Performance Unlimited Blog

You’ve got your eye on that Princess 50 Flybridge yacht and you can almost feel the spray of water in your face as you imagine yourself navigating from the bridge spinning the tiller with cool and collected mastery. Well, none of this is very realistic. That 50-foot boat is too big for your Johnsburg driveway and it’s not the kind of boat that really fits Pistakee Lake. Additionally, it’s not the kind of boat you can tow behind your Prius. There are numerous reasons to add a tow hitch to your car, SUV or pickup truck. You may use a trailer for hauling material for construction jobs. You may have horses and want to tow them in a horse trailer. Then again, you may have discovered that Johnsburg is a great area for outdoor activities and you’ll need to tow your new toys. Those new toys could include a boat, though certainly something smaller than a 50-foot yacht. The toys could also include a pair of jet skis and/or a pair of Ski-Doo Snowmobiles. Having toys, such as these, you need to ge...

We may have more snow, ice and cold to face here in Richmond but, there’s little doubt that we’re nearing the end of the winter of 2022-23. If you have run snow tires this winter, you may want to run them a little bit longer, just to make sure you don’t need them before you take them off. But it is time to start thinking about rotating your tires. Rotating your tires is a procedure that Richmond, as well as other, car owners often overlook. It is a highly recommended procedure. In fact, as Bridgestone explains on their Website, tire rotation may be “required to keep your tires covered under warranty.” Why would tire manufacturers require car owners to rotate their tires to maintain warranties unless there was a pretty good reason for doing so? Here are some of the reasons that you should have your car’s tires rotated: Rotating the tires spreads wear evenly on the tires. If the wear continues in one area, the tires will loose tread in that area sooner than if the tires are rotated and t...

Will your car have the luck of the Irish as we approach another St. Patrick’s Day in McHenry? Or will the Blarney Stone hit and crack your windshield? Will four-leaf clovers grow inside your fuel injectors clogging them so your car won’t run? Will Leprechauns turn your tires to corned beef and cabbage? Fortunately, few of these hazards are concerns you really need to consider. The Blarney Stone, a block of Carboniferous limestone remains in the walls of Blarney Castle near Cork, Ireland, and far from McHenry, IL. Four-leaf clovers do far better growing in potting soil and not so well in fuel injectors. It’s also unclear why Leprechauns would turn your tires into anything but the rubber they’re already made of. Still, the idea that your vehicle may have a good or bad year remains to be seen. You may choose to wish on a four-leaf clover that your car runs well the rest of 2023. Maybe that will work for you. Then again, maybe the good fortune you hope to gain from a shamrock depends on wh...

Welcome to March in beautiful Johnsburg. This is the month when winter will officially end, though there’s no guarantee winter-like weather will pass on schedule with it. But, regardless, we’ve now put the first months of winter in the rearview mirror and warmer weather is sure to follow, eventually.  March is known as the windiest month of the year. Is that true? Has March earned the reputation for gusting winds and all that comes with them? Meteorologically speaking, yes, March is generally the windiest month of the year. This is explained in that March is a transitional month. Warmer weather is approaching. The mix of cold and warm air can sometimes prove volatile. The average March wind speed in Illinois is actually 9.1 mph (April actually comes in a touch higher with average wind speeds of 9.2 mph). If that’s the average wind speed, it’s safe to say that we’ll see gusts of wind considerably higher. It’s not surprising to have wind gusts of 45 mph and higher.  When the win...