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Everyone who owns a car knows how important it is to do maintenance on a regular basis. If you don't do maintenance, your car will cost you a lot of money that, in this economy, most of us do not have to spend. Things like checking your tire pressure, checking and changing your oil regularly, cleaning your air filter and fuel system can make your car run better and even get you better mileage as well. The question, however, is whether you should do your maintenance yourself or leave it to the trained professionals at the local dealership or garage.

If it's a matter doing something as simple as checking the tire pressure, the fluid levels and cleaning the air filter, it's a do it yourself job. Almost every gas station or auto parts store carries tire pressure gauges right on their front counters and most places that have the air station have one built into their air machine. To check fluid levels, you just pull the dipstick, wipe it off on a cloth and put it back in get the level then look to see if it's within the marks. Cleaning an air filter couldn't be any easier, either. Pull it out, take a brush and gently brush it clean and put it back. Simple right?

Now, if it's a matter of changing the oil or fuel system maintenance, my personal preference is to leave it to the trained experts. Why do I feel that way? My father was a mechanic for many years and I spent as much time as I could in the garage with him and learned. I learned that it's very easy to screw up the most vital systems in your vehicle if you're not exceptionally careful. Now, cars have all these electronic and computerized systems that make them even more sensitive and easy to break. We're paying a significant amount of money for a car, why would we want to break that car by doing maintenance that we're not trained to do.

The problem, however, is that garages tend to overcharge the customers for simple maintenance. They also try to find other things that are wrong with your car in order to scare you into getting them fixed and spending more money. My recommendation is that you never do more than you took your car in for. For instance, if you took your car in to have your brakes checked, do not do anything more than have them checked. Let them tell you what they think is wrong with the car, take notes if you can, get a printed estimate, then leave. Take your notes and estimate home with you and call other garages, tell them what you were told is wrong and get an estimate. Once you have a few estimates, lay them out side by side and see which is best for you.

Take your time to care for your car and your car will care for you, but be wise and don't try to do more than you are personally capable of doing. Let the experts earn their money and do the maintenance that you're not equipped to do.

Learn more about this author, Margaret Kerr.
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