Los Altos Auto Repair

Hi Cayenne here,

I want you to take a deep breath because we are barking about fresh air today when driving.

Pop quiz: What is a cabin air filter?

A. A filter for your Los Altos house?
B. A fresh, piney scent?
C. A filter for the passenger compartment of your car?

Clever you, it’s C.

A cabin air filter cleans the outside air before it comes into the passenger compartment of your sedan. It filters out common Los Altos air particles like dust, pollen, spores, bacteria, pollutants, exhaust gas, odors and even sparrows.

These high tech filters can block particles larger than 3 microns. By contrast, a grain of sand is about 200 microns.

Not all Los Altos car owners have cabin air filters. They are fairly new on the scene in CA. Last check, about forty percent of new vehicles sold in Los Altos come with cabin air filters, but the number is growing every year.

Cabin air filters make driving a lot more pleasant for Los Altos drivers. Your sedan can be a haven during our Los Altos allergy season with very little dust and pollen getting into the cabin. Of course, like all filters, the cabin air filter eventually gets clogged. When this happens, your heating and air conditioning flow can become restricted. The filter can even get kind of smelly.

Check your owner’s manual for replacement guidelines. If your sedan owner's manual doesn't mention your cabin air filter, ask your personal and trust service advisor at Allied Auto Works for a recommendation. It’s usually every year or 12,000 miles / 19,000 kilometers. Change it sooner if you drive in dusty conditions around the Los Altos area, or if you start to notice a funky smell coming from your vents.

The team at Allied Auto Works urges Los Altos motorists to keep their cabin air filter cleans. It may not help with your brother-in-law in the backseat, but it will make your driving experience around Los Altos more enjoyable.

Come by Allied Auto Works in Los Altos and we'll take a look at your cabin air filter for you.

Now exhale,

Cayenne

Hey Duke here and it is another sunny day in Los Altos and we are going to talk about something different, I mean DIFFERENTIAL!

Every sedan on CA interstates has a differential, and it is vital to the proper operation of the vehicle, but most Los Altos car owners don’t have a clue what it is.

The differential compensates for differing wheel speeds. For example, when you turn, the inside tire on the turn travels a much shorter distance than the outside wheel. So the inside wheel of the sedan must move at a slower speed than the outside wheel. Without a differential, the wheels would hop and scrape while turning.

Have you ever seen the large bugle-shaped object in the middle of the rear axle of a truck? That’s the differential. In a rear-wheel drive vehicle, the differential is located on the back axle. Four-wheel drive vehicles and SUV’s have differentials on both the front and the rear axle.

You might expect that the differential is located on the front axle of a front-wheel drive vehicle. You’d be right. But the differential is called a transaxle on a front-wheel drive vehicle because its location allows it to be combined with the transmission.

In an all-wheel drive vehicle, an additional differential or transfer case is located between the front and rear axles. Differentials are strong: They have to be because of the essential job they do. But those tough parts need proper lubrication. You don’t want your differential to seize up. That results in pricey damage to your sedan.

So you need to have your sedan differential serviced regularly. It’s not a complicated job. At Allied Auto Works in Los Altos we've been servicing differentials for 29 years. The used lubricating fluid is simply drained and then replaced. Some vehicles require specific additives in the differential fluid; your Los Altos service center will ensure you are getting what your sedan needs.

The intervals in time or mileage for servicing your differential vary greatly from vehicle to vehicle. Check with your owner’s manual or Allied Auto Works to find out how often your sedan differential needs to be serviced.

Generally, however, front-wheel drive vehicles need their differential serviced more often than rear-wheel drive vehicles. Also, if you spend a lot of time off-road or on Los Altos area dirt or gravel roads, or if you drive through water, you will need to service your differential more often than the standard recommendation – check with your personal and trust Allied Auto Works service advisor.

Preventive maintenance for your differential is good car care that can spare you expensive repair bills. Knowing what your differential is and how it operates is important and will help you understand why this is good auto advice. Remember, take care of your sedan, and it will take care of you.

Well that wasn't too different, it all still about the car,

DUKE

Hi Cayenne here and as the saying goes, nothing is free and that goes for today's so called maintenance free vehicles.  Let's find out more!!!
In our auto video today we'll be talking with Alan Peterson about myths surrounding automotive maintenance. You can lump these myths into the statement that "modern cars are so reliable, they are virtually maintenance free".

Any good myth has some elements of truth. No offense to Los Altos Bigfoot fans, but this maintenance-free myth has more evidence than most. If we look at some isolated areas of auto maintenance, we could conclude that maintenance isn't so important. But other areas would just as easily lead you to believe that maintenance is more important than ever.

Here are some examples for our friends in Los Altos.

• Some cars in Los Altos no longer require chassis lubrication. They're made with self-lubricating materials and have sealed joints. There's literally is no way to grease those joints.

-Chalk one up for the myth.

On the other side, some vehicles come with sophisticated variable valve timing. A lot of complicated parts up in the valve train that didn't even exist not that many years ago. These parts are very vulnerable to oil sludge.

• So, skipping an oil change here and there could lead to very expensive damage.

-A point to maintenance.

• Electronic ignition has eliminated replacing points.

-Myth gets a point.

• Fuel injectors on direct injection engines are very expensive to replace so one must be sure to get a fuel system cleaning on schedule.

-Point for maintenance.

I think you get the picture. As automotive technology advances, it eliminates or reduces some maintenance requirements. And maintenance becomes more critical for some items. Most others remain very similar to what they've always been.

So the maintenance mindset is still important for car owners in Los Altos if we want our vehicles to last a long time. The checklist may change over time, but there'll always be a check list.

Let me mention a couple of items on modern vehicles that folks need to be aware of. One of the most of the most important is timing belt replacement. Used to be that all engines had timing chains – you know, metal chains. They rarely broke.

It's cheaper to make engines with timing belts rather than chains, so replacing the timing belt is on most engines' maintenance list. The money the manufacturer saves by using a belt is more than off-set by what the vehicle owner has to pay to replace the belt. And it's a drop in the bucket compared to the cost of repairing the damage if the timing belt breaks.

So make sure you know when your timing belt needs to be replaced. You don't want to miss that. If you have 60,000 miles or more, break out your owner's manual or ask your Los Altos service advisor at Allied Auto Works to check on the recommendation right away.

Another is sealed wheel bearing assemblies on some vehicles. As you might have guessed, it's cheaper to make a sealed unit than one that has access to inspect or service the wheel bearings. The problem is that when the bearings fail, you have to replace the entire unit, not just the bearings. That'll cost 5 or 6 times as much.

For our friends in Los Altos, we hope this has underscored the importance of knowing and following your maintenance schedule. Come in and see us at Allied Auto Works. You'll find us at 2073 Grant Road in Los Altos, CA 94024. Just give us a call at 650.968.7227.

Well here is to my advice which is always free,  Ruf, Ruf,

Cayenne

Duke here and today it's all about safety, let's get started!

Today at Allied Auto Works, Duke wants to talk with you about a very important safety issue. This automotive safety warning is coming from a very unusual source: fire fighting experts. You’ve probably heard of E-85 gasoline being offered in the Los Altos area. Some newer vehicle models are specifically built to run on E-85 – the rest are not.

Does your vehicle use E-85 gasoline? Bring it down to Allied Auto Works at 2073 Grant Road in Los Altos, CA 94024 to find out, or give us a call to make an appointment by calling 650.968.7227.

E-85 gasoline has been developed to fight air pollution and reduce oil consumption. E-85 fuel is a mix of 85% ethanol, a grain-base alcohol, and 15% gasoline. So-called Flex-Fuel vehicles are designed to use either normal gasoline or E-85 gas. The result is lower harmful exhaust emissions to our local Los Altos community.

All gas engines can run with up to 10% ethanol and in fact a lot of gasoline sold in the Los Altos, CA area does contain some ethanol. The problem comes when well meaning drivers without Flex Fuel certified vehicles put E-85 into the tank.

At a 15% concentration, the potential for problems arises. Because of the chemical differences between ethanol and gasoline, special seals and gaskets are needed for Flex Fuel vehicles in Los Altos CA. In a normal engine, the ethanol in E-85 gas will eat away important seals and gaskets. This leads to gas and oil leaks.

You Los Altos car owners can imagine the fire hazard caused by leaking gasoline. CA fire fighting experts caution motorists to only use E-85 if they know they vehicle is certified to handle it. They expect vehicle fires to increase because of using the wrong fuel in non-Flex Fuel vehicles.

So are drivers who don’t have a Flex Fuel vehicle but use E-85 to help the environment actually putting themselves at risk? Yes. In fact, service and repair centers in Los Altos, CA are being warned to purchase fire extinguishers that use the special foam needed to extinguish ethanol fires as a precaution in case starting-up an ethanol damaged engine leads to a fire.

Obviously, this isn’t something you want to have in your Los Altos, CA garage at home, either. If you have a Flex-Fuel certified vehicle, feel free to protect the environment by using E-85 gasoline. If not – please do not use E-85 in an engine that’s designed to run on unleaded gasoline only. At Allied Auto Works we are concerned about your safety. If you have questions or want to find out how to determine if your vehicle can safely use E-85, go to www.e85fuel.com for more resources.

Take a look at Duke's attached auto safety tips video from Auto Tips Videos.

Now I feel safer already,

Duke