What is CarMD and why do you need one
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Company
carMD
carMD is a company that helps people learn about their cars and how to fix problems. They make it easier for drivers to understand what's wrong with their vehicles.
Term
OBD2 port
The OBD2 port is a special plug in your car that mechanics use to check for problems. It helps them understand what's going on inside the car's computer.
Term
vehicle registration reminders
Vehicle registration reminders let you know when it's time to renew your car's registration. This is important to avoid getting in trouble for driving a car that isn't legally registered.
Term
SRS
SRS means Supplemental Restraint System, which includes airbags that help protect you in a crash. If this light comes on, it means there might be a problem with the airbags.
Term
tire pressure monitor
A tire pressure monitor tells you if your tires are too inflated or not inflated enough. This is important for safe driving and can help your tires last longer.
Term
check engine light
The check engine light is a warning light on your dashboard that means something might be wrong with your car's engine. It's important to check it out to avoid bigger problems.
Term
ABS
ABS means Anti-lock Braking System, which helps your car's wheels from locking up when you brake hard. This keeps you in control and helps prevent accidents.
Term
gas cap
The gas cap is the part that covers the hole where you put fuel in your car. If it's not on tight, it can cause problems and even turn on the check engine light.
Term
MSRP
MSRP is the price that the car company suggests you should pay for a car. It's like a starting point for how much a car costs before any extra fees or discounts.
Term
fault code
A fault code is a number that shows up when there's a problem with your car. It helps mechanics figure out what's wrong with the car so they can fix it.
Company
Nova Electronics
Nova Electronics is a company that makes tools to help people fix cars. They create devices that can help you find out what's wrong with your vehicle.
Term
vehicle health index
The vehicle health index is a tool that shows car owners what problems might cause warning lights to come on in their cars and how much those repairs might cost. It's useful for knowing when to get your car checked.
Part
oxygen sensor
An oxygen sensor checks how much oxygen is in the car's exhaust. If it stops working, it can cause warning lights to come on and lead to bigger problems if not fixed.
Part
spark plug
A spark plug helps start the engine by creating a small spark that ignites the fuel. If it doesn't work, the engine can have problems and warning lights may come on.
Term
vehicle health report
A vehicle health report is a document that shows how well your car is running and if there are any problems. It helps you understand what needs to be fixed before going to a mechanic.
Term
catalytic converter
The catalytic converter is a part of your car that helps clean up the exhaust gases before they leave the vehicle. If it breaks, it can be expensive to fix, and it might make your check engine light come on.
Term
OBD connector
The OBD connector is a plug in your car that mechanics use to check for problems. It helps them understand what's going on with your car's computer system.
Term
VIN
The VIN is a special number that identifies your car. It's like a unique ID for your vehicle that helps track its history and ownership.
Car
Ford Mustang
The Ford Mustang is a popular sports car that has been around since the 1960s. The 1966 version is especially loved for its classic look and powerful engine.
Term
antifreeze
Antifreeze is a special liquid that helps keep your car's engine from freezing in winter and overheating in summer. It's important to have the right amount in your car.
Term
viscosity
Viscosity is how thick or thin a liquid is. For oil, it affects how well it can flow and protect the engine parts.
Term
fuel injector cleaner
Fuel injector cleaner is a special liquid you add to your gas tank to help clean the parts that deliver fuel to the engine. It helps keep the engine running smoothly.
Company
Tecron
Tecron is a brand of fuel cleaner that you can add to your gas. It helps keep the engine clean and running well by removing dirt and buildup.
Term
fuel stabilizer
Fuel stabilizer is a product you add to your gas to keep it from going bad when your car isn't used for a while. It helps keep the fuel fresh so your engine runs well when you start it again.
Term
battery tender
A battery tender helps keep your car's battery charged when you're not driving it often. It makes sure the battery doesn't run out of power by giving it a little charge regularly.
Company
Deltran
Deltran makes devices that help keep car batteries charged. Their products are popular among car owners who want to take care of their batteries when the car isn't being used.
Company
C-Tech
C-Tech makes smart chargers that help keep car batteries charged properly. They adjust how they charge the battery to keep it healthy over time.
Car
Ford Escape
The Ford Escape is a small SUV that is good for families and everyday use. The 2006 version is part of the first series of this model.
Term
transmission
The transmission helps your car move by sending power from the engine to the wheels. If it breaks, the car won't work properly.
Concept
salvage value
Salvage value is how much money you can get from a car that is no longer working well or has been in an accident. It's the value left in the car even if it's not drivable anymore.
Car
Mercedes-Benz E450
The Mercedes-Benz E450 is a fancy car that is comfortable and has lots of cool features. It's part of the E-Class, which is known for being a nice sedan.
Brand
BMW
BMW is a car company from Germany that makes fancy cars. They are known for being fun to drive and very well-made.
Car
Kia Stinger
The Kia Stinger is a stylish car that drives really well and has a lot of cool features. It's popular because it gives you a fun ride and looks great, all while being more affordable than many other sporty cars.
Car
Mercedes-Benz Sclass
The Mercedes-Benz S-Class is a very fancy car that is known for being super comfortable and packed with the latest technology. People talk about it because it's considered one of the best luxury cars out there, perfect for those who want a smooth and stylish ride.
LIVE
W-A-T-T presents John Paul, the car doctor, All Things Automotive.
Have questions? Call or text 7-8-1-837-4900.
Now, here's John Paul, the car doctor.
And good Sunday morning everyone and welcome to another edition of the car doctor program on 959WATD.
My name is John Paul, the car doctor here to help you with your car problem on what is, I believe, the last Sunday in November.
As we're heading towards, well as Jesse said, some cold weather with the wintery mix coming up this week.
So a little bit of winter weather coming up maybe before the official first day of winter.
And I guess this means like 24 or 5 shopping days left till Christmas.
And if you're Jesse or I, it means you have 24 days of not having to worry about anything and then one day, one shopping day.
Isn't that correct, Jesse? Pick up stuff on the way home?
I think so. I think that's what Jesse does. He picks up his Christmas gifts on the way home.
I think I hit the wrong button, but yeah, that's usually how it goes.
Yeah, yeah, me too. It's always good to shop at the local 7-Eleven for Christmas present.
Anyway, with us on the phone is Kristin Brokoff. She is from carmd.com.
We've had, I think, Kristin, you and I have known each other sort of this way.
For a long time back when carmd was sort of a product you plugged in under the ash and a couple of little lights came on and gave you sort of a code.
That was a lot of years ago.
Well, good morning. How are you?
Good. How are you?
Yeah, I think it was 2006 or so when we first met.
And carmd was really the first company that ever started to educate your average driver about you can't ignore the second delight.
You don't want to put the black tape over it. You can't just hope it goes away.
So you've helped us educate folks many, many times over the years.
Although, we were talking about it with a listener last week. The black tape was an answer that the brothers on NPR made a whole skid out of putting black tape over all kinds of lights.
Now you guys have come up with something really kind of neat, carmd connect. Can you tell us about that?
Yeah, we're super excited. So our original product, you had to be proactive, you had to or reactive, you had to see the second delight, take out the tool, plug it in and then you actually had to go back to your computer and plug it in to see what the problem was.
And now the apps and AI and all that are just so standard in people's lives. This is a little product carmd connect that you plug into the OBD2 port right under the dash.
Most of your savvy listeners know that and you pair it with the carmd connect app.
There are no hidden fees. There are no subscriptions like a lot of other products out there. And once you do the initial setup, you're proactively monitoring your car for maintenance reminders.
You can get vehicle registration reminders. It's getting cold. You're going to get tire pressure monitor reminders.
And then when the check engine light or an ABS or an SRS type light comes on or something pending, you know, you're going to get an early reminder so you can get that figured out early and know what repairs should cost.
Know what the parts and labor are in your area. And I think a lot of your listeners know carmd has one of the largest knowledge bases with over, I think we're at like 100 million technician verified fixes.
So, you know, when we tell you something's wrong or we predict a failure is with a very high degree of certainty.
Well, 100 million would certainly do that. And one of the emails I get on a pre routine basis is, and I was going to say parents want to know where their kids are, but some parents want to know where their parents are.
And, you know, and some people have bought GPS tracking devices and they have to pay a monthly fee. But this device also interfaces with your cell phone and the technology in your phone and it can kind of keep track of where your car is going, right?
Yeah, we had a lot of folks that were wanting more than just, you know, to diagnose car issues and your right teen and aging parents are a big deal or even remembering where you parked or meeting up at a concert or whatever.
And carmd connect allows you to basically put together a friend group. So to be your immediate family, a parent and pair the device with the app, invite folks. So if you're one of those people who doesn't want to be tracked, you don't have to.
But it's a great way to set up a geofencing alert, you know, my team got to work or school or football practice or, you know, mom made it home from the doctor's appointment.
Now, it does pair with the phone. So it's getting the location. It's hanging the location for the person and the vehicle, which is what enables us to make it so affordable. So it doesn't have like an always connected telematics.
Like it's on while the car, if the car got a boot on and it got towed, unfortunately, you know, it's only going to know the last location that the car was at when the phone pinged it kind of like a file or whatever.
But, you know, it's not as expensive as a low jack. So, you know, you, you get that value added, you know, peace of mind without the really hefty cost.
When you were first describing, I was saying, I was thinking to myself, did you see me come out of Home Depot the other day and not remember where I parked?
Oh my God, I get so distracted. I've done that. I've been like, you know, two stores over. Oh my gosh. You know, daydreaming and making my Christmas list.
Exactly. And, you know, the device itself and the app, the app is pretty neat because, you know, there's some, there's some really interesting features in the app.
And like you said, the verified fixes to be able to do that where you can, where you can do that. But also, you know, you can, you know, you can use it on more than one car if you want to swap it around and things.
But also it has this sort of AskRMD and artificial intelligence feature, which I've been playing around with it. It's quite fun, actually.
So, yeah, just real quickly back, we really recommend one device per vehicle. Like it's really meant to be paired.
And so, but yeah, the AskRMD is so fun because when you ask a general chat GBT or, you know, off the shelf bot, you know, you're going to get a very generic answer.
But with AskRMD, it basically knows your vehicle's year make model, what's going on with the car. If there's any hitting codes or pending codes or current codes, it knows, you know, how many miles you have.
And so when you ask it a question, it's giving you a very specific answer for your specific vehicle because of the car and the knowledge base.
And then you can also say, you know, hey, I want to know about my daughters or, you know, a different and, you know, put the year make model.
So it's really fabulous because it's unlike anything else you can get on the market. And again, it's totally free.
Yes. So you've, you know, it's really meant for your average driver, but I'm sure it could be useful also for your DIY type listeners.
Right. You know, the idea that you're, you know, sometimes, and I'll talk to people pretty regularly and they'll say, you know, I was driving down the road and the check engine light came on and, you know, I pulled over and I checked the oil.
And I'm like, well, chances are the oil had nothing to do with the check engine light. But the idea that you can look at, look at your phone and kind of even if you didn't know anything about the car, it's a whole lot quicker to do that.
Then take out the owner's manual and kind of go through the owner's manual and hope to come up with some sort of an answer.
Yeah. And let me tell you, you were talking about not knowing, you know, I've got a daughter who's leaving for college and in fact, it just started snowing at my house.
And, you know, you freak out as a parent, you're sending them 100 or 200 mile away and they're trying to learn how to be adults, you know.
And so I use this in her car to kind of co-manage her, you know, oh, mom, you know, it's starting, the weather's starting to get cold.
You know, if they don't even realize sometimes you're going to need to add air to the tires to, you know, because it got cold.
I've actually had her get a check engine light on and instead of having to have her send her down to a repair shop for a scan or, you know, an auto zone or an O'Reilly, I was able to diagnose, thankfully, it was just a loose gas cap.
And we were able to resolve it, you know, essentially remotely so that I could guide her and you're teaching them to be, you know, responsible drivers and vehicle owners.
But you've got, you know, got that peace of mind and that kind of like being a little mechanic or a guardian angel, you know, on their shoulder while they're away.
Yeah. No. And if people are interested in buying the car MD Connect, it's available in Walmart now?
Yes, we are in an end cap in many, many Walmart across the country, not all of them.
And they're doing a special holiday promotional price of $79.97. And you can also get it at Walmart.com.
So that's definitely the best price you're going to get.
And once it's gone for the holidays, it's gone at Walmart, you know, as far as that price.
And you can get more information about the product at carmd.com.
There's just a couple of buttons on the home page that give you more insight into the carmd Connect product.
And it's available on Amazon, but I think it's a little bit higher priced right now than Walmart.
Yeah, I think the retail price is what, $120 or close to that?
That's the MSRP, you're going to get it around $99 and then, you know, the $79 at Walmart.
Yeah. And like you said, it is not, I guess, initially kind of a, you know, do it yourself, go out and buy the parts and fix it.
But it gives you all that information if you want. I mean, it gives you the idea that, you know, it will tell you what the fault code is.
And then you can kind of ask the AI auto mechanic, you know, and say, you know, what do you think?
And kind of give you an answer.
Yeah, I mean, it's going to give you the option to do a quick scan. So it's just going to do, you know, the ABS and the OBD2.
And then you can also do a more detailed scan. So you're going to get all of the OE, you know, from a auto start, stop to, you know, front relay control to the door mirrors and the heated seats and all that.
And it'll basically, you know, tell you if there's, you know, any problem, it'll give a very basic description of the fault code and whether kind of the severity of it.
So if you're one of those DIYers that wants to roll up their sleeves and, you know, get into the full, you know, ripping parts out of cars and replacing things.
And you want the, you know, the whole tree on, you know, what do I do next in terms of the triage? It's probably not for you.
And if you want like the bi-directional and stuff, you know, we have a, I would call it an affiliate or a sister company called a Nova electronics.
And I know you've had a lot of our products mentioned over the years and something like that's going to be a little bit better for your heavy DIYer.
But the car to connect is a fabulous consumer empowerment tool.
It really is. And, you know, just the idea to be able to look and be able to, you know, just have it there to use it.
You know, as we were talking, I was, you know, going through, you know, the last thing that came up on, I caused the code on purpose because I wanted to see what was going on.
And it came up with, came up with two different codes and it could, it certainly could lead me down kind of a path of things I could look at and decide what to do with it.
Also, one of the things that your company is really good at is something called a vehicle health index. Can you kind of explain that to us?
Yeah, we, I think it's been 11 years now we've been putting out the vehicle health index every April during car care awareness months.
We tell you the most common reasons for the second gen light, the associated costs and kind of whether those costs have gone up and down.
And really it was designed to empower folks to understand, you know, why does the light go on? Why you shouldn't ignore it?
For instance, you know, one of the top repairs is an oxygen sensor. But if you ignore the oxygen sensor, it could become an ignition.
It could become a catalytic converter. You know, another is a spark plug is a very common reason that a check engine light would come on because it's failing.
You ignore that and then it's a spark plug and an ignition coil, which, you know, can cost you upwards of 400 bucks if you're talking about parts and labor.
So it's just that whole idea of educating folks about the reasons that check engine lights come on, why you shouldn't ignore it.
And then, you know, even the regional insight has been helpful to folks in the industry to know if there are trends that people are seeing, you know, for parts stores to stop, you know, the most common parts, the most common vehicles that have issues or don't.
So, yeah, it is, it is amazing. And if you Google check engine light, car MD is going to come up as, you know, one of the preeminent experts.
Yeah, it really is. And, you know, you look at some of the various tools you have, you know, everything from multi meters to tablet style scan tools that are through the ANOVA side, which really shows, you know, you guys know what you're talking about.
I guess is really what it comes down to. And, you know, it's funny, I just looked at, I just looked at Walmart.com and the Walmart near me doesn't have the car MD connect, but it can get it in a couple of, you know, a couple of days that can arrive and it can either pick it up at the store or deliver it.
And what was interesting is because Walmart's Walmart, it always brings up something else at the same time, and it brought up some sort of GPS tool, and the GPS tool looked pretty reasonable, but it was $20 a month for the subscription service.
So for, you know, the cost of the cost of this GPS tracker and three months worth of access fees, you've paid for the car MD and sounds like a pretty good deal to me.
And honestly, you know, we always used to say, you know, if you can avoid going back to the shop for one scan, you know, because it's typically a minimum of one hour for 100, 120 bucks, you know, it's literally paid for itself in the first use.
And the other great thing is if you have a repair shop that you trust or, you know, you want to do it yourself, you can, you know, basically print out a PDF of what car MD connect found as far as the vehicle health report, the most likely fix the parts, etc.
And almost like give them a heads up, like, like, hey, this is what we think is going on with the car, you know, don't even, don't even have me come in for repair until you know you have the part because it is going to be very accurate.
And then, you know, we also have a list of shops that are available to schedule repairs, you know, right within the app, or if you have a favorite shop or that you trust, you can populate that and then, you know, it's right there in the app when you do need to have something fixed and you can send that that PDF along and it's, you know, it's really just more information, more communication, you know, to show you know what you're talking about.
Well, here's, here's where I'm asking you to predict the future. And the program on before us was a wrap up of some of the things going on during the week and they were talking about AI and robots and all kinds of crazy things and but it.
Do you ever see a point where maybe car MD connect will send a message to your trusted repair shop for an interpretation and then they're going to actually send you an email and say, Oh, by the way, we just got pinged by your car MD device that says, you know, your, your check engine lights been on and off and you might want to bring it in before something happens.
That is, we are absolutely working toward making this kind of the only thing that you'd ever need in your network, you know, from, from, you know, the consumer to the repair shop to, you know, the full, full, full loop, absolutely.
And with regard to predictive, we already have that, you know, we can predict the most likely reasons that your check engine light is going to go on. And basically, you know, you can make decisions, do I want to purchase an extended warranty?
Do I need, you know, to maybe sell this before anybody finds out? You didn't hear that from me. But yeah, I mean, if you know there's a 50% probability that you're going to need a catalytic converter and it's $2,500 or whatever, you know, maybe you make other decisions.
Yeah, maybe time to let that car go down the road and think about something new. But yeah, no, it's, no, it is an amazing little device and it is literally the width of the OBD connector, and it's about an inch deep. It's a little tiny thing that's going to sit there.
You're basically never, it's not going to be in the way. It's not going to be like a scan tool that, you know, has a big connector that goes to it. It's just a little tiny thing that sits in there and kind of, kind of just sits there. And, you know, if all things go well, it never tells you anything. Your car's in perfect shape and there's nothing wrong.
But it's nice to know that even if it's a matter of maybe you know a little bit about the car and you just kind of hit the button to do a scan and you just have to do a quick scan and go, you know, electronically, the car looks like it's in good shape. I'll go, you know, go take that trip home.
Yeah, and it takes like five minutes to set up. I mean, it'll scan your VIN every once in a while. You have to key it in manually, you know, it'll ask you your most recent registration, et cetera. And I actually moved to a state where they don't mail you a reminder about registration.
And I got pulled over because I totally forgot to register the car and they gave us a fixed ticket or whatever. But this you can actually say, would you like a reminder that you're going to need an admissions test, you know, and don't wait till the last minute because if you don't pass, you can't register your car.
So, you know, all this great stuff, but you're right. I think there's going to be a lot more AI in the future. You know, right now it's just the AskRMD, which is kind of empowered by our database and AI, but man, it's going to be a fun, fun ride we're going to have here.
There we go. Well, Kristen, I want to thank you for taking a little time out of your Sunday. And again, the device best deal right now, go to Walmart, go to your local Walmart and look around for to go to walmart.com.
I'm there right now and it's a it's a great price for $79.95 and, you know, go check it out. And I was reading some of the reviews and the reviews, at least online are quite good about it. And again, it's it does just what it says it's going to do. So pretty good.
Yeah, some of the some of the DIYers that, you know, they wanted more and that's fine, you know, just make sure you, you know, this is for you but Carm to connect is just absolutely fabulous. It's really bringing your average driver into into the world of knowing what's going on with your car.
Yeah, no, absolutely. Absolutely. Well, yeah, it would be it would be an absolutely great holiday gift for somebody. And again, even if you're even if you're a tinkerer and you think, hey, you know, it's under 100 bucks, I'm going to buy it and see what it's like. I'm going to, you know, play around with it. Some people just like to tinker around and it's it's fun for that. And again, that that AI app that gives you car advice, starting to get a little worried about my job here.
Yeah, what did you ask it? Anything fun?
I did. I did. And like a lot of AI, the more information you give it, the better it gets at answering the question. So no one.
And it is weird that you can ask the same thing and it gets smarter. You're right. And every time I'm like, wait, but we want you know, you're trying to film a video and you ask it a question and then the next time it gives you a different answer. I'm like, what?
Yeah, no, it's it's it's it's the whole the whole thing's good. And again, you know, whether it's you know, whether you're looking at the car MD connect or you're looking for more sophisticated tools through in Nova.
You guys, you guys have some great products out there. And I want to thank you for taking some time and sharing the information with us.
Absolutely.
Safe, safe winter driving and happy, happy holidays.
You as well. Take care. Bye bye now. Why don't we take a break?
Pay some bills. My name's John Paul. This is the car doctor program. You'll sitting on 95 9 W ATD. We'll be right back.
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Honored with a lifetime achievement award from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. He's John Paul, the car doctor on 95 9 W ATD.
And welcome back to the car doctor program on 95 9 W ATD on this one of the busy travel days and for people who are traveling by air it looks like there's snow if you're up in that Michigan,
northern New York area. Well, I think you're going to be stuck there because some pretty significant snowfall and flights have been canceled and all that sort of stuff.
And this usually the Sunday and Monday morning are typically the most busy return days from the Thanksgiving weekend.
So Jesse, your Thanksgiving was good. Did you smoke that turkey?
I did smoke the turkey. Yes.
And what was the smoking method you hit that was terminology?
Oh, yes, there was. So it is called a spatch cocking, which means you basically remove the spine of the turkey before laying it on the smoker and it gives it more of an even cook.
And was it delicious?
It came out perfect. That was actually my first time ever cooking a turkey. I had never done it before.
And yeah, it was very juicy. There was no brining. There was a dry brine, which basically the difference would be a regular brine would be you create some sort of a salt water recipe with some herbs and whatever else you choose to throw in there.
And I skipped that because I had learned in my research that it could be too salty. If you if you brine it, smoke it, butter it, all that kind of stuff.
So I kind of skipped a few things there and then I ended up dry brining it.
So just, you know, salted overnight, put it in the fridge, spatch cocked and take out the spine smoked it for about four hours.
You do the ribs as a backup just in case.
I did the ribs because our guest list quadrupled at the last minute and we're like, oh dear, there's so many more people like we bought a relatively small bird.
We're like, yeah, that should be enough. There's gonna be like 10 of us. No, it ended up being like 40 of us and yeah, but it worked out. It worked out. It came out phenomenal.
I forgot you live in a mansion.
It's it's a nice house, but it's, you know, I wouldn't say it's a mansion. It was a mansion at one point.
I don't know if I ever told you this, but actually my house in Whitman is a historical house.
We actually just got our historical plaque for the side of the house, which is kind of cool.
But at one point it was twice the size and they actually chopped off half the house and moved that half of the house a few streets over to be a whole other house.
Is that the one that became a, was it, there was a couple of those in Whitman. Didn't one of them become a funeral home?
Possibly. I am right next to a funeral home.
Well, okay.
But anyways, it worked out. Yeah, so it spoke darky, came out good. Everyone said it was the best they've ever had, so that's good.
I recommend smoking it and definitely spatch cocking it for an even, an even cook.
Who knew, who knew that we were gonna turn the car doctor radio show into a gourmet food show.
Look at that. Who knew? It could happen, so.
But anyway, so I want to thank Kristen Brokoff for joining us.
And in the weird things about, you know, things I get in the mail, we made a little fun out of
Moation, ocean, motion, the functional energy drink for functioning adults.
And I sent the guy, the guy who's the co-founder of the company, the clip of the show.
And he, and he never responded back and I'm like, oh, maybe he didn't like Jesse and I making fun of the name of his company.
And so I got a little card that said they're actually, they're actually live now.
The company is live. Distribution is gonna start soon.
And they sent me, they sent me a little bit more of the product. So there you go.
So apparently they were happy with Jesse and I making fun of the name.
So hopefully they're happy enough to actually send me some too. Come on.
I'll see what I can do.
They know where I live, you know, so that's the way it goes.
Anyway, so apparently it's a busy day here because now the FedEx truck is backing up in front of my house.
So, and I don't believe I'm getting anything from FedEx, but so I apologize if you hear backup alarms.
The FedEx trucks backing into the empty driveway across the street from me.
So if you want to join us, we are live like we are every Sunday.
If you want to join us, the phone number is 718374900.
How you get through and talk to us about your car, your car problems, whatever's on your mind will try to help you with, you know, maybe you're getting ready for wintertime.
Maybe you're putting your car away from winter.
I think I, I think I answered that question six times this week, putting my car away from the winter, heading to a southern state to go away.
But I'm leaving car here.
I have my 66 Mustang that I want to put away for the wintertime.
This is my first year with it.
I had quite a few of those kind of questions this week.
And if you're going to put it away and you're not going to drive it, it makes sense to put it away right.
And that usually includes, and this is what I try to do.
I usually like to put things away with relatively fresh fluids.
So I look in the, you know, look in the radiators, the antifreeze looking good shape.
Good. Okay. Is it good to 35 below zero?
Yes, it is. So that's a good clean. It looks good.
You don't want it. You can, you can buy these dip strips now where you can dip it in the radiator.
Tell you if the antifreeze is acidic or not.
Or you can, if you want to be a little bit fancy, you can take a voltmeter and put the black wire of the voltmeter against the negative cable of.
The battery and then take the red lead of the voltmeter and just stick it in the coolant.
And if it registers voltage, and I've seen it register as high as one volt.
But if it registers voltage, you're, you basically made a battery inside your radiator, which is never a good thing.
So if the coolant is in good shape, great.
I like to put things away with fresh oil in them.
That way when I come back, I don't really have to worry about it.
And oil doesn't lose its viscosity when it sits just sitting there.
Today's cars, you know, years ago, they used to say, you know, change the oil when you put the car away, change the oil and you can get it back out.
There's a lot more issues with carburetors that would drain down and things that doesn't happen with fuel injection.
Nothing really to worry about there.
I like to top off the fuel system.
I do like to add a fuel injector cleaner a couple of weeks before I put the car away just to kind of clean up the fuel system.
Something like Tecron.
I'm still a favorite fan of Tecron.
Tecron, you know, they're not a sponsor or anything.
They've been around since I, I remember going to General Motors School and we were talking about fuel injected cleaner and the instructor at the time said back when the very first fuel injected cars from GM came out back in the fifties,
they would be Tecron in the glove compartment or in the trunk because they recommended even back then because fuel was dirtier to add a cleaner to it to make sure everything stays the way it's supposed to be.
So having having the fuel injector run that cleaner through it, maybe a tank of gas before you put it away, put the car away with a full tank of gas and add a gas stabilizer.
Stable STABIL has been around for years.
It's a good product.
It's the one that if I go to the parts store and I look at fuel stabilizer and there's half a dozen choices, I always go to stable and maybe it's just old habits.
I have seen some testing where they've compared different fuel stabilizers together.
Stable usually does the best.
Again, it's the one I tend to use.
So air up all the tires to, to the maximum amount.
So if you normally put say 32 pounds of air in the tires and you look at your tires and there's, you know, the maximum is 35 put 35 in the tires, they're going to lose a little bit of air when it sits.
Also, if you're parking on, you know, in the garage or on the driveway or concrete or something, it's not a great idea to park on dirt without putting something under the car.
A car, plywood, something to keep the moisture from coming up.
But if you're parking on concrete, I like to park on, I went and bought a four foot square of construction insulation.
The pink stuff you see that they put against foundations, like an inch and a half thick piece, cut it into four squares, drive on top of it.
The tires sort of squish into it.
No flat spots on the tires that way, kind of last longer.
Battery, yeah, if you can put a battery tender on it.
My two favorite, battery tender by Deltran, great products and the C-Tech smart charger, really good one too.
I'm a little afraid of the, as much as I am favorable about a lot of Harbor Freight stuff, that $6 Harbor Freight battery minder thing, whatever it's called.
That one scares me a little bit, just seems too inexpensive.
I'd worry about leaving it unattended.
Same thing with a solar charger.
If you're using a solar charger because you don't have power, but you can stick it near a window or something to get a little sun.
Watch out for some of those because they don't have any way to regulate the voltage.
I have one when it is un, when it, you check the voltage on a sunny day at 17 or 18 volts.
It actually uses a 12 volt battery as a way of stabilizing the voltage.
If you're going to use it all the time, try to get one with its own built-in regulator so it's not going to overcharge the battery.
It shouldn't, but it could.
So, you know, spend a little bit of extra money for that.
If you live in an area that has rodents, block up the air intake to the air cleaner, block up the tailpipe because that's a good home for them.
And if you have a car with a appearance cover under the hood, plastic engine cover, take it off, stick it in a trunk or somewhere.
That tends to be a home for homeless rodents.
So get that out of there.
It helps a lot too.
Put a coat of wax on the car.
Clean it all up.
Put a car cover over it.
Hope for the best.
There you go.
Our phone number again.
718374900.
Let's talk to Rusty and Wuburn.
Rusty?
Good afternoon.
Good morning.
Good afternoon.
Happy Post Thanksgiving.
Early Christmas greetings, my friend.
How are you?
Wow, that was a lot.
I think there's still a little turkey left.
I think there's one slice of pie left in my house.
And I see a turkey sandwich still in my future.
That's perfect.
Awesome.
I just wanted to call and personally thank you for all the help you did with being on Toyota.
They actually called me yesterday of all days.
They called me at five o'clock yesterday before I went for the Bruins game.
And they're like, oh, well, we got this email.
Like many months from you.
I'm just like, what?
I know about almost a year ago.
Like, oh, yeah, yeah, we're just following up with you.
Oh, we just talked to the dealership and acted Toyota.
Nothing we can do with normal wear and tear.
Thank you. Goodbye.
That was it.
Well,
for all the work that you and I worked on with their email,
the phone call lasted 16 seconds.
And the idea,
and the idea they were working on Saturday.
I know.
Yeah.
I was shocked because I saw the call come in.
I was like, well, maybe it's just someone's like, you know,
trying to sell you a Toyota.
Yeah.
Right.
I take it like, oh, no, this is the executive,
executive office in Dallas, Texas.
And I'm like, oh, great.
Oh, we're just responding to this letter follow up that that was sent to you
almost a year ago.
I'm like, oh, yeah, we just spoke to acting Toyota at two o'clock this afternoon.
And we reviewed the pictures that normal wear and tear.
Thank you for being a little customer.
Nothing we can do for it.
And that was it.
They said goodbye.
I didn't have a chance to breathe.
Well,
well,
Well,
at least the email I sent out
got some response.
Yeah.
That's why I'm calling the state.
Thank you very much.
I mean, if you were closer, like up in the North Shore,
I'd buy you lunch or dinner.
But I would just say, just wanted to say thank you.
And, you know, I just wanted to,
because if I sent this to you in an email,
it would have made the justice wouldn't have been done.
Yeah.
Well, I appreciate it a lot and knowing,
you know, and, you know, they don't follow up with me.
So I don't know anything about it.
So the idea that they followed up at all is always a good thing.
Oh, yeah.
Five o'clock on a Saturday after Thanksgiving.
Yeah, I know you're heading out the door.
It's like, you don't even expect it.
Like I said, I thought it was just another,
you know, a corporate call to sell something.
Dedicated
dedicated
Japanese company with the Texas work ethic.
I don't know.
I'm all confused now.
The idea they even did it.
But, yeah.
No, no, it's, hey, we tried.
That's all we can do, right?
You know what?
We made the effort and, you know,
I have up to 74,000 miles on it.
The car will be paid for this time next year.
You know, it's going to last another one,
maybe 200,000 miles, 300 miles.
You hope, yeah.
We're banging them out, but thank you again.
All right.
All right.
Thanks, Russi.
All right.
Take care and have a good holiday season coming up.
Thanks.
71, 837, 4900.
Somebody wrote to me this morning and said,
I have a 2006 Ford Escape with a trade.
And the transmission is shot.
Is it worth spending $2,500 to have a used
transmission installed?
The Escape has 135,000 original miles.
Interesting.
They pointed out original miles.
Original miles.
Has been well maintained and runs good.
Recently, my mechanic who suggested
transmission has replaced the wheel bearing
front struts and brakes.
We've also had some body work done.
It's been a good winter vehicle.
And I live in an area that gets lots of snow.
I'm debating what to do.
Please advise.
Well, you know, what's your Ford Escape worth
right now where I assume it doesn't run
or doesn't drive the way it should?
Salvage value, maybe?
$400 for scrap metal.
Maybe $500 to $1,000.
Maybe if someone's looking for it.
You know, spending $2,500 on a used
transmission is a little...
I don't know, a little bit of a chance
because it is a used transmission.
So you hope that your garage
and your salvage yard work together
and try to get the best product
they can get for the car.
One that, you know, maybe it's a lower-mileage car.
Maybe it's one that looks like it was in good shape,
but it was in a crash and the transmission
was in good condition.
Whatever the case.
Put a $2,500 transmission in the car
and now, all of a sudden, you have a car
that's worth $4,000 or $5,000.
So based on that, I would fix it.
That's what I would do.
I would put a transmission in it.
7818374900.
I'm intrigued by this.
Mike, who's at the beach.
Michael?
Yes, good morning, car doctor.
Oh, okay, from that beach.
Okay, I don't know if maybe you're
at Miami Beach or something.
How I wish.
Maybe very shortly.
I got a quick question for you.
I'm somewhat of a Mercedes nut.
I've recently purchased, well,
four years ago, an E450
Mercedes-Benz sedan Ford-O-Matic.
Okay.
Currently, the car's about to come off
a warranty the 9th of December.
At such time, I got to put a warranty
within a couple of weeks.
The Mercedes will not let me renew with them.
Make a long story short,
the warranty with them is $5,000.
For three years, I think it's 75,000 miles.
Am I doing this prematurely?
The car's only got 18,900 miles on it.
Should I wait until the year or two
and buy an aftermarket?
$5,000 will go a long way with repairs
down the road.
It will go a long way with repairs,
absolutely.
If you said to me, my car just turned
100,000 miles.
I'd say get the warranty because
many, whether it's a BMW or a Mercedes
or an Audi, they're fantastic cars
until they hit triple digits
and then all of a sudden, they get expensive.
And on this, with such low miles on it,
I think I'd be 10, what year is it?
2021 or something?
It's a 22.
It's a 2022.
It's getting alright.
I've had it for two-way services.
And that's $300 a pop.
And the reason why they kept doing a service
is it didn't have enough miles to do the B-Service.
The B-Service, having recently been done,
I got a discount, but the B-Service dock
is $1,000.
Yeah.
I mean, I asked the guy who's coming home with me
to take me a date.
I don't know whether it's been spent for $1,000.
What's he gonna do with a car with 18,000 miles on it?
Not much.
But any event, okay.
No.
And I think the factory warranty on that,
at least the driveline warranty,
is that four years of $50,000?
I've come to that.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, you've done that.
I've reached that.
I've got four years.
I've had it this summer, sometime in December.
Alright.
Okay, alright.
No, I would be, with such low miles on the car,
I think I would be tempted to...
Ride the wave.
Ride the wave a little bit, yeah.
Like you said, $5,000 for three years,
something like air conditioner fails or something.
You've got...
Air compressor.
Air conditioner compressor went this past summer.
It was 1800.
And they fixed it.
But say it happened next summer,
and you didn't spend the $5,000 on the warranty,
and you spent $1,800 out of your pocket to fix it,
you're still ahead.
No, I think I would be tempted to just kind of stay with it
and see what happens.
And this sounds a little too self-promotional,
but when you go look at an aftermarket warranty,
and I'm sure you get pitched by everybody in the world.
The AAA one is a good one.
And why I say that is, not because it's...
You know, ours...
I've been at AAA for 40 years.
In the 40 years I've been there,
I think we've been in the extended warranty business
for 30 some-odd years.
It's a AAA warranty with my E430.
It was a 2000.
It worked out very well.
I was about to go to them and ask them,
I worry about it down the road.
You happen to know the name of AAA, the warranty company.
And what I found was, over the years,
we've had to swap warranty companies.
And we've never left the member out in the cold.
You know, if something happens,
because, you know, I remember once we had GE Financial
as the warranty company,
they decided they were getting out of their business
and we protected the members
until we found a new company to take over.
So, you know, it's those kind of things.
And you know, the movie stars
and people that advertise the ones on TV,
you know, when that company goes bankrupt,
you're probably left with just an expensive piece of paper.
And I'm pretty sure, you know,
Danica and Iced Tea aren't coming to your house
to fix your car.
They're no longer available in Massachusetts,
that particular warranty.
Oh, really? All right.
Yeah, called up.
I don't want to give them a black eye on the radio,
but they're no longer available in Massachusetts.
There you go.
That's true. The grapevine was Nova.
Oh, okay. Yeah.
Yeah, I've heard of that one, too. Yeah.
I was double, like, 3,500 bucks.
There were no bargain either.
Yeah, but, you know, in a few years
when the car starts getting a little bit older,
I might want to consider it
just because of the kind of car it is.
But in a couple of years, you might buy a new one.
So, who knows?
Thank you so much, Doc.
All right.
Why don't we take one more call
and then take a break?
I have a question from a caller off-air.
She was asking you to go over the three points
of the car that you want to address
for rodents before winterizing
or something along those lines.
I would want to
block off all the
places where rodents could get in,
like up through the tailpipe,
in through where the air cleaner inlet is.
You can cover it with a piece of plastic
in the tailpipe so you can stuff some steel wool in there.
I would take the...
If you open the hood and there's a big plastic engine cover,
I would take that off
because that could be a home for homeless rodents.
And there was a company we had
on the program a while ago, Earthkind.
Earthkind has a rodent repellent
which is made out of...
and I'm making it up.
Fur trees or something like that.
And it keeps away rodents
because they don't like that smell.
But it's not a poison.
So it keeps away...
I'd even put one of those little sachets
under the hood,
maybe even in the car just in case.
And then of course,
if it's in a garage,
look for any places,
mice can get in a hole the size of a nickel.
So if you see any little holes in your garage,
block those up, get the spray foam
or whatever and take care of that.
And you should be in pretty good shape.
If you want to go a little further,
you can get some rodent repellent.
It's supposed to smell like a predator,
so something that would eat a rodent.
You can sprinkle that around.
That shake away is one that works pretty well.
You can get that.
And worst case,
if you know you have a problem,
you can set traps up.
The problem with traps are if you don't check,
you could have one dead smelly mouse or rat
or whatever the case is.
Now let's talk to Jim in North Ready.
Hello, John. Good morning.
Good morning.
I'm giving you a follow-up on my 2014 Nissan Center
with the ABS problems.
Okay.
You suggested doing the
slow bleed.
It actually did eventually turn on the ABS unit.
I could hear it running.
I was getting tiny ear bubbles coming out
from the front right side,
and I think that ended up being the Bernoulli principle.
We were just getting sucked in through the leader valve.
Other than that, it didn't really work too well.
I still have the brake.
Only when I sat up the car,
the brake pedal goes to the floor after starting it.
And then the brake works fine.
I can hold my foot on it.
It seems a little bit low,
but it doesn't go all the way to the floor.
I drive it around town just a little bit
and step on the brake during dirt roads and stuff,
but I'm still in that problem with the starting up
that it goes to the floor.
That's puzzling because
if there was air in the system,
there would be air in the system all the time.
It may be the master cylinder
is just starting to get near the end of its life.
I replaced it.
That was a new one.
It could be defective, but...
It could be.
But just the idea that
you get a soft pedal or a very low pedal
on the first brake application
and then it gets better for the rest of the day
tells me you've pushed something to a maximum place.
So if you had a really stuck brake caliper slide
and when you first step on the brake,
it sort of jiggles it around
and gets it to work.
But if you had the air in the system,
you're going to have the air in the system all the time.
So not just air.
It sounds to me like maybe you did get a defective master cylinder.
Could very well be.
Yeah.
I'm puzzled.
I need to think about this over the brake we have to take.
Okay.
All right, Jim.
Okay. Thank you very much.
All right. Thanks, Jim.
All right. Take care. Bye-bye.
We need to take a break.
Pay some bills.
My name is John Paul.
This is a car doctor program.
I need to puzzle over this for a minute.
See if I can come up with an answer.
You're listening to a car doctor program in 959WATD.
If you're listening and you have an idea about Jim's Nissan
and why it has a low pedal just when you
get in at first thing in the morning,
give us a call.
781-837-4900.
We'll be right back.
Thank you.
Hey there, folks.
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for John Paul, the car doctor, on 959WATD.
Now, back to the car doctor.
And welcome back to the car doctor program.
Jim's car has me pumped.
You know, could it be air in the system
and when you pump the brake pedal the first time in the morning,
it pushes the air to the end of the system.
But I would think between all the brake bleeding he's done,
he would have gotten all that air out of the system.
Hmm. Hmm.
New master cylinder could be defective.
I've seen a lot of bad parts lately.
You know, whether it's people I talk to, repair shops I talk to,
a lot of bad parts lately. Could it be that? Yeah.
Maybe I'd spend the money and go somewhere and have,
or go to the auto parts store and rent a pressure bleeder
and pressure bleed the system or get one of the vacuum style ones
that you open up the bleeder screw and suck all the brake fluid out
through the bleeder screw.
I prefer the pressure bleeder style.
I think they just do a better job.
And what you're really doing when you pressure bleed like that
is you're really pushing all the old fluid and dirt and stuff out,
which I think is good.
And on an older master cylinder sometimes,
what it does is it sort of, the brake fluid sort of rejuvenates the seals a little bit.
You know, like I said, the other thing is worn brake hardware,
stuff that's really loose, you know, until it gets settled into position,
it can, you know, have a low pedal.
But still, if the idea that he gets in it in the morning,
it's got a low pedal when he first starts it up,
and then he drives it for the rest of the day and it's relatively normal.
Don't know. This is puzzling me. I don't know.
I'll have to ask a chat GBT or, you know, car MD,
let's see what it has to say.
Well, that's an idea. Why don't I do that?
Let's see if car MD knows. That'd be fun.
I don't know. It might take too long to do this, so.
But we'll try it. We'll see. We'll see if it knows.
Low brake pedal, first thing in the morning.
First thing in the morning. This is exciting radio.
It's thinking. It's thinking. It's thinking.
If the brakes feel low or unresponsive first thing in the morning,
it could be due to moisture causing slight surface rust on the brake rotors,
which is normal and should clear up after a few brake applications.
However, if the issue persists, it could be indicative of air in the brake lines
or a failing brake master cylinder.
Oh, there we go. Did you hear that, Jesse?
Yes.
Yeah. Okay. I just held the phone up to my microphone.
So, again, the same answers I have. Air in the system,
maybe that air is settling out overnight and when you pump the brake in the morning,
it sort of pushes it into a corner somewhere where it's not as much of a problem.
It's all I can think of. Puzzled. Puzzled.
Somebody wrote to me the other day they have a Kia Stinger, which is a really nice car.
All-wheel drive, probably V6 turbocharged engine, probably.
Two different size tires on it. Tires in the back are bigger than tires in the front.
It's primarily rear-wheel drive, even though it's all-wheel drive.
They went to a tire store they were looking for specifically all-season performance tires.
And they got four tires. The ones in the front are summer tires.
The ones in the back are all-season performance tires.
And they wanted to know if that was a problem.
They said the car seems to handle just fine.
Well, when we were talking to Wes Bowen from Nokia,
they make an all-season performance tire.
But the idea of mixing a summer tire with a winter tire or an all-season tire,
never a good idea because that summer tire is going to turn into a hockey puck
once the temperatures get cold.
And all-wheel drive traction is going to be bad.
And more importantly, braking is going to be bad.
So not a good idea.
My recommendation was go back to the tire store and get four tires that match.
It's important to get that.
So you want to get four tires, especially that's a performance sedan.
That is, you know, think like an Audi S-Class kind of,
kind of, you know, our S trim or whatever they call their performance car.
You know, and the Stinger was actually built by a combination of Audi engineers and Porsche engineers.
So there you go.
Well, that music means we need to step aside.
We have, you know, programs coming up right after this.
But until next week, make sure you wear your seatbelt.
About this episode
Kristin Brokoff from CarMD joins John Paul to discuss the innovative CarMD Connect device, which plugs into your car's OBD2 port and pairs with an app for real-time vehicle monitoring. The device offers maintenance reminders, check engine light diagnostics, and even GPS tracking features for added peace of mind. With over 100 million technician-verified fixes in its database, CarMD Connect empowers drivers to understand their vehicle's health better. The episode also touches on winter car care tips and the importance of proactive vehicle maintenance.
Original notes
In this episode we talk with Kristen Brocoff of CarMD. Check out their website (https://carmd.com/) In 2006 (when I first met Kristen) CarMD launched to empower consumers by providing not just tools but information to make better more informed decisions about vehicle health. We also find out about executive producer @jessewilkins smoked turkey recipe. Plus we get to spend some time with our listener family. We also used the AI feature of CarMD Connect to try to diagnose a brake issue. Give it a listen.
The Car Doctor Podcast
John Paul
0:00
58:03