If you’re getting your very first car repair underway, or you’re just looking for a few tips and tricks to make handling your car repairs a lot more stress-free, then you’ve come to the right place.
In this article, we’ll take a look at our five biggest tips for handling car repairs and some things to keep in mind if you’re working as a DIYer or just making a few minor repairs at home in the shed. You don’t want to run the risk of damaging something or pulling something apart without the knowledge or a guided list of how to put it back together.
That being said, in a lot of cases it can be far more affordable to work on your car repairs on your own than contracting a mechanic to do it, though sometimes it is best to hand off your vehicle to a mechanic for some specific vehicle maintenance tasks – and we have a tip for this too.
Let’s dive into our five tips for handling car repairs!
- A Tidy, Safe and Organised Workspace is Essential
Without a doubt, the biggest tip from us is making sure that you have somewhere safe and organised to get some work done, and this means making sure your area is clean and tidy.
The space you will need in your work zone will depend on the types of car repairs you’re doing, though it’s always best to have more free space than you think you’ll need. In some cases, dismantling one part of your vehicle may start a domino effect whereby you’ll need a tonne of space to lay out all of the components and parts you’re taking out of the vehicle, and so plenty of space is imperative.
One second thing to keep in mind related to this tip is making sure that you don’t stack components on top of one another. This might cause things to jumble up and become more confusing than they need to be when it comes time to put everything back together, so make sure there is plenty of flat space in the shed or garage for this.
- You Can’t Rush Car Repairs
You will either learn this the easy way or the hard way and so it is always good to be mindful of the fact that you can’t really rush a car repair.
The process will always take a fair amount of time, and so work to make sure that you have plenty of time to get the work done before committing to pulling your car apart – especially if you have work in the morning, or in the next couple of days. One thing you should always consider or plan is getting on top of alternative transport arrangements early in the event you can’t complete a repair in a set period of time.
One final point we’d like to make is that if you are in a time crunch, it might be worth considering professional mechanics like the ones from Enji to get the job done as these experts will be able to get things wrapped up a lot quicker.
- Labelling is Imperative
What may be one of the most important tips on our list is to make sure you don’t only label everything you’re taking out of your car with a number or an instruction, but you are also taking photos of components before you pull them out.
You will always want some form of direct and relevant point of reference when it comes to putting your vehicle’s parts back together, rather than relying on photos online. These images might be a little off, and so your own imagery is vitally important.
On top of this, things such as nuts and bolts should never be clustered or tossed together. Each one of these parts is going to be slightly longer, thicker or smaller than the other, and so you’re going to want to make sure that you’re not mixing and matching when it comes time to rebuild your vehicle after it’s been pulled apart.
A big tip from us is to make sure you have a tonne of little slots and compartments to put these nuts and bolts and other parts into. For example, it might be a good idea to get your hands on an egg carton and use this for your nut and bolt separation tasks. Things like clips and washers are also going to need to be grouped with their corresponding part, and so keep this in mind too.
- Keep Specific Make, Model and Component Research in Mind
When it comes to DIY repairs, you’re going to want to make certain that you’re working with instructions and directions that are aimed at your vehicle – directly.
It is good to keep in mind that a lot of model numbers differ by just a single digit which can change the entire repair and replacement process of a specific mechanical component and so you want to always make certain that you’re making the right changes to your vehicle.
One good thing to note is that your vehicle manual should have a lot of information for you with regards to the instructions, or at least the model number of a specific auto part, and so working from here is a good idea.
- Draft Up a Final Check-over List
To end, you should always make sure that you have some end goal or end list to look back over as you put your vehicle back together.
This means that there should be a reverse teardown guide to follow and you have some idea, or at least a set of instructions, that you can look over as things are put back together. Sometimes when we come to the end of a DIY repair we can become a little excited and forget how to put certain things back together, and so you should always follow these steps.
