Went about my day making $$$, got home and flushed the system with new coolant/distilled water.

Yay me!

I haven't taken a vehicle to a shop since ...............ever. I'd rather spend the money on tools, parts and learning.

They are not witchcraft as everyone claims. I rebuilt my first several months ago and it was fairly easy. Plymouth 727 torqueflite. All new bushings, seals, clutch discs, steel discs, springs, etc. Just take it apart in sections and keep them all organized, there are a few spacers that need to be in the correct position to keep endplay in spec. Hardest part was pulling a few bushings with a cheap HF puller.

I just changed all rotors/pads on my wife's 2012 Subaru Legacy.  The dealer wanted over $800 to do the pads and rotors on both axles.  I bought some Akebono ProACT and Centric rotors from Rockauto for $240 shipped, took me a couple hours to install.  Both the pads and rotors seem better than OEM and I saved about $600.  My wife is thrilled that the pulsations are gone now when braking down long/steep hills; they stop noticeably shorter and have better initial "bite".

To me, the biggest benefit of doing my own work is getting to use higher quality components and make sure everything is hand torqued to spec's.  I change my own oil; for $30, I can use Mobil1 full synthetic oil and an OEM or M1 filter.

For a long time I had more money than time and I paid to have almost all vehicle maintenance done.

Now I have more time than money so I'm back to doing as much as I can to keep my 03 Z71 (210,000 miles) going.

In the last year I have:

Replaced all the shocks

Changed the fluid in the front/rear diffs and transfer case.

Pulled the transmission pan, changed the filter and as much fluid as I could get out.

Replaced the brake pads and rotors and rebuilt all the calipers.

I just hope the engine and transmission keep going for a while, that is beyond what I can handle.

One of our vehicles is a low mileage certified used with extended warranty.

I won't be touching it for a long time.

This for me is a great feeling.  I have spent my entire life turning wrenches to get to work.  We've worked hard to keep the wife in a new or newer car since we have been married. Currently she is driving a 2013 that I have yet to touch, other than a cleaning. It's a great feeling!
Other than her car, I help my son on his '95 Mustang GT (installing a new clutch this Sunday), also have a '97 CR-V my oldest daughter drove through high school and college.  We bought it back from her when she bought her new car, for our 15 yo to start driving soon.  And my 19 yo has a '99 Lexus that is an absolute POS I hate with every damned bone in my body.  But he traded it for another POS Blazer that was about to explode.
In addition to those, I have a '66 Mustang GT Fastback that has been a total 15 year restoration that is about done.  So as you can see, I'm reaching that burn out stage.  My well maintained '95 Mustang GT was totaled out a year ago August.  
My new '15 GT Mustang is at the rail yard right now waiting on delivery to the dealership. No more wrench turning to make it to work!!! But I still have a few I need to maintain.

I had my wife's Jeep in for an alignment recently, and the wonderful techs at NTB broke the adjustment sleeve on the tierod. They broke it, but I was going to have to pay to fix it... Best case scenario according to them, $110 for the sleeve or, if it was frozen in the tierod, $750 for the entire assembly. And then install was going to be on top of that!



Luckily, I had my phone with me, and I started searching while they were hunting down prices on parts. I found that I could get the OEM adjustment sleeve for $45 from the dealer (And we all know you never want to buy parts from the dealer!), and I found the whole OEM tierod assembly (knuckle-to-knuckle) for $125! Even the badass, offroad, chromoly, heavy duty tierod assemblies are $350 or less!



Needless to say, I ordered/installed the parts myself. I still had to have them align it though.

I like older vehicles without computers because I can fix anything under the hood, short of a windowed block, with a toolkit that'll fit under the front seat. And since my F350 has a mechanically-injected diesel engine, and my YJ is going to have one, the most likely problems will be broken belts and belt-driven accessories. The engines themselves are good for 300K, 400K, even 500K.

Apparently, its the lil stuff thats gonna kill me. lol.

Here is todays adventures..........................

So, today was "drive the Blazer around" as I dont drive it often, try atleast once a week, sometimes longer.

Anyways, its nice out (finally cooling down), put the windows and go cruise to run errands, usually put on the VENT , just to get air circulating thru the vents and get the blower going, etc.

Well, put the vent on and only feel air at my feet,,hmmm, put the A/C on and nothing from the vents in the dash. Im like "great, now what".

So, get home, and really have no idea where to start, I know there are blend doors on the top of the "Box" under the dash, so i pull the glove box down and start poking with the vent door controls. I figured out the back one (closest to firewall) is strictly Hot / Cold and it works (but its mechanical straight from dash controls) but atleast the doors moved, etc.

Next was the blend door controls next to the hot/cold controls, well it looks like there is a rod that connects two doors and thats it , no exposed wires, etc. well in my wisdom and messing with a 30 year old truck, i broke one of the plastic retainers holding the rod to the arm to the blend door. Im like "oh well, deal with that later, lol"

So, I cycling thru the controls on the dash and manually moving these blend doors and sorta kinda understand what position does what, but they arent moving on their own. I also see vacuum lines running around back there and going to the kick panel, so I mess with that one and all the controls and NOTHING opened up that lil kick panel door, hmm, i get no change in vacuum sound or pressure when going thru controls, so I figure, probably vacuum issue. so I check behind the heater/ac controls best I can, and trace lines and then then I see ONE line going thru the firewall by the glove box.

so, I figure this is more than likely the source of the vacuum from engine to these controls, so pop the hood and trying to figure out where the lil line comes thru the firewall, it actually looked like it might be in the blower box or heater section but I found it a few inches away poking out of the firewall, i figure thats got to be it. I start to follow it and sure as sh!t, I see the line is broke in half against the firewall, just sitting here in 2 pieces.

I was like "Thanks gawd", this will be easy fix and it was, I had all the pieces I needed to fix this line and then tested the system and it all works as it should.

Took me about 2 hours total to figure this out and about 5 minutes actually fixing it. I had visions of me ripping the blend box out from under the dash or the controls being bad or who knows what. Im so glad it was a simple fix.

Once again, I couldnt imagine the ppl that dont work on stuff themselves what they wouldve done. This is why i like my truck, easy to work on. etc.

Anyways, thats my tale of the day.

So. found a pic on the net of the part I broke. I guessing this part is unattainable.



The only solution for perma repair would be an eyelet bolt with set screw option or something.

Me too.  The thing is, if you go in and sound like you know what you're talking about, you rarely get the hard sell for add ons.  In other words, when they think you know something about cars, they don't try to screw you.

RF

There have been a couple exceptions in the last 23 years of driving,  but getting tires mounted and state inspections are the only time mine see a shop
 

My most recent "project":



One of the upper ball joints in my 1997 Dodge Ram 2500. Went ahead and replaced all 4 ball joints, both hub bearings, changed the differential oil, found a loose shock mount and tightened it up, tightened up a couple of loose steering joints.

Fortunately the last time I was in this axle, 5 or 6 years ago for axle u-joints, I was pretty generous with anti-seize and this time it came apart really easy.

Personally, I don't see the point of having money if you are not able enjoy what it can do for you. Being financially secure and able to enjoy new vehicles are not mutually exclusive of each other. I don't want to wait until I am 80 years old to enjoy some of the nicer things in life. That is not what I consider to be balanced. Watching our savings and investments grow is satisfying, but not exactly what I would call enjoyable. Kind of like keeping an older vehicle going by doing your own maintenance. Although I do enjoy the retro appeal of some older vehicles.

Otherwise, I do enjoy the experience of driving a new vehicle with better handling and performance, more amenities, newer and more integrated technology and higher reliability. Where I am actually just driving, not actively monitoring for unusual sounds, vibrations etc and analyzing them.

If a new car doesn't do anything for someone, that's fine. Doesn't mean that it isn't a worthwhile expense for someone else.

I say that in ARFcom fashion, you can have both.