Zentrucker.com

By Author: Everette Jamison
Article: Tires wear down over time. As they do, your ability to control your car erodes. Under normal circumstances (for example, driving at regular traffic speeds during dry weather conditions), that may not be a safety issue. However, inclement weather can cause slippery roads. One mistake behind the wheel can potentially send your vehicle skidding across the road without the ability to grip or provide traction.

It’s important to realize that the rubber on your treads is constantly wearing down. Driving creates friction between the rubber and the road; after prolonged use, they become worn. When they reach the halfway point, they become a safety issue. They endanger not only yourself, but other motorists. Below, we’ll explore the danger that worn treads can represent and the effects of their wearing down. I’ll also provide a few tips that you can use to check your car’s tires.

Understanding The Potential Danger

As noted, normal weather isn’t nearly as dangerous as wet weather. But, when the roads become wet, the moisture on them can cause hydroplaning. New wheels have rubber in which deep grooves are set. The moisture on the road goes into the grooves, allowing your tires to touch and grip the road.

Now, imagine that you’re driving on treads where the grooves are half worn away. Because the grooves are worn – and thus, shallower – the moisture does not seep into them as deeply. That limits the ability of your tires to gain traction on the road. In sudden stop situations, hydroplaning is practically unavoidable. That can cause your vehicle to careen into other drivers, or worse, pedestrians.

The Effects Of Wearing

When your wheels wear down, they can cause a number of problems, especially in rainy or snowy weather. For example, when you’re driving in the snow, the grooves in your wheels allow them to bite into the surface, increasing their grip. Worn treads reduce this grip. Also, your car has an increased tendency to hydroplane at lower speeds. The shallower the grooves are, the less capable they are of channeling the water; therefore, the less grip your tires can maintain on the road.

Tips For Improving Your Safety

Millions of drivers routinely check their car’s oil and even the air pressure, but fail to inspect the level of wearing in their treads. It’s easy to do; a reliable way to measure requires a penny. Insert the penny inside the grooves with Lincoln’s head facing down. If any of the grooves are not deep enough to partially hide Lincoln’s head, the treads have worn down too far. Even if the topmost portion of his head is submerged in the crevice, the rubber will have already lost some of its road-gripping ability.

Spending money to replace one or more of your tires may not be pleasant, but doing so can protect you, your passengers, and other drivers from a collision. Syndication Source: ThoughtSearch.com For all your used Ford engines and used Ford transmissions needs consider the leader in parts, http://www.everdrive.com

By Author: Joshua Ferris
Article: When I bought my 2008.5 Mazda3 the first thing I noticed was the huge horse whip style antenna jumping off the roof of the car. I’m not much of an AM/FM radio aficionado and with optional satellite radio or an iPod in tow there isn’t a whole lot of reason to be but for important traffic updates and local news it can’t be beat.

The shark fin works as a sleek, compact replacement for your stock horse whip antenna and is extremely easy to install. We did hit a few snags though so read on to see how we did it and what not to do.

What You’ll Need

1. Flat Head Screw Driver (Optional)
2. Painter’s Tape or Masking Tape
3. Isopropyl Rubbing Alcohol (We used 70% and definitely recommend sticking at 70% rather than the more potent 98%)
4. For Waxed Cars Only – 3M General Purpose Adhesive Cleaner or 3M Prep Solvent 70 or Dawn dish soap (liquid)
5. Hair Dryer (Heat Guns are too powerful and will damage your paint!)
6. A stool of some kind (Unless you are tall enough to reach over the Mazda3 and push down on the middle.)

1. The first thing you are going to do is unscrew the Elroy Jetson style antenna from its base. The antenna is all one piece so it should come right off.

Okay, this is where we goofed it up a little bit. The picture above still has the antenna on while we were applying the rubbing alcohol. I don’t think it really matters whether the antenna is on or off when you apply the rubbing alcohol but we were very eager to get started so it’s on in the pic above.

2. Apply the rubbing alcohol using a paper towel or blue shop towel and wipe the entire surface where your shark fin antenna will be. Don’t use cotton balls or cotton pads because, as we learned above, it leaves streams of cotton everywhere.

Note: For waxed cars, you’ll want to use the 3M General Purpose Adhesive Cleaner/3M Prep Solvent 70 or Dawn liquid dish soap first to remove the wax from the install area. Then use the Isopropyl Rubbing Alcohol to go over the same surface again and let it dry.

Before planning the location of your shark fin make sure there is no left over residue or other elements (dirt, dust etc.) on the install area because it will lessen the integrity of the double-sided adhesive gasket on the bottom of the shark fin.

3. Place the shark fin over the antenna base and approximate the position over the antenna connection site. The reason you want to be as exact as possible is that you are positioning the shark fin so that you can place painter’s tape (or masking tape) around all four sides and not have to re-align it when you want to connect the shark fin to the antenna base. Once you are satisfied with the positioning of the shark fin, proceed to step four.

4. Place painter’s tape around the shark fin starting with the front of the shark fin and then moving to the back. Then place painter’s tape on the left and right of the shark fin.

Note: We used just one piece of painter’s tape to make sure the front end was where it needed to be. If you want absolute precise alignment we recommend placing the tape over the front of the shark fin in two – three pieces in a triangular configuration.

5. Peel back the pre-slit paper on the underlying adhesive gasket from the back. It’s sliced right in the middle of the back so you can pull it away (carefully!!) to a little ways past the corners of the back of the shark fin. You are doing this because you will start the final placement of your shark fin in just a few short minutes!

There are two attachment screws provided, dubbed M5 & M6, that should fit your antenna base quite nicely. Inside the shark fin antenna there is a coiled up connector that you will use to connect your shark fin antenna to the antenna base. Refer to the photo above where you will see how we connected the cord to the antenna base using the larger of the two screws and did so with our fingers rather than using a flat tip screw driver. The instructions caution against over tightening so we’d recommend leaving the screwdriver in the garage for this one.

Tip: Tilt the back of the shark fin towards the antenna base to ensure enough slack while the fin is being connected.

Before mounting the shark fin you need to make sure the part of the roof that it will be placed on is at room temperature. We opted not to use a hair dryer because it was about 70 degrees out and the sun was going down. In hindsight we would probably use the hair dryer anyway because our shark fin pops up a little bit in the front meaning it didn’t bond well up there. I doubt it had anything to do with the adhesive gasket and more to do with the temperature of the roof.

6. Use a hair dryer to get your install area on the roof to room temperature. Be careful and do not focus the hair dryer in any one spot of the roof to avoid damaging your car’s paint.

7. Remove your adhesive paper completely and prepare to mount the antenna.

8. Visually align the front of the shark fin to the pieces of tape used in Step 4 and between the two side pieces. Do not press down on the adhesive gasket yet (this is sticky stuff!) and make sure the shark fin is aligned properly on all four sides. I was the camera guy so I checked it from all four sides while my installer realigned the shark fin as needed.

9. Once you’re aligned properly press down firmly on the the front of the shark fin for about a minute. It is absolutely crucial that you press the front down first.

10. Now that the front of the shark fin is mounted you can simply hold down the rear of the shark fin for about a minute (hold firmly!) and then remove the masking tape.

Success! The shark fin has been installed!

That’s all there is to it!

Initial Impressions: The shark fin actually improved my local radio reception and I’ve been pretty happy with it thus far. I’m disappointed that the front end didn’t bond as well as it should have but I think that might have been user error. After all, we didn’t have this guide of dos and donts to follow when we installed it.

Final Thoughts: If you are into aesthetics or perhaps better radio reception I would definitely recommend that you pick up a shark fin. It’s more of an aesthetic treatment rather than an AM/FM booster but I certainly appreciate not having a bumper car-like wand whipping around on top of my car while I’m on the highway.

Disclaimer: This install guide was created to help you along in a visual way and to review what we learned from our experience of installing it for the first time but you should still study the install procedure sent in the shipping box. It’s very thorough and might cover a few things we omitted in our guide. Syndication Source: ThoughtSearch.com To learn more about the Mazda 3, Mazdaspeed 3 or to meet other Mazda3/Mazdaspeed3 enthusiasts, please visit our Mazda 3 Forums.

By Author: Everette Jamison
Article: Your vehicle’s spark plugs play a key role in starting your car. They produce the spark necessary to crank the engine. The problem is that they wear down over time. After hundreds of thousands of sparks, the electrodes deteriorate, widening the chasm that the spark needs to jump. Eventually, you’ll begin to have problems starting your car. Oddly, millions of drivers never think to replace them until they start having problems. Today, you’ll learn 3 reasons why you should change them before they fail.

Reason 1: Better Performance

Every time your car misfires, it wastes fuel, releases more emissions, and suffers a mild reduction in power. Spark plugs in good working condition prevent misfires from happening. But, as I mentioned above, they deteriorate slowly over time, allowing more and more misfires. After awhile, the declining efficiency can have a significant impact on your car’s performance. When you replace the plugs, your vehicle stops misfiring and enjoys increased efficiency and improved performance.

Reason 2: Reduces Cold Start Problems

If you live in an area with cold weather, your car has to work harder to start. A lot of times, the problem with cold starting lies with the spark plugs. Cold weather can make it difficult for them to produce the necessary spark, especially if they’re dirty around the electrodes. You’ll find that replacing them with new ones will all but eliminate cold starting problems. Plus, the new plugs won’t need the ignition system to generate as much voltage for the spark.

Reason 3: Protects Catalytic Converter

If you remember, bad spark plugs lead to misfires. And when your car misfires, a small bit of fuel gets dumped into the exhaust. When that happens, it can cause the catalytic converter to overheat because the temperature at which it has to operate skyrockets. If the converter fails, a blockage can develop in the exhaust, choking off the engine. That will slash your engine’s power and significantly reduce the fuel economy of your car. If you just replace the converter, the same thing can happen. The problem is with the spark plugs, so resolving the issue means replacing them.

Replacing Them

Even if you’re using the type that last for 100,000 miles, get into the habit of changing them every 30,000. Remember, when they wear down, they can cause problems even if they don’t fail (bad fuel efficiency, low engine power, etc.). Changing them every 30,000 miles helps ensure those problems don’t happen. Besides, they’re inexpensive and simple to replace. If you don’t want to do the job yourself, most mechanics can do it cheaply and quickly. Syndication Source: ThoughtSearch.com For all your used auto parts and used engines visit http://www.everdrive.com