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 Obviously one hot topic around the country and I’m sure around the rest of the world is the price of fuel. It doesn’t take Einstein to realise that with prices edging upwards of $1.50 a litre owning and driving a car is turning into an expensive hobby! Honestly I think that the amount of tax we pay on fuel in this great country of ours is simply daylight robbery but I guess that is another issue for another day.

 So along with high fuel prices come people looking for ways to save themselves some money at the bowser. With that of course comes people and companies claiming that they have the answer for keeping more of your hard earned in your pocket.

 If you spend any amount of time on the internet you may have come across these websites claiming that it is possible to run your car on water. The skeptic and motor mechanic in me said “Yeah, right!” the first time I saw one of these sites. When you look past all the hype of the salespage you see that sure it is possible to supplement your vehicles fuel supply by extracting what is known as ‘Brown’s Gas’ or ‘hydroxy’ from water.

 So does it work? Are there any side effects, for your vehicle I mean, not you! Headaches, nausia? No seriously now, of course the people behind these products will have you believe that it is the answer to all the problems you have ever had but I want some hard facts, some solid figures. The best way to get these is to run a test and that is exactly what we are going to do.

 Luckily for us we have only one car that sees regular use, my wife has a real job where she often has to deliver meals from the local chicken shop whereas (according to her) I spend all day on my bum surfing the net and rarely have to venture out into the big, wide world. Hey, it’s not surfing it’s work! Anyway, Belinda’s car is a 1997 Toyota Camry, four cylinder 2.2 litre, automatic power house with almost 240,000km on the clock - way overdue for replacement but very well looked after none-the-less.

 For the purpose of this test we are going to track the fuel range we are getting from a full tank at the present, document it all on this site and then once this is done we will fit one of these miracle making kits and see what we get, once again over the range of a full tank. I have changed the spark plugs, oil and filter and cleaned the throttle body so we start off with a clean slate, so to speak. I will be monitoring the tyre pressures on a weekly basis to ensure that the results we get are as accurate as possible and as it is coming into winter here the air conditioning will only be used occasionly.

 The type of driving that will be done will be mostly city type driving, however we will do a couple of highway runs of equal distance to accurately compare the fuel usage. Here are the details of the first fill-up. Part Two of the base mileage test can be found here.

 55.90 Litres - Odometer Reading 237,158KM  
                                                                                                                                   

Run Your Car On Water - Part Two

Run Your Car On Water - First Drive

Run Your Car On Water - Quick Update

Run Your Car On Water - First Test Results

Run Your Car On Water - Quick Update No.2

Run Your Car On Water - Not EFI Friendly By A Long Shot

Craig

 To further extend the free auto repair advice that we have been offering for nearly two years now we have decided to launch the Autofix Advice Forum.

 Previously the advice we have been giving was through a contact form and subsequent emails back and forward, which was working well however I think the forum will offer more information from a wider range of people.

 My aim with the forum is to have a number of knowledgeable people on board with us to help answer your questions and of course other forum members will be able to offer their thoughts and opinions as well.

 One such person is Bret Youngs who is a motorcycle mechanic, 1st class welder and all round nice guy. Bret also has a back injury and is unable to work and as long as I can keep him interested he will be around to offer his expertise.

 The forum is in it’s infancy and looking pretty bare but I will be adding more categories and boards as needed and any feedback you have is more than welcomed.

 To post a question on the forum you are required to register first which only takes a few seconds and rest assured that you’re information will be kept strictly private.

 If you have an auto repair question that you would like answered or have a spare couple of minutes please head over to the Autofix Forum and let us know what you think.

Regards,

Craig

An interesting piece was published in The Courier Mail last week regarding a survey conducted by Choice Magazine. The results of the survey state that nine out of ten car dealer’s service centres missed a planted fault in a car they were servicing. Believe it or not, even the so called ‘experts’ can get it wrong! I know you would have never thought it possible.

Ford, Holden, Subaru and Toyota service dealers in Sydney were told by a driver she was about to travel interstate and wanted a minor service and safety check done on her car before she left.

Only three out of twenty-eight service centres used in the survey picked up four deliberately planted faults including a blown reverse light, low brake fluid, right rear tyre pressure twenty percent below the manufacturer’s recommended standard and a spare tyre with pressure reduced to ten psi.

Almost half of the service centres failed to notice the blown reverse light bulb, one in ten didn’t fill up the brake fluid and about eight in ten didn’t increase the pressure in the spare tyre.

Ford-branded service centres performed the worst and Toyota centres performed the best with all centres topping up the brake fluid and right rear tyre pressure.

The Choice report states that almost all of the service centres were independently owned with the parent company rarely having direct control over them.

However they’re supposed to meet certain obligations to the parent company, including some form of agreement to adhere to a code of standards, the report reads.

Not surprisingly, the report recommends that consumers should take recommendations rather than the word of a dealership badge when shopping around for car service.

Now I don’t know about you, but if my wife was about to take a long trip I would want to know that her car was in good shape and that she had the best chance of getting to her destination without any dramas. And where would you go to get the best possible service for your vehicle? Logic would say that taking your vehicle to the manufacturer’s dealership would be a wise choice, right?

Sure the mechanic doing the service is only human and things can get over-looked, but with only three out of twenty-eight service centres picking up on the faults I can’t see human error as a factor in this. Okay so the blown reverse light is hardly a life-threatening issue but the low brake fluid, reduced pressure in the right rear tyre and a spare tyre down to ten psi is something that has the potential to cause major problems.

You would think that with the hourly rate that these places are charging the level of service would be second to none. Eighty dollars an hour plus is commonplace with dealership service centres and what do you get for your money? Probably a first year apprentice on minimum money thinking about what he is going to do to his girlfriend tonight instead of concentrating on servicing your car.

Whatever you do people, please don’t think that just because you are doing the ‘right’ thing and taking your car to the dealership for servicing and paying a premium price that you are getting ‘premium’ service. As this study goes to show this simply may not be the case. Recommendations are by far the best way to find a competent, reasonably priced mechanic.

Craig