3 ways to prepare your car for the winter
Winter is here, so lets prepare our cars for these cold snowy seasons ahead.
Checking our tire tread during the winter months is very important, a combination of worn tires and winter conditions tend to equal out in a dangerous circumstances. Making sure you have a good pair of tires on your car increases your stopping distance and decreases your stability on wet roads. You can try and slid past winter with low treads on the tires....but that's all you'll be doing....sliding. A single skid into the curb at 5MPH can easily cause $1,500 worth of damage to suspension and steering components. Sure, insurance covers it. But you’ll have to pay the deductible and it counts as an at-fault accident, raising your premiums for years. For about the cost of a single deductible, you can buy new tires or install snow tires to avoid those slip-and-slide accidents. To check the depth of your tread, use an inexpensive tire tread depth gauge. Check the tread depth at the center and outer edges of each tire. Winter tires could save your life. Winter tires, also known as snow tires because of the snowflake on their sidewall, provide much more traction on snow, getting you started 33 percent faster from a stop sign and reducing your stopping distance by almost 30-feet compared to all-season tires. Winter tires even perform better on ice, stopping you 48 percent faster and reducing side skid in turns. With better stopping distance and handling in turns, winter tires can prevent a potential at-fault accident. If your collision deductible sits in the $500 to $1,000 range, winter tires could actually pay for themselves in a single season if they keep you out of an accident.
2.Check your coolant
Engine coolant does more than protect your engine from freezing and cracking. Coolant also contains anti-corrosive additives and water-pump lubricants to keep your entire cooling system in tip-top shape.
Test the level of your coolant’s freeze protection using an inexpensive tester. Suck in some coolant from the coolant reservoir and read the results on the scale printed on the tester. But don’t stop there. Just because coolant tests OK for freeze protection doesn’t mean the additives still provide protection. To check that, you’ll need a digital multimeter. Begin with a cold engine. Remove the radiator cap and start the engine. Set your digital multimeter to DC volts at 20 volts or less. When the engine reaches operating temperature, insert the positive probe directly into the coolant. Rev the engine to 2,000 rpm and place the negative probe on the negative battery terminal. If the digital meter reads .4 volts or less, your coolant is in good condition. A reading greater than .4 volts shows the additives are exhausted, and you may be in the market for a new radiator, a water pump or a heater core. All of those repairs cost far more than a simple coolant change.
3. Winter wiper blades
Standard wiper blades get packed with snow, causing the blade to streak or miss large swaths of your windshield. Winter wiper blades eliminate that problem. A rubber boot encloses the entire blade, preventing ice and snow from sticking or packing. They make for much better visibility and safer winter driving. Remove your old wiper blades and store for use again next spring. Then snap on the winter wiper blades and see clearly all winter.
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