Engine Maintenance Mistake 1 – Failure to maintain your car engine on time
People generally like to spend a lot of money on tuning, but it’s easy to overlook scheduled engine maintenance. According to experienced auto mechanics, poor engine maintenance accounts for 50 percent of the total failures in the cars they handle repairs. It can be seen that the maintenance of the engine can play a vital role in prolonging the service life of the vehicle.
Reminder: During the period of regular maintenance, it is not only necessary to maintain the engine, but also to perform some inspection and maintenance on the relevant parts of the engine when driving in some particularly humid or dusty areas.
Engine Maintenance Mistake 2 – Blindly dismantling the engine thermostat
If the thermostat is blindly removed because the engine temperature is high, the coolant can only be widely circulated, and the cooling intensity cannot be adjusted, making it difficult to ensure that the engine works at a suitable temperature. Conversely, the engine is often operated at low temperatures, resulting in reduced engine power, accelerated wear and increased fuel consumption. If the engine temperature is still high after the engine thermostat is repaired or replaced, other parts of the cooling system should be repaired, and the thermostat cannot be removed.
Engine Maintenance Mistake 3 – Engine Idle Temperature Rise
When idling heats up, due to the low speed, the oil pump cannot quickly press the lubricating oil into the lubricating surface, and the oil pressure is also low, so that the moving parts of the engine work in a state of dry friction or semi-dry friction. Due to poor fuel atomization at low temperatures, unburned fuel rushes into the crankcase and washes away the oil film on the cylinder wall, which also accelerates the wear of parts. Therefore, after the engine is started for a few seconds, the engine should be warmed up at a fast idle speed to improve the lubrication condition of the engine.
Engine Maintenance Mistake – The engine temperature is neither afraid of high nor low.
Some people think that the engine temperature is not afraid of high or low when driving. In fact, when the engine temperature is low, it is also very harmful. The service life of the engine can be guaranteed only when the vehicle is driven at the normal temperature specified in the car’s instruction manual.
Engine Maintenance Mistake 5 – Baking the Oil Bottom with a Blowtorch
Using a blowtorch to bake the bottom of the oil in winter will not only chemically change the additives in the oil and lose their original properties, but also deform the oil cement and the bottom of the oil, which is easy to cause fire. The best way is to choose the right oil according to the local minimum temperature in winter. Where possible, it is best to park the car in a garage with thermal insulation.
Engine Maintenance Mistake 6 – The tighter the pump fan belt, the better.
If the belt is too tight, it will not only stretch or break, shorten the service life of the belt, but also cause the generator shaft and water pump shaft to deform and bend, and the bearings will be damaged early due to excessive tension. The tightness of the fan belt of the automobile engine should meet the technical requirements. In general, the deflection of a common belt assembly is 10-15 mm.
Engine Maintenance Mistake 7 – Deteriorated car oil, bad oil filter
The oil quality of different grades of lubricating oils will change during use. After a certain mileage (parameters, pictures, inquiries), the performance will deteriorate, which may bring various problems to the engine. In order to avoid these failures, the oil should be changed regularly according to the usage, and the amount of oil should be moderate. It is generally best to be between the upper and lower limits of the oil gauge.
Reminder: Don’t add less oil, but don’t add more. It’s not that the more expensive the brand-name synthetic motor oil is, the better the oil for your car is.
Engine Maintenance Mistake 8 – Air Filter Blockage
The air intake system of an automobile engine is mainly composed of an air filter element and an intake pipe. Depending on the usage, the air filter element should be cleaned regularly. The available method is to blow high-pressure air from the inside out to blow the dust out of the filter element. Since the air filter element is made of paper, it is necessary to pay attention to the air pressure when blowing to avoid damage to the filter element. Under normal circumstances, the air filter element needs to be replaced with a new one after being cleaned three times. The cleaning cycle can be determined according to the air quality in the daily driving area.
Engine Maintenance Myth 9 – The intake pipe is too dirty
If the vehicle is often driven in a road area with a lot of dust and poor air quality, you should pay attention to cleaning the air intake pipe to ensure smooth air intake. The intake pipe is very important to the normal operation of the engine. If the intake pipe is too dirty, it will lead to a drop in efficiency, making the engine unable to operate within the normal output power range, and increasing the wear and aging of the engine.
Engine Maintenance Mistake 10 – Too Much Sludge in the Crankcase
When the engine is running, the high-pressure unburned gas, acid, moisture, sulfur and nitrogen oxides in the combustion chamber enter the crankcase through the gap between the piston ring and the cylinder wall, where they mix with the metal powder produced by the wear of the parts to form sludge. A small amount of sludge can be suspended in the oil. When the equivalent is large, it will precipitate out of the oil, block the filter and oil holes, make the engine difficult to lubricate, and aggravate engine wear. In addition, when the oil is oxidized at high temperature, it will form paint film and carbon deposits, and stick to the piston, increase fuel consumption and reduce engine power. In severe cases, the piston rings will be blocked and the cylinder will be pulled.
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