Who's Your Car Repair Go To - It's Under The Hood!

Welcome to the under the hood show podcast. Thank you very much for listening and downloading the podcast app

Russ Evans who brings us the under the hood show podcast Berkeley one classics your key to collector car insurance and

Road ready wheels

replica OEM wheels at huge savings use the offer code hoodie for even more and by car dash part over

200 million used parts ready to ship to you fast

Don't forget we streamed the show on YouTube and Facebook. We'd love to have you join us there

Here is the under the hood show podcast. This is under the hood

Welcome to the under the hood show. We are glad to have you with us Russ Evans is here to answer your automotive questions

Thanks for joining us under the hood Shannon Nordstrom is not here today to answer your questions. He's off. I'm here 866

594 415 0 that's the phone number to reach us. I'm Chris Carter. I'll answer that I'll just

Just I'm I'm a gamer when the phone rings

I don't even I don't even do that Doug does it our producer Doug answers it

And then he just tells me hey talk to Eric in Utah, and I'm like, all right, let's go to Utah and talk to Eric

See what I did there. That's the magic of me. Hey Eric. Go ahead

Thanks for taking my call

Yeah, I got a 06

Impressa of just the RS model

So

What's happening is I already got the timing belt kit for it with the water pump and I plan on bleeding the

power steering some more because the

guy that I that I'm buying the car from he replaced the power steering pump and

It still winds pretty bad

So I'm just gonna bleed it to see if that fix the issue, but

So I took it for a test drive

right and

So I was going down the street, and I was doing the whole you know making u-turns and stuff like that

you know listening for stuff and

So I I cranked the wheel all the way to the right to where you know, obviously the the power steering pump was struggling

You hear the wine and then the engine started to bog down real bad and then

And then the check engine light started flashing showing the multiple misfires

and

so I'm wondering if

if

The timing belt is just probably that loose to the point where when I put that much stress on the engine

It just started misfiring

Boy, it had been really loose so loose that it's jumping and gonna destroy the engine

It wouldn't misfire just from being a little loose

It'd misfire if it had jumped time

But it may be that you've got some bad ignition coils on it and or bad spark plugs and being under a load

It's causing it to misfire. You might have oil in the spark plug tubes as well

Yeah, I would I would check that first because if it's if it's that running that low on

Idol speed and then you put it under a load

That's where you're gonna see that miss the other place

You'll see it is about 45 miles an hour in high gear trying to climb a hill under under a very heavy load

That's about like a duplication when you're either that or when you're at idle that low and you got that wheel crank

So I'd be looking more for an ignition miss if you look at that misfire monitor on there

You're probably gonna see, you know one specific cylinder that's showing that miss

If not more than one

But that's why your full engine like flashes telling you there's a misfire that could damage the catalyst

So just a little bit of a background on the parts

So that I know this gentleman pretty well, he's he's actually my supervisor

so I was there when he and his son were working on this car and

They replaced basically the entire ignition system

Cooling system all that good stuff and this was all within the past two months

So I that that's why I'm thinking that the timing

The timing belt it jumped it to

It's still missing. He said that

Yeah, oh, okay, so it didn't just miss and quit it it continued to miss

Correct. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's not good

But so it didn't the light wasn't on before I started driving it

and then I drove it put it under load and then it just started flashing I parked it right away and

And then it was just solid after that the light

So I'm like

I

Have the kit and everything like I said, I do plan on doing the belt and everything before you then start started again

I'm hoping that that fixes the issue, but I was you know hoping for some validation

I guess is what I'm looking for

Yeah, I

So if I had one that missed and you find that that thing is a tooth off

You

Before you go to the work of putting a whole belt on it you might want to get it lined up on top dead center

And do a leak down test on it make sure the valves aren't bent

You know you can do and then you have to turn the engine to get each cylinder on top dead center with both valves closed and then find out

but you get the valves closed put the cylinder all the way down it's so the engine won't crank but

You want to do a leak down test and just find out if you've got air leaking by the valves

If you don't have air leaking by any valve you're you're fine then put the belt on it and and go from there

But it's it's possible it's got it if it jumped time it could have jumped enough to bend a valve but

Probably not it might just be off just a little bit and causing it to misfire hopefully

But it's important to keep belts on those cars

And you know that we replace the whole kit with the belt the tensioners and everything because we don't want them to jump water pump goes

with it too

Right, okay perfect, and this kit that I got it came with the seals

So I should just go ahead and replace those while I'm in there, right?

Oh, yeah, yeah, cuz if they leak on that belt, they'll ruin the belt and then it'll jump ruin the engine

Is that

Does that validate here? Does it just see here's the problem Eric not only

Validated not early early are not only are you in this thing with your supervisor that now you're gonna not but you broke it

You took my car before exactly yeah

Good luck with everything

Thanks guys. I really appreciate it. You bet. That's uh, yeah, that's a

And I by the way when he was I could I remember that feeling calling you hey

I have this car. I'm driving and it's it's doing this, but uh, it's probably just it's probably not bad

Huh, it's not like I'm gonna have to replace the engine next summer. What did you do?

eight six six five nine four four one five oh

That's the number to reach us here at the end of the hood show

What's caught your attention in the automotive world, but we got some big changes coming I remember when they introduced

The Model S and the Model X. Oh, yeah, Tesla, you know, they had the Roadster

They're like, hey, we're gonna have this model s knowledge like the roadster the roadster was wasn't I mean it wasn't

It was a unique one-off kind of you know, I mean not a one-off, but it wasn't a car that was a factor

It's like a you know, I was like, I remember when I first heard that name and with cars like Tesla

You know like the five-man electrical ban. I mean who are these people?

Yeah, I'm like

car I'm like, okay Tesla like

Nikolai to what and I didn't pay much thought to it then as more things came out and the Roadster and they were talking

But I saw a couple little video snippets on TV. It wasn't even on just before YouTube

So it was what is that? That looks pretty cool. Then I realized how small it wasn't

And then the Model S those are those cars were game changers like you were saying Chris. Mm-hmm model s is

second only to

the Model T that

Revolutionized the industry whether you like it or not. I don't care what you think

When you think

Electric car somebody says electric car the first thing that's gonna pop into your mind is a Tesla

Well, whether you want to admit it or not

And even if that doesn't if they say electric car

The word electric car means what it means because the s right

Existed it just it was that it's in your it's in your head whether you admit it or not

I we know those cars. It's like when you say

Hybrid the very first thing that pops into my head is a Prius. Yeah, it's just what yeah, they had the Honda Insight

Yes, but that's not the car that revolutionized it that the Toyota Prius

Revolutionized hybrid cars period and now there's yes, there's other ones that have done better and things but

It's still there and with that model s there are so many electrics now. There's thousands of different

variations, but that car

blew up the industry, you know

And now it's gone

They're pulling the production on the model s and the model x the x I can see why but the s is so expensive that

You know it it makes sense what they're doing, but that's what the s and the x are that they're the most expensive

models yeah, and the three

Now they're everywhere. You don't really see you see an x

Often but you hardly ever see an s anymore. Yeah, and now hardly ever

Yeah, they're rare. You see one when I see one of those

I think oh, there's somebody with some money or somebody without some money because they've got a really old one. Yeah

It's not it's not like transportation like I'm seeing when I'm looking at a Model 3 or something like or a Y

That it's just changed out a whole lot, but they're switching in favor of

Robo taxis

That is something that a lot of that we've got

We got like Waymo we got companies that are making these and you know like them or not

They're there they're in the big cities

But they're trying to build more of them and move them into other areas

To just smaller towns and they're they've they've done very well with their technology

They're learning to

Make this technology at the beginning. It was all camera driven well now

They're kind of like an airplane flying through the clouds. They're able to do this in the dark

They're able to do it in heavy fog rain. They don't they don't need anything

They can see better than the humans can and they they can operate where we can't and it's it's coming

It's just so much technology so fast you watch this if you watch the highlights of the CES show from Vegas this year

You'll be blown away at all the all the stuff the robots the cars the technology just wow

Flying machines personal transportation stuff that's just I was just reading about the

all of it kind of cooled like the the

autonomous

driving and

The the full electric future. I mean it's all cooled a little and the same with like the electric

Personal aircraft

Autonomous aircraft. It's all settled down a little but it hasn't stopped. It hasn't it's more like it's developed at a regular pace without the

The publicity right like the companies that you heard about three years ago that you never hear about anymore a lot of them

Still exist and are three years further

Than they were you just don't hear about it as much anymore

So it was the interesting I read a couple things while I was gone and I was just

It continues at a pace just not a public pace and it has slowed down in that

The their targets have changed. They may be become more realistic and more legitimate

Well, have you seen the Jetson one Chris the aircraft?

Yes, it's pretty much like a drone you sit in yeah, and that thing I thought was just gonna be a pipe dream

They had a like four or five that were concept vehicles and like you said Chris

I didn't follow up for three years and then all of a sudden one pop back up on my feet and they're like

Oh, no, we're delivering them now to people. They're buying them

This is what they cost and we're we're selling them and there we've refined it and gotten

We've become this good at what we do and there's other companies doing it

You thought I never and there's been car models and electric car models and gas car models that have

progressed but

It's the news cycle people like I we've lost interest in this but it's still the electric thing is those cars are still

Everywhere except here. I mean we talk about it less but not in China. They're there. Oh, they're going for one France, China and Germany

Yeah, let's go to Louisiana and talk to Kelly. You're on the end of the hood show Kelly. What can we do for you?

And and Chris how are y'all doing today fantastic?

Well actually in Washington DC as we speak but

Live in Louisiana and it was in Savannah, Georgia last weekend where they had we had snow

So they were talking about the the cold earlier

Last week week before we had the hard hard freeze in Louisiana and I was getting in my

2022 Tacoma

Four-door was rolling down the back windows to get the ice off of it and it made a

Terrible sound so I stopped immediately and rolled them back up and there's been no problem with it. I

Did not hear the that Tacoma has a rear window a little little glass that

There's a button you can push from the cab that will open the back window

ever since that cold snap the

The back window will not open

Then the switch doesn't click. There's no there's no

Appears as no juice to it. I did not try to open it when it was so when it was terribly cold

And I guess my question is

Is there a fuse just for that?

That one window or what might be some of the problems

With that rear window not opening if it's a factory installed window it should not have a separate fuse

It should I believe that one's on the on the windows regular main window circuit if it's a dealer installed

sliding window

With its switch

Then it's probably has a separate it's it's possible it has a separate fuse for it

There are some that look identical to the factory that are aftermarket and they have their own

Wiring to them with their own fuse so it could have gone out and it might just be a failure in the switch may have just failed you'll have to

Pull it loose get to the power wire behind it and see what you've got for for power

If it's there or not and if it's not then you got to track down where that power source is

The cold should not have affected that

The cold will affect those other windows though when they get when they get frozen

It's a different kind of freeze the freeze that we have I've lived in both places and the freeze we have here

you know, we'll get freezing rain now and then we had freezing rain yesterday and

It's different when that hits and sticks things together versus just cold ice and snow we get

You know there

You'll get the water and it seeps down in the doors and drains out the bottom

Which is normal, but as it's seeping down those tracks

It's starting to freeze and then it finally freezes solid and you've got a lot of ice built up inside of the doors

You can't just scrape your windows and call it good. You got to wait for things to thaw either the warm in the car up or

Waiting for the Sun to come out

You know, I just looked and it looks like it's gonna be like 78 degrees this weekend down there or something like that

And I was like, oh, how nice and the weekend before they're going

Oh, it's the end of the world buy more toilet paper. Yeah, like you're gonna need exactly two cases to make it those two days, right?

Where up here we were going to the monster truck show. Yeah, bread milk and toilet paper. I

Just beer. Yeah

And I laugh I laugh when I see that but we saw it through COVID up here

We saw how crazy people were and I equate it to the same there

But it's funny because you know, my friends are saying we're not going out

It's it's only gonna be 23 degrees for a high today and it's and it's icing. We're like, huh?

It's gonna be negative eight for a high here and we're going to the monster trucks. Yeah, we're all going out. We're driving around. It's it's

normal, I

Guess it's it's it's what you're used to though

In the summer up here when it reaches, you know, if it hits a hundred and three degrees and it's

90% humidity people think they're the world's gonna end they stay inside and stock up sometimes

So yeah, I think

As far as you yours is going

I think you need to check the power source of that to find out and you'll find out real quick if it's aftermarket or factory because

It'll have a bunch of wires on it that don't look

factory

I'm almost certain it's factory because this was most of them were purchased in December

December of 21 when the chip shortage was

You know vehicle shortage and chip shortage and it rolled off the truck and the salesman called me and said

Mr. Kelly, it's gonna be gone by the end of the day if you don't come get it. So

I didn't even drive it. It was they took it. They were washing it. I said, I'll take it. So I

Would I would imagine it's factory and all look through the fuse system and and see what you can find

On that I I don't remember them having a separate but they could you know, it's possible a lot of those too though that

That they didn't come with it from the factory. They did put a lot of those things on

We just ran into one the other day that had a

a non-operable

Sunroof in it and they they said well, we don't use the sunroof. We don't like it

It's just a piece of glass up there and a suburban

Loaded suburban and they said we were supposed to go back in and have them

Turn that on, you know, make it work once once the parts came in and we got notifications

Or we just don't want to fix it. I like but it's a sunroof. What about when you sell it? Well, they can deal with it

It's like oh my

That help you out there. Yeah, there you go. Thank you. Thanks very much for the call. Good luck. The

is there

That Tacoma that window that Tacoma

the one

Cold snap is that gonna affect that and we've talked about this before

Does does my Tacoma that's up here every winter work better in the cold than his?

well

not when it's new

But when it's old maybe because if you've got let's say you've got a you got this Tacoma just like us and it's

and

When it was three years old

You put a new window motor in yours because it failed, right?

Well, his is older than that now

But his window motor has been getting weak

But there wasn't anything to really load it and make it go bad. Now. He said he didn't operate it, but still this principle

Yeah, you've got components on your car that are get they're failing

But they never were tested up here. You're testing him and you're like, oh, yeah, I did replace my

Brake master cylinder I did replace my booster

I did replace that window because it failed because of the temp strain

You know if you've got a heart condition

That's really bad and the doctors like take care of yourself and you do not want to strain it

You make you may make it 30 more years if you take it easy, but you get really stressed out you go run full speed

You may just quit

That's right there. That's why I don't go running and go strain my harder muscles or anything

Oh, they're

Pristine I don't want to wreck them the end of the hood show podcast is brought to you by exclusive sponsors like Berkeley one Classics

Celebrating 50 years your key to collector car insurance and by car dash part calm with over 200 million parts

Find them online at car dash part calm and by road ready wheels

OEM replica wheels at a huge savings road ready wheels calm

Thanks for listening to the under the hood show podcast

What would your vehicle be without wheels our partner at road ready wheels has wheels

Thousands of wheels affordable in stock and ready to ship to you replace or upgrade your damage or plain steel factory wheels with new

OEM looking road ready wheels

Maybe steel is the way to go for you to mount a second set of winter tires

Or you just don't like the aluminum look road ready wheels has many choices for you

Go to road ready wheels calm and use their online vehicle selection tool to help you find the wheels that fit your vehicle

Mercedes Cadillac Ford Chevy Chrysler and many more with the OEM fit and look that you want

Save 10% at checkout when you use the code hoodie for being a loyal under the hood show listener

New OEM wheels can be expensive with some wheels that cost 500 or more from the dealer

Many of those from road ready wheels are about half of that saving you some serious cash

Use your factory tpms sensors and caps to go to road ready wheels calm to find out more

That's road ready wheels calm if you need parts whether it be for a brand new car or going back about 20 years

It doesn't matter check out car dash part calm

It's fast and it's easy over 200 million parts strong all across North America

Over 4,000 recyclers to choose from giving you the largest selection available whether it's an engine transmission

Doors seats or wheels you can find them on car dash part calm

We even let you know what parts from other models and years fit your car many recyclers supply pictures of their parts too

We even have a mobile app search us in Canada or buy from your local independent recycler

Whichever you choose buying recycled is good for the environment and good for your wallet

If you're a repair shop, there is a professional version available for you at no charge

That's car dash part calm car dash part calm check it out today

I'm russ evans with shannon northstrom and chris carter when we needed protection for our own personal collectibles and performance vehicles

We turn to berkeley one classics and here's why

Berkeley one classics has over 50 years experience and they're dedicated to serving their customers

They will work with you to help determine the amount of coverage a vehicle like yours should have

And that coverage is agreed valued coverage. So there is no disagreement on what your vehicle is covered for

They also have discounts for car club members

Berkeley classics ensures a wide range of vehicles from sports cars and rare exotic cars to antique vehicles including cars trucks

tractors military vehicles and antique motorcycles

Over 50 000 of them a year visit berkeleyclassics.com today and get a free quote and find out firsthand

What they can save you and how well they can cover your valuable investment

It takes just a few minutes using their easy online quote tool on their website. Visit berkeleyclassics.com

That's berkeleyclassics.com or call 800 603 33 30. That's 800 603 33 30

Welcome back everybody. It's time to get back under the hood with a motor medics

866 594 4 1 5 0

That's the number to reach us here at the end of the hood show

Don't forget if you miss an episode you can catch it wherever you get your podcast

And if you used to get the show on the app

You can get it wherever you get your podcast

We just had a comment on our facebook page about that. So we don't have the end of the hood app anymore

But we do look there is a google app. There's a alexa app. There's a there's all sorts of

Everyone my heart everywhere you get a podcast you can get our podcast

But they love what they're saying is they loved our app. Yeah, they did it was very simple

I gotta wait until

It's removed by attrition automatically because

You can't just go in and get rid of stuff

It just it just opened on my phone because we were talking about it and there it is it just with our faces

And that's the apple one, but I just said it and there it is

Um

At least it's quiet

Uh

Yeah, they're there, but people people liked it. It was easy to use you just go there

There were episodes you could send us messages ask us questions all that stuff and and I I do have people that can rebuild it

But so many people are moving away from it now to the other platforms. I mean the podcast I see it still growing

But oh, yeah, I got a question on that for you after the show

And if you want to watch the show you can catch it on our social media channels

And if you subscribe to the youtube channel and join the hoodie fan club it under the hood show dot com

You could win a hoodie like lin right congratulations for everybody here at under the hood and our friends over at berkeley one classic

celebrating 50 years of collector car coverage

And universal technical institute uti.edu and if you've watched the show

And you go back and watch old ones you'll see I didn't wear a hat

And then you'll see that we got a camera that's behind me and I decided to wear a hat every episode

our

TV that was the green why do you wear a hat now because there's a camera behind me our tv screen

Popped up in our shop yesterday with a very old episode

Bear studio just the table and us

and

You don't realize how long we've actually been we're like. Oh, didn't we just start in this new studio?

Uh in been a while six years ago. Yeah, it popped up

We visibly looked much younger

In that well. Oh, yeah, you did. Um, but we looked a lot younger

On our youtube channel, which is kind of cool

Because if you look at this youtube channel in 10 years, you're gonna look but you're gonna go. Wow, that's a lot of that is a good

We've been in this studio long enough to have visibly aged

and and

also it's it's

it feels

Good that so many people are watching and listening because I look at episodes

On podcast and on the rate of the podcast

Is what surprised me. I mean, we've got like 80,000 people a week that are

downloading and listening to

All the shows not just this week's but going way back

so those those original episodes are still active from

A decade ago and they're still relevant

They're still talking about cars and problems and the stuff people have because we talk about today

We talk about 26 miles 2026 and we talk about

1960 miles

So you may have a car question about a 20

26 10 years from now because it's your 10 year old car and it'd be perfectly relative

Let's go to io and talk to steve. You're on the end of the hood show steve. What can we do for you?

Yeah, hi guys

Uh, here's what I have a 98 chevrolet lumina sedan

uh

3.1

and rather than

I don't live in hilly country. I'm like 75 miles from you guys

but uh

when it does

Take on a little incline rather than

Downshift it wants to stutter a few times me too eventually

It will

You know drop down a gear

Uh, no fault codes no miss codes

So i'm wondering is this something in the transmission? Is there a

Module or something I need to look at

I'm thinking it's probably stuttering because it's a an ignition misfire

It's not bad enough to trigger uh

as the engine gets

So the engine's running

And you've got your ignition coil generating the spark. It's sending it over the wires to the spark plugs

Things should flow in that order the the spark should end up in the cylinder on the plug and that's it but

If you've got a worn coil you've got worn spark plug wires or

Cracks that are breaking down the ceramic on the spark plugs

What can happen is as you start to accelerate up a hill

But the engine's not revving up high

It's under a load because it's in a high gear when you hit that 40

To 50 mile per hour range

For most cars they're all geared about the same for mileage and comfort on the highway

Which puts it in about that speed range somewhere

The engine is under more of a load. So let's say at

200 rpm

When you're under no load your cylinder pressure is at

Point x but under a heavy load like climbing a slight hill

It's at point y which is going to increase the cylinder pressure is more temperature more pressure more heat

It takes more energy

For the spark to jump that spark plug gap with more the more pressure you apply and the more heat you apply so

With that said it's looking for another option

And that is either out the side of the plug the side of the wire the coil

And it's arcing to ground which affects the coil and even the primary side of it

Or it's arcing to another spark plug wire and that's where you're getting that miss in that shake

So, okay. Well, yes years ago. I had a

fault code

You know miss bank one, you know, so I replaced the plugs granted this has been a couple years ago, but

It's not throwing a miss code. It may not check engine

Yeah, no at that rpm. It may not it's got to set a miss for a long time

Like you've got to you've got to have that thing hard miss for

In some cars we've had people where you'll

Go start going up a hill and you'll try to maintain that speed as long as you can until you get a flashing check engine light

And then let off of it and when that happens you should get a a code, but you know, I had a

At a ford

No honda I had a turbo honda the other day

And it would shake like crazy going up hills like that

It was constant and it would just beat you to death

I'm like why until it went into fault mode and limp home

You'd have to shut it off restart it and then drive it again easy to get back home

And I read the active misfire monitor and there was nothing

showing up there was no codes

and

No misfire showing up until

It shut down and then it showed a cylinder for

Miss fire in history, but it wasn't showing any data and a lot of that can come from

Uh not doing a crankshaft relearn on it when a battery's been disconnected or something

So it's not seeing it, but you can definitely feel it. So

It's time for a tune up. Oh well

Probably yeah, yeah, that sounds a lot easier. I thought maybe the transmission was going south for the winter

I really doubt it. It's more than likely its ignition miss and our friends over at advanced auto parts have all that

Stuff for you, you know, you could get and it's that's old enough car. It's going to be really cheap

A coil it's all you know with that one unit there. You get a coil spark plug wires and spark plugs

Save your fuel mileage everything that is uh

I had that same thing where it was

Just by talking to mechanics the transmission was probably going and it's just drive it till it goes if you can't you know if you

And so we went years

Thinking the transmission was going and it would just do the little thing

And then the check engine light came on

Finally and it was simply coils and and plugs that was it and

For years that we had thought the transmission was going and it was just a miss that never showed up on any

Any check engine lights or anything no codes at all for years and then it was just that so

That was the uh

Go ahead steve

Yeah, yeah, no that just sounds so much better just you know a tune up like you say rather than

Worry about a transmission, right?

Yeah, the transmissions they when they fail in these cars

They usually bang really hard between gears as they're shifting or slip really bad. That's what you'll feel

It's it's not a chatter thing you feel out of this model transmission

And that was between the time I we we went long enough that I didn't know you when it started

And then when it finally the check engine light came on you're like, oh, it's just it's it's

Arcing to ground and we you showed me and it was the original the car was 11 years old

And the plug wires were all still at the wind start numbered. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you open the hood

You could see it

Original battery original plugs and wires for 11 years somebody got their use out of it

Me for a long time. I love that car

8 6 6 5 9 4 4 1 5 0

That's the number to reach us here at the end of the hood show. I had a question. I was thinking

About two weeks ago and maybe without Shannon here. This is the perfect time to ask it

Is there anything like on your mind?

That is something you think

That the shop is going to have to buy that is like a major

Like new or different like where you're just like oh because I've changed it again

Yeah, because I remember we talked years ago about um

Oh an alignment machine and you guys had one and then they didn't and you were like, uh

Just talking about whether you should get one whether it would be worth it

But is there anything like we're right now? You're like

Dude, should we get a battery?

crusher

Liquifier we have got everything we need to do what we need

For the cars we type of cars we work on right

We're we're set we've we've got to the point where it's like we've chosen to work on the these vehicles

We have that stuff if we decided to do more electrics, we would have some more electric technology stuff, but we're not going to

um

We provide a service by installing

Our our main business is we do a lot of engines a lot of transmissions because people have one

They have one fail and the the prices are getting so high now

For that type of work. We're finding other shops are not wanting to do engines and transmissions

They're wanting to do the smaller stuff. They're wanting to do struts and tires and shocks and

Um, you know tune up maintenance work and stuff like that

But you know, we have a number of shops that send us whenever they have an engine job

They're like go to Nordstrom's and they know that we respect what they do as well

And that if they send that customer us to have the engine put in or transmission

That if it needs brakes or something else is what we're going to send it back to them to get that done and say no

You know, I know we can do it but go back to where

Where they wanted you to do it and then we can do it more affordable as well because we do so many of them

I mean, we've done over 10 000 engines in our shop and transmissions. That's a lot

And we're still doing them and we we provide

We're putting in

Probably half new and half used and all the used stuff has a minimum one year warranty parts and labor

And the new stuff is all got a three year hundred thousand mile warranty. So

It it's it's a pretty good deal

But we have we have kept all the tools when we're putting used ones in we have to do timing belts

We have to do chains things like that. So we've had to get all the tools to do all these

You know lock kits and stuff to lock timing chains and belts and all that

That's a lot of a lot of stuff

We've had to invest in to make sure we have it even if we use it once

They've become cheap enough where we've been able to get them. I had to buy one the other day and it was 50 bucks

I'm like, wow, they would have been four or five hundred. Yeah six seven years ago

But now it's pretty cheap the cost of auto repairs

With some of the tariffs and we might come back and talk about that a little bit

Whether it's actually happened or people

Think it's happening

The price of auto repairs has become in some cases disgusting. My brother's truck blew up and uh

I talked to him two days ago about that and what they what he told me they wanted for repairs

Totally blew me away for both the used option and the the new option

And it it was it was just not a fair price and i'm seeing that more and more with shops lately

They have they've just decided if it's something they don't work on they will price it so crazy high

That people will say, oh, i'm not going to get it fixed and they'll look somewhere else or if they say

Oh, I guess I have to fix it. They'll say well for that price. We'll give it a shot

But that's not fair to the customer

Just say this is something we prefer not to do if we do it

It's not something we do often so it's going to cost a lot more you might want to check somebody else

But if you want me to do it, I'll do it. It's going to cost more

Well, great tell them up tell them up front and let them make that decision

But don't just charge more and then let everybody think that it's high right because it's I mean, it's not a little high

It's like in like in my brother's case

he was quoted like

$13,000

To put a remanufactured engine in the dealer was cheaper than that

And we were like

9,000 bucks and typically in his area, which is in texas across the country

They have been about what we are

But they've just gone through the roof. I'm like dude the prices. Oh, you know the terrace. No

It didn't we've actually had prices on our engines and transmissions for two reasons

They've they've become lower

Because the prices become lower as they've changed

But also because we're putting so many in and they're selling so many over at the northstrom side

That we've got a better deal on them and we're passing that along. We're selling them for less

so

Don't let people

Scary into thinking you need to pay more

Just because they're using an excuse of things being costing more because they're really not and also in that case

It could be a case of

I come I go to a shop and I say I need to put an engine in this car. They look at the book and go, okay

It takes

This much this is how much it would cost me to do that engine

Whereas if you take it to a place where they do them all the time

They're like we know how much it costs to do that engine and we can do it for

X amount less because it'll be the fourth one that month that we do and we were good at it

So we have the we already have the $50 tool

Yep, or the $5,000 tool that we're trying to make back, you know, because we've done it so many times

But yeah, we're there's there's those things as well. I mean we

We enjoy what we're doing and we do a lot of it

Got a message here on the chat. Good morning from Perth Western Australia

Can you use an oil system cleaner if your engine has a wet timing belt?

Did I ask that one the uh, is that one that we I saw the other day? No, I don't think so

Yeah, the oils the oil system cleaner should be safe in most cases

But you definitely want to go to the manufacturer's website and find out if it is or not

um

But the main thing with these wet so wet timing belts, I've got an engine in my shop right now

That is being put in because the wet oil pump belt

failed and

This this engine only had 50,000 miles on it and they have now backed up the

Time to change these. I think they're 30,000 miles and that's such an expensive

Belt to replacing this car the oil pump and the timing belt

Uh

That's going to be unrealistic for most people because the type of car it is

people

People can't afford those repairs. It's a car. You're buying economically to begin with probably on payments

Even though it's a cheaper car. You can't really afford a

You know 2,500 bucks put a belt in or whatever it is on those

When it's in the car, but we're doing it when it's out because we're putting an engine in

Well, the engine we got to put in it was missing all its teeth on its oil pump belt

Even though it was still operating we're able to grab it and pull it off with our hand without loosening it. It broke

Same way with the timing belt

That's the acids in the engine oil eating away at that rubber

It's not good. It's a very good heavy nitrile belt made for

That purpose as a wet belt and it should last longer because it's a wet belt. That's what they were thinking

But when those acids build up because you don't change the oil and a lot of people with these economy cars

If they can't afford the car, they can't afford the repairs. They're probably not keen on going in for

Most even quick lubes on those are like 100 bucks 110 bucks for an oil change

They're like, oh i'll extend it and when we see people going 10,000 miles on these on an oil change

Like I pulled the service records on this one on the car fact shop and it had great

service records that were at specific intervals

At about 10,000 miles every six months

It led me to believe by seeing them from the car time the car was new until now

And seeing them every six months consistent that pretty much tells you they've been changing the oil at the same place every time

And now it's dead

They didn't change it enough that car is recommended with that little turbo and that one liter

Three months 3000 miles. They weren't doing it

eight six six five nine four four one five zero

Let's go to florida and talk to timothy. You're on the end of the hood show timothy. What can we do for you?

Hello guys, I love this show. Thanks. Thank you. I got a problem

I got a problem got a two thousand and three four cherry twelve blazer

Over 200,000 miles on it now

I'm trying to find it. Is the cluster going bad?

Or is it a ground I'm missing or is the fuel pump going out because the fuel pump

Reading is just laying on this side. This is full and it went over

So I want to know if I need to replace the fuel pump or is the I need to miss the ground or what's what's what is guys?

I would get a scan tool

Plugged into the vehicle and read what the fuel level says when you know that things got somewhere under full

So it's probably like a half a tank. You kind of got an idea. I'm sure you can judge how much fuel you've got

When you know, it's lower than full by a lot

Plug a scanner and it'll say fuel percentage

Either in the body computer or the engine computer section and if it says

50 and your gauge is stuck over there all the way on full or all the way and empty you got a bad cluster

Because it goes through the computer first and then to the dash

but if it says

Empty I got what you're saying or a hundred percent

And and it's wrong, you know the gauge

Let's say your gauge says way past full lane on its side and that scanner says a hundred or 110 percent even

Then you've got a problem with your sending unit or your wiring and what you can do is go back to the tank

and then you'll need to check the wiring

And we can ground the sending unit wire specifically because if we ground the wrong one, we're going to kill something

On the car and you don't want to do that

But if you ground the sending unit wire the gauge should go all the way up to full

When it's disc or when it's disconnected it goes to full when it's grounded it should go all the way to empty

So you can test it

You know you can unplug it and it can be tested back there to see

But the first step to make it easier for everybody so you don't have to crawl into the vehicle and do some checking with meters

Just plug in a scanner and read it and see what that scanner says

The gauge on the dash matches the gauge in the computer

We've put a number of gauge gauge clusters dash clusters in these vehicles for this problem

But we've also replaced a lot of fuel pumps in these vehicles over the years for this same problem at this point

It's getting old enough a lot of people around here are just resetting that trip meter

And filling it with full fuel and once they drive 200 miles they refill it to the top again

Because they don't want to spend even a a few hundred bucks for that instrument cluster

I

Don't match in the money for the business cluster. I just want to know if it's because the test is when I bought the car

Gages was acting well funny. So I'm like, okay

It's probably the cluster but then when the fuel from the fuel gauge went out then I'm thinking it's a fuel pump

Right, if you plug that scanner and it's going to show that it's going to it's going to tell the percentage

And then you'll know

And that is is that

Okay, so he if the the computer readout doesn't match the dash in this case

Then it's the instrument cluster and it's just you're talking about an o3 trailblazer amongst others

But not every yeah, some cars go direct to the gauge, but this one goes through the computer. It's the opposite

I'm in a different diagnostics to do it. Correct timothy. Thanks very much for the call. Good luck

8 6 6 5 9 4 4 1 5 0

uh, I was uh

Down in florida with my daughter over the weekend and uh, I have to tell you ross

Look at me. I was in my daughter's car. You know my daughter, right? Oh, yeah

The sticker on the window

I didn't recognize

The line no the oil chain. No, that's what i'm getting at

The oil chain sticker was one that I wasn't involved in and the mileage was

Oh, her mileage on her car wasn't past the sticker yet

Good for her

You go girl. Can you believe it? It was it was like, uh, it was it was amazing. It was like

She doesn't want to call me saying uh, uncle russ mccarr blew up again

Actually, I don't think she minds that part of it. She know but the it's the she could do without that

But yeah, how about that? Huh? I was so proud. I was like, hey finally

She probably doesn't want us to say well, you did you change her up? No

She wants to make sure she's doing that

All right, it's the aftershow now that for my awkward transition there as I missed the timing and

We got to the end of the hour now. We're gonna talk to

Let's talk to shannon. You're on the under the hood show shannon. What can we do for you?

Yeah, I've got a 2003 f-150 super crew four by four

And I just had some new tires put on

Yesterday and the guy was showing me on the rear axle. There's a ton of play like you can pull the wheel out, you know

16th of an inch or so and it you know kind of clunks is that?

One other thing is I bought this truck used obviously and

In the love box. I found that they had put a detroit locker

rear end in there

So I'm just wondering if if it's the clips, you know on the axle that are wearing that allows that play or maybe

Something with that aftermarket

locker rear end

In concept play or what?

If I remember right, I don't think that one has clips on the inside on that f-150. I believe that one has the

Retaining in the axle bearing. It's got pressed on axle bearings on the end of it at the hub

So you got to unbolt the four bolts to take the whole hub out to do that

So your play would would be involved with the with the thrust bearing there at the end

Very yeah, I don't think you have to look it up to know for sure

But I don't I don't think they had a floating axle tape in there where it's got the clip on the inside

The ones with the clips they could have some wear going on but a lot of those will move

Quite a bit, but if you have one side moving more than the other

That's usually an indication that bearing is starting to to wear out

And if it does if it does they were both pretty even

Oh, they were they both

Yeah, because oh but we have that all the time I see them all the time on our trucks

They move they'll move back and forth

Um, you know up to an eighth inch. That's that's pretty normal back there. There's a little bit of play

Okay, so

That's not a big concern then

Do you think I don't think I don't think so not unless you can feel it and it's making noise

You know in affecting the alignment stuff like that as long as there's no up down

Or side to side play. It's just in and out. That's normal

A little bit. Okay

Well, then I noticed this morning when I was driving it

The one of the rear brakes started kind of making some squeakage

So I didn't know if it was that play bearing on the

Caliper or what and that's something you got to you got to look at too to see

Where you're at if it's if it's wearing the brakes funny

You've got too much play back there

If the brakes are correct if the caliper slide pins are lubed and

Sliding freely and all that right stuck the calipers aren't stuck

Uh-huh. Okay

All right. Well, thank you. You bet. Good. Thanks very much for the call

All right. I think that's gonna pretty much do it. We

I got nothing else to talk to you about. No, I mean I do but it's off air stuff. So

Yeah, all right. All right. I mean, it's not off air stuff like

bad

it's off air stuff like not relevant to

Disney the car show or anything

Anything that we would talk about so yeah vacation stuff. Yeah, exactly

That's gonna do it for the end of the wood show. Thanks everybody

I wanted to keep up the awkward finish to the after the

Aftershow too since I ended the regular show so weird because I card

I'm just gonna go ahead and do it this way too. All right. Okay. Bye

With russ evans, this is shannon orts from thanking you for tuning into the norters under the hood show

Have a great day and remember ptla the opinions heard on this program based on the many years of experience of russ and shannon

Are offered for entertainment value only and as a guide to your repair needs

No claim to repair or cause is given or implied

Always consult with your own certified technician and follow all safety procedures before attempting any repair

To be a part of the show call 866 594 4150

Find out more by visiting under the hood show dot com

Under the hood is produced by prairie house productions

All content is the property of nordstroms automotive incorporated and may not be used without our permission

copyright nordstroms automotive ink

Who's Your Car Repair Go To - It's Under The Hood!

About this episode

Subaru Impreza RS

timing belt kit

power steering pump

bog down

check engine light

misfire

catalytic converter

ignition system

top dead center

leak down test

valves

belts

Tesla Model X

Tesla Model S

Tesla Roadster

Ford Model T

Toyota Prius

Tesla Model 3

vehicle shortage

chip shortage

non-operable sunroof

Suburban

window motor

brake booster

brake master cylinder

Road Ready Wheels

steel wheels

Chevy

Cadillac

Chrysler

OEM

Mercedes

TPMS sensors

Ford F150

Request an Explanation

Want to learn more?

Help improve this episode

More from Under The Hood show