There's the chip.
If you've been driving behind a truck carrying stones, looking for a way to drive through traffic and get out of harm's way, you're definitely irritated when one of the rocks slips out and comes down on your windshield, chipping it slightly. Even if you know a lot about cars, this inconvenience seems like a waste of time and money to get fixed, especially since it feels like it never should have happened. But thinking about the problem won't fix the chip. Here's how a chip in your windshield can be fixed.
First, remember that fixing chips in your windshield is usually best left to professionals. Unless you've fixed chips before, this article will only serve as a demonstration of how chips are fixed by technicians who know how to work with glass. Even though glass is all around us in our daily lives, it is still a highly fragile and brittle material that can easily form into sharp edges that can do a lot of damage to someone who's not being cautious.
Glass professionals will be able to drill into your glass windshield and apply some sort of vacuum pressure to prepare the area. The professional will then inject resin into the windshield, which will work to fill the affected area as if the glass was always there. Once this has been injected, it is cured by ultraviolet light and then scraped smooth.
This is ideally what happens, but not always how it goes down. A chip present in a windshield means that there's a strong possibility the glass can crack, causing further damage to the windshield and making a total replacement necessary. That's why your chip repair costs can be higher than you expected - not because anyone is ripping you off, but because of the fragile nature of glass. If you could work with glass, you would probably understand the complications that often arise in glass repair. It's often best to simply replace glass instead of repairing it.
Now that you know a little more about the chip in your windshield, you should try to strive for better prevention. Stay clear of debris-stirring or carrying trucks that might drop a stone on your windshield. If you're careful about how you drive, you should be able to avoid a chip in your windshield.
Once you do notice a chip in your windshield, be sure to have it taken care of as quickly as you can. Be sure to ask professionals for advice about what to do before you take the car in for treatment.
Photo Credits: Lee Bennett
Originally posted 2009-08-03 03:51:22.
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Posted by Fix Handyman on August 9, 2010 in
Car, How to Fix, Mechanic
Auto Repair at Home vs. The Car Shop
If you've ever looked under the hood of your car and thought "I think I can learn this," then you might be the kind of do-it-yourself-er who enjoys a good challenge. But does that mean you should always take your auto repairs into your own hands, or will you still want to check out a good local auto repair shop that can handle your problems with less trouble? The answer to that question will depend on your car, its problems, and yourself. Let's take a look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of repairing your car at home.
First, repairing a car at home can be a great learning experience. It's one thing to look at a book that supposedly teaches you how to repair cars, but if you really want to build experience, there's no substitute for the real thing. Minor repairs that can be easily fixed can give you a great introduction to auto maintenance - and you couldn't learn these things if you took your car to the shop every single time there was a minor problem. Remember that learning should be a proactive experience, and in order for that to be the case, you'll have to sometimes take matters into your own hands.
This, of course, doesn't guarantee immediate success. Maybe you stay at home and keep your car over the weekend to try to fix a minor running problem, but when you make no progress, you find that Monday has rolled around again and you've made no progress. At this point, will you wished you'd have gone to the auto repair shop? If so, then you probably should have taken it to the shop in the first place.
But even when you're met with short-term obstacles, your attitude will largely determine your degree of success with your car. If your failure is just another reason for you to give up on something you wanted to learn, then that's what you'll treat it as, and that will become the reality. But if you want to really learn cars inside and out, you might be fine getting a taxi to work for a few days or bumming a ride off of someone else until you can figure things out on your own. Sometimes an education is worth that kind of price.
Remember that even when you want to challenge yourself, it's not always recommended that you try to fix your car problems yourself. If you think that a problem is beyond your skills and simply would be too time-consuming to take care of, there's plenty of reason to bring it in to the auto repair shop. You can ask plenty of questions if you still want to learn about auto repair and ask them what they did to improve your car's performance.
Photo Credits: Teosaurio
Originally posted 2009-07-28 05:42:35.
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Posted by Fix Handyman on June 20, 2010 in
Car, How to Fix
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