by Jeffrey Sammerson

Created on: September 13, 2007   Last Updated: October 15, 2011

Most times when you think you need a major repair, you can end up with sticker shock with the estimates that you get from some garages. When I feel I have a problem with my car, I try to avoid garages at all costs for anything except emission tests and inspections. If you don't know how to fix cars or are intimidated by garages and believe whatever they tell you, I hope this can help. If you have any reason to believe that something is wrong with your car, these are the steps that I would take.

First off, what is the reason you think you have a problem? Diagnosing the problem yourself can save a lot of money, with just a little bit of time and energy. Sometimes you may take your car to garage for a diagnosis and they don't find anything, so you just wasted some money. So if you do find what the problem is yourself, you can then decide to have at the repair yourself, or take it to a garage. At least this way, you can call the garages to get a ballpark price on the repair.

Let's start with noises. Was the noise a squeak? Squeaking is most likely the cheapest fix. You have to ask yourself where was the squeaking coming from. Squeaks normally come from two major places, the tires or under the hood. Squeaks coming from the tire region is most likely your brakes, which should be able to be fixed for around $100 at a garage. If you decide to fix this one yourself, it'll cost you about $25-$30 and an hours worth of time.

Now let's talk about that squeak coming from under your hood. If you have this problem, it could be a little more tricky. The first thing I would check is the belt. Most new cars only have one belt. Push on it to see if it is overly loose. If you push down on the belt it should only move about a half an inch or so.

Anything more than that would produce a high pitched squeal at start up and/or around turns. Also, be sure to check your power steering fluid. Any garage should be able to fix squeaks for a minimal cost. If you followed those steps and decided that it is not the belt, the next culprit to me would be a pulley. You probably have a bad bearing, and in that case I would start with three estimates. One from a big name garage, one from a medium size garage and one from a small community/mom & pop garage.

Normally the big name places like Midas or Mieneke and others like that work on commission. So they are more likely try to replace things that don't necessarily need replaced. That doesn't mean they do bad work. They will fix your problem

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