If you have a car then you will understand how large costs can seemingly crop up from nowhere, making a significant dent in your savings.
However, there are ways you can be proactive and prevent these expensive repairs and save money on repairs if something does go wrong.
Adjust your driving habits
There are many bad driving habits that we pick up following passing our tests, some of these are harmless but some can lead to a faster deterioration of your car and its parts.
1 – Riding the clutch: Driving while leaving your foot resting on the clutch causes the clutch disk to not make full contact with the flywheel and pressure plate, causing it to wear down faster. This will lead to the expensive cost of replacing your clutch disk and flywheel.
2 – Resting on the gears – Resting your hand on the gearstick between gear changes is a bad driving habit many of us have, however, this can lead to faster general wear and tear of your gear box or even snap the selector fork.
3 – Abrupt driving – This counts for both braking and accelerating. Abrupt acceleration will use more fuel, reduce the MPG of your car, and wear down the engine components faster than normal. Braking abruptly will wear down your brakes and require them to be changed more often, which will rack up the costs.
Do DIY car maintenance where possible
A great way to save money on car maintenance and repairs is by doing it yourself.
For those less experienced in car maintenance, getting a tyre swapped can cost up to £17 per tyre, costing a total of £68 for all four tyres (not including the price of the tyres). You can easily save almost £70 by changing the tyres yourself.
If you are on the more experienced side of automotive repairs, investing in an engine hoist can allow you to access the engine to work on it yourself. Investing in the tools necessary for more professional auto work can still be a fraction of the cost of some of the most expensive car repairs out there, with some engine repairs costing up to £7500.
Know your stuff when you need maintenance
When you take your car in to be serviced, it is important that you do your research, know what your car needs, and when different services are actually due.
Car dealerships can make up to 49.6% of their profits from their service and parts departments. With many car dealership employees working on a commission-based salary model, it is often in their interests to upsell you and sell you services and repairs that are not yet needed.
A common example is replacing brake pads when they still have 50% of the pad and another year of use left.
By looking in your car’s manual, you will find the correct increments of when parts should be replaced and serviced, as provided by the manufacturer. If you use this as a rough guide, you should be able to tell if you are being mis-sold repairs for your money.
