Until winter passes – and it will pass – giver your car more time for the drive

It’s beginning to feel as though this winter is here to stay forever? The cold just keeps on coming, wave after wave of arctic blasts that make the simplest outdoor tasks monumentally challenging: snow that follows the waves of cold and keeps folks almost perpetually with shovel in hand or lining up behind their snow blowers. As bad as this winter has been so far, and though there’s no guarantee that the Midwest and Northern Illinois won’t see more and even worse, take heart – winter will pass.

One way to look at it is that this is the last day of January. Unless we’ve fallen into the midst of a new ice age, and the evidence isn’t available to support that contention yet, spring is only a stone’s throw away. Officially, it’s less than two months away. By that time, an unofficial spring could easily overtake the bitter winter blues of 2013-14.

One way to make winter easier to stomach is to find enjoyable activities to do indoors. Maybe you’ll enjoy the Super Bowl this weekend? There are the friends, good food or, well, tasty food; there are the commercials and the half-time show. For those who have endured another football season more than imbibed in another football season, there’s the knowledge that this is the last game of the season; your spouse won’t have the “but-the-game-is-on” excuse to get out of family activities until next fall.

On the other hand, maybe you enjoy outdoor activities: snowmobiling, skating, skiing, etc. If that’s your chilly cup of tea, by all means, make sure you dress warm. The keyword here is ‘layers:’ layers upon layers. If you dress warm enough you might just enjoy the outdoors on a minus-15-degree day. Then again, maybe it’s better just to stay indoors and drink your tea piping hot.

Whatever you do to mentally prepare yourself for winter, a plan to ensure your vehicle is equally prepared is essential. Few things will make the winter even less tolerable than to find that your car won’t start, doesn’t run right, won’t stop, can’t handle icy conditions, has broken an essential part of the steering or suspension driving through winter-induced potholes.

In Florida, you can say to yourself, “the car battery is getting a little weak. I should think about replacing it someday.” In Northern Illinois and McHenry County, those words are laughable and this is the kind of winter to bring tears to your eyes, if your car isn’t up to the task.

If you haven’t done so already, have your charging system checked, make sure your car is properly tuned, change the oil on schedule (see your owner’s manual) and replace those balding tires. These are things you can clearly do knowing they’ll keep your car from adding to the winter blues.

Keeping a blanket in the car, some water and a charged cell phone will help you deal with an emergency should your car breakdown.

Even if your car doesn’t breakdown, there are things you can do to make operating the car a little less frustrating. Keep some lock deicer handy. Make sure you have a good window scraper and brush for clearing the snow and ice off your car. Try to allow yourself enough time to warm up the car before you drive. In fact, you should allow yourself more time to drive since winter conditions – snowy and icy roads – tend to stretch the duration of trips folks take this time of year.

Is your antifreeze safe from freezing this Richmond winter

You still have time to have it checked Well, there’s no denying it – winter tends to get chilly here in Richmond. We have to deal with snow and ice on the roads, scraping the same off our windows and windshield, and staying warm while we drive. Of course, you had your antifreeze checked before winter rolled into town. What?! You didn’t have your antifreeze checked before winter clamped down on Richmond? So, how’s your antifreeze doing? If you haven’t had it checked, there’s really no way of knowing, is there? This car has overheated in the middle of a Richmond winter. But, on the other end of the spectrum, the antifreeze can also freeze if it's not up to its job. Hopefully, you haven’t had a serious problem with your antifreeze already. If you did, you’d probably know. When antifreeze fails, it’s a potentially catastrophic condition for your vehicle’s engine. You could have hoses that have burst because of freezing antifreeze. Worse than that, your engine block may have crac...

Blocks of ice falling from cars in McHenry could cause accidents or damage

We’ve all seen those blocks of snow falling from behind the rear tires of a car when the snow rolls into McHenry . Fortunately, they’re just packed snow that will disintegrate under your vehicle’s tires as you simply drive right through them, right? Don’t count on it. Those blocks of snow are often packed so tight, condensed by the thaw-and-freeze cycle, that they’re anything but oversized snowballs . They’re often more like boulders. Hit one of those blocks and the collision between the block and one of your tires could send you careening off the road or into oncoming traffic. In some cases, they’re so solid you could pound them with a sledgehammer with little effect. They truly can represent a serious road hazard. The problem is that it’s difficult to tell how solidly they’re packed when you see them on the road, left their unwittingly by another driver. Either way, your best bet is to try to avoid them. But you want to be careful dodging blocks of ice in the road, too. You need...

Get out to McHenry Music Festival for a good time and music near to home

Some folks here in McHenry will load up the car and head out to Red Rock Amphitheater near Denver to see a show. Some will go to the MSG Sphere near Las Vegas. Some will go to the Bonaroo Festival Concert to see a show. That’s quite a bit of driving and you’d better make sure your vehicle is up to the trip. What happens, however, if something goes wrong – if your vehicle breaks down while driving there or back? What happens if the show is canceled, as happened this year with the Bonaroo Festival? We’re talking about some serious inconvenience, aren’t we? Wherever you go, whether your driving to Colorado, Nevada, Tennessee or anywhere else in this continent, you want to perform your due diligence and make sure the vehicle is up for the trip before you go. And it doesn’t really matter if you’re driving somewhere to see some live music or for any other purpose. A breakdown can be costly and may put you at the mercy of weather conditions or nefarious characters that come across you while y...

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