When should you service the transmission of your car out in your Wonder Lake garage?

You don't need to service the transmission as

often as you should change the engine oil.
But, if you want to pull out of your Wonder
Lake drive with confidence, you'll want
to service the transmission when it's due.

You start the engine and give it the gas. The engine revs but, otherwise, nothing happens. You sit in your Wonder Lake driveway and go nowhere. Clearly, you need to do something else if you want to begin your trip. And we all know what that is.

You need to put the transmission in gear

When you think about your car sitting out there in your Wonder Lake garage or driveway, you probably think about the maintenance required to keep it operating properly – the engine, the suspension and steering, the tires and brakes and other components. But how many times do you think about the transmission.

Fortunately, transmissions are fairly reliable components. You can drive for 100,000 miles, with some transmissions, before you have to service the transmission. The only thing you really need to look at is the transmission fluid level. (Check your owner’s manual for the recommended mileage when you should have the transmission serviced since some transmissions, for instance, may require service at 30,000 miles).

In some cases, checking the transmission fluid level may require getting under the car. This is one reason you want to have a qualified technician servicing your transmission.

Changing the transmission fluid is essential part of servicing the transmission

Transmission fluid lubricates and keeps the gears and other components in the transmission from getting to hot while reducing the wear associated with friction. The transmission fluid also carries away dirt, particles and fragments that might otherwise cause damage between moving parts of the transmission.

In other words, the transmission is essential to the operation of the transmission. Take the transmission fluid out of the transmission and you won’t go far before the transmission stops working entirely.

Changing the transmission fluid is a simple matter of draining the existing transmission fluid, replacing the drain plug and filling the transmission with new fluid. A more extreme transmission service involves power-flushing the transmission.

Power-flushing does a more thorough job of cleaning dirty transmission fluid out of the transmission. But you probably don’t want to power-flush a transmission with 100,000 or more miles on it. Power-flushing is likely to break sludge and particles loose that could clog passageways in the transmission. This could cause catastrophic failure of the transmission.

The other common problem to watch out for with transmissions is the leakage of transmission fluid. If you have a leaky transmission, you’ll find puddles of red oil under where the car was parked.

About the only other thing to consider is how you’re treating your transmission. If you get stuck in mud or snow and keep shifting back and forth rapidly while holding the gas pedal down, you’re putting a lot of strain on your transmission. But, if you take care of your transmission, when you put the car in gear, you won’t have any trouble pulling out of your Wonder Lake driveway, at least not from your transmission.

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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