How To Take Care Of Your Car Gear Box
Most cars these days have either manual gears or automatic gears. Manual cars are cheaper when compared to automatic vehicles. Most vehicles of the manual version are mostly 5 gears models.
Like engines, which a driver should take good care of, the gear box of a car should also ideally be taken good care of.
To keep it working in good condition, an engine should have enough lubricating oil in it. Normal cars have approximately 4 pints of engine oil in it.
The Kancil, which is a small car, possesses some 3 pints of engine oil.
Just like the engine, the gear box oil should also be taken care of. However, there exists two different opinions regarding gear box oil.
The first school of thought suggests nothing should be done to the gear box at all. As such, this school suggests it is not necessary for drivers or owners of vehicles to do anything.
This group seems to have the belief that gear box will not run short of oil. Therefore, they seem to advocate drivers shouldn’t meddle with gear box oil at all.
However, the second group possesses the notion that gear box oil can go short from time to time. Therefore, drivers should inspect and fill up its shortage periodically. This group also feels gear oil should be replaced from time to time.
If you know nothing much regarding cars, what more about gear box oil?
Leave the problem to your mechanic. Leave it to the mechanic whether to change the gear box oil or otherwise.
Mechanic friends advised me that gear box oil normally consists of oil numbered 90W to 140W. Older version of models, which have front wheel drive ideally use gear oil numbered 90W.
The rear wheel drive vehicles usually require gear oil numbered 140W. W stand for “viscosity”, the better protection it provides to the car’s gear box.
How does a driver take good care of his gear boxes?
A 2nd hand gear box will then have to be obtained. Malaysia possesses 2nd hand yards all across the nation. A 2nd hand gear box for a Kancil 660 cc vehicle can easily cost RM400 – RM450. The fixing service of a mechanic can easily cost anything between RM100 – RM150.
As mentioned earlier, how does one take good care of gear boxes? One should ideally:
i) Change gear oil periodically.
ii) Insert into the gear box additives which makes the gear box smoother to operate. I have used Slick 50 gear oil in my vehicles. It has been found that the above transmission fluid surpass expectations.
Besides the above recommendations, I would also wish to recommend the below mentioned suggestions:
i) Avoid dragging a vehicle too for a distance, especially gear 1 and 2.
ii) Avoid reversing the vehicle too far a distance. This is believed to be responsible for making the gears whine.
iii) If your vehicle end up stuck in a muddy hole for example, you are advised never to engage “reverse” gear, accelerate harshly to attempt getting the wheels out of the muddy depression.
The correct way is to get the assistance of a bull dozer, attached a length of rope or chains to the vehicle being pulled and this will assist the vehicle being successfully pulled out from the depression you are stuck in.
The other alternative to this problem is to get a group of people to lift the car out from whence it was stuck.
Can a manual gear vehicle have its gear system converted into an automatic gear system?
The answer is Yes!
As said earlier, our country has many 2nd hand junk yards all across the nation. Secure a good 2nd hand auto gear system and you will obviously not face much difficulty.
Furthermore, 2nd hand gear boxes have a guarantee period of 1 to 2 weeks. Drive around and test that it is in satisfactory condition prior to settling the amount for your gear boxes.
Best of luck to you in your endeavor! But your should be open minded and accept the fact that at times one can be unlucky to receive gear boxes imported from Japan, which fail to provide satisfactory service.
Do not worry too much about it as most scrap yards honour their words. Should you face the problem of purchasing good gear boxes, get the help of some good mechanics to assist you.
If you should face any problems pertaining to gear boxes, ask your foreman for assistance. I’m sure he will only be too willing to assist you.
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The Benefits of Flushing Your Vehicle Engine
Should Motorist Be Advised To Flush Or Not To Flush Their Engine
Mechanics should know about this subject well. But the problem is, not many advocate it to their clients. There must be a good reason for it.
As a 12 or 13 years old, while in lower secondary classes, I already knew about “flushing”. My late father was a lorry driver. While tinkering around his Bedford, father would explain mechanical things about cars and lorries to me. Young as I was then, such stories really interested me.
As the Driving School Malaysia Blog enters into its 10 months of existence, I have been contemplating about this topic very deeply.
Should this subject be broached or otherwise?
My personal opinion tells me that it should.
Therefore, after much serious considerations, with regards to the pros and cons of flushing an engine, this subject has thus been selected as a topic for my short article today.
Young drivers today might not know about flushing. Permit me therefore, to explain the meaning of this word. To flush an engine means to clean up the internal parts of an engine.
How do we do that?
Many drivers change their engine oil at 5000 or 10000 km duration. It is believed, frequent changes of the engine oil and oil filters augur well for the engine itself.
But the engine itself becomes dirty and clogged up with sludge as time goes by. Engine parts such as valves, connecting rods and piston rings to name but a few, needs to be serviced periodically to. In fact, carrying out a task of flushing the engine, especially older car, should do the vehicle a lot of good.
However, new engines are in perfect running condition. As such, it is not recommended this job to be performed on them.
Furthermore, new cars are still under warranty. If anything is found to be wrong with your new vehicles, talk to your car sales person. He will certainly be able to advise you what to do.
How does one go about flushing an engine?
If you need any help, seek your mechanic’s advice. The steps are as follows:
1) Drain engine oil as usual.
2) Change oil filter as you normally do during an oil change.
3) Either purchase flushing liquid which is available commercially or,
4) You can use diesel. Normally most larger c.c. cars require approximately 4 liters for its engine capacity. After filling the diesel into the engine, start and allow the engine to idle for 5 minutes.
You are advised not to accelerate at all. Allow the engine to roll on its own. Remember, revving the engine might cause damage to the internal parts.
At the end of the 5 minutes duration, stop the engine running. Drain out the diesel oil. Change a new oil filter. Insert new engine oil amounting to 4 – 4 ½ liters into the engine.
The flushing process would most probably have cleaned away sludge and other sediments present in the engine. The engine will nor have become cleaner and lighter. The engine furthermore would now appear to be more powerful.
With new oil and its viscosity being better, you car should ideally run smoother than ever before. Add in a further bottle of X1R or Slick and it should even make your vehicle run better.
There is however present 2 schools of thought pertaining to flushing of engines. One school adamantly is against it being done. On the other hand, the other seems to be for it.
As owner of your car, you are the one who makes the final decision. Talk to your personal mechanic and seek his opinion. Weigh the pros and cons. The decision is yours actually. To flush or not to flush, that is the question.
Mechanics, most of them, would rather prefer that you overhaul or do an overhead ring job rather than flush your engine. The former is more costly to undergo, but it brings a bigger profit to the mechanic.
To flush an engine takes a lesser time to perform and less profit to the mechanic. As a mechanic, which of the above would you recommend to your potential client?
Few mechanics nowadays talk about it to their potential customers. They would rather that this subject be not brought up at all completely. The reason is very obvious.
Why The Engine Of A Manual Car Dies Off?
A reader of this blog recently asked the following question. He or she wishes to know, “Why does the engine of a manual car die off suddenly?”
As said numerous times before, I am not a mechanic. In attempting to answer the above question, I will try to garner all my 35 years of driving experience to answer this difficult question which the reader posed.
If in my attempt to answer, should the answers given be found to be incorrect or differ from the views held by other readers, kindly do excuse me.
Mechanics, car specialists and even auto engineers are welcome to give their comments.
Why does the engine of a car or vehicle die off suddenly?
New cars, should in fact not suffer such dilemma. Car engine dying off suddenly or stalling should in fact pertain to older or second hand cars mostly.
Nevertheless, let us examine the reasons that bring about such a problem as mentioned above.
Certain car models possess good or powerful torque. Torque is explained as the pulling power of a vehicle. Some vehicles can even travel at 0 km/h, yet its engine does not vibrate.
In usual circumstances, the driver has to control a little bit of clutch to avoid the vehicle jerking or vibrating. If one is capable of understanding what torque means, he will understand that in most cars, if you are too slow to use the clutch quickly enough, when the car is travelling far too slowly, this will cause the vehicle to eventually stall or its engine dying off.
The second reason for an engine stalling is obviously your ability to control the clutch well. When a car is moving too slowly, the driver has to have good control over the clutch mechanism or else the engine tends to stall.
What is the 3rd season to explain why the engine dies off suddenly?
The engine timing might be too retarded. A slow engine may be good for consumption of a vehicle, but it normally leads to a car engine dying off rather frequently.
In mechanical terms, this means the car’s Revolution Per Minute (R.P.M) is way too slow. Ideally, for smaller c.c. cars, mechanics should adjust the R.P.M. meter to either 0.7 or 0.8.
Larger c.c. vehicles such as Volvos, BMWs or Mercedes should have its R.P.M. meter adjusted to 1.0 or even 1.2. Your mechanic should know about this. So do have your engine R.P.M. adjusted well. Failing which, your vehicle would probably face frequent stalling or engine dying off.
Is there a 4th reason which causes frequent engine stalling?
Certainly there is.
A car plugs can also contribute to this problem too. Plugs that are in use for far too long tends to be soiled or coated with carbon deposits. They might even be wet with fuel, if your car should be consuming petrol as the mechanic say. This would normally cause jerking and eventually even lead towards engine dying off.
An engine stalling suddenly can at times be caused by a wire disconnection somewhere along the electrical supply. For this, you need a good mechanic to check the electrical lines of your vehicle.
When fuel goes low and fuel indicator flashes, this indicates extremely low fuel in your vehicle’s fuel tank. Do top up your supply immediately or most likely your car engine will suddenly die off.
Finally, although not a frequent cause for an engine dying off suddenly, the battery can also be a cause towards a car stalling. A complete cut off of electrical supply of current from the battery have sometimes been quoted as the reason for an engine suddenly dying off.
The above are some of the usual reasons as to why the engine of a vehicle should suddenly die off while we are driving. Hopefully, this article answers the question posed by the blog reader.
