Spring Car Maintenance Tips

Once your car has made it through the long, dark days of winter, you may well feel like you are out of the woods, and there is no need to do much in the way of maintenance. However, it is a mistake to get into this way of thinking as it can end up meaning that your car is not protected for the spring season ahead of you. To address this particular issue, here is a series of spring car maintenance tips that you will hopefully find seriously useful.

Double Check the Battery

One of the most common issues that continue to go wrong after the winter months is directly related to the car battery. Excessive temperatures can end up shortening its life, which is exacerbated if you have not driven your car much during the winter months of the year. So, it is worth checking the battery’s fluid levels to ensure that they are all properly topped up. If this is not required due to the modernity of the car battery, you should at least check it for any signs of corrosion or leakage of battery acid. While you are at it, if you are not currently driving around with a set of jumper cables in your trunk, now is the time to think about changing all this and getting a pair to help you out in an emergency.

Get Ready for Specialty Repair Needs

Sometimes you’ll need specialty repair instead of regular maintenance work on your car. For example, if you live in Colorado Springs, an area notorious for heavy hail in late spring and summer seasons, it might be worth looking into hail damage repair in Colorado Springs before your car has been damaged. Because once it hails, everyone in the neighborhood will need auto hail repair, and most body shops will have a waitlist to deal with the peaked demand. If you research and get to know a specialty hail repair shop now, this makes it much easier when you actually need that repair work.

Check the Tire Pressure

This is another job related to cars which people simply do not complete enough. Again, this is particularly relevant if your vehicle has been sitting around for an extended period of time during the winter months of the year. Remember, you should get into the habit of checking the tire pressure before every single extended journey that you take. You also need to do it if the weight of the vehicle is likely to change. As well as being a good general maintenance car tip, this can also help to ensure that you are using your fuel in a more economical manner.

Assess the Air Conditioning System

While the air conditioning may not be immediately necessary during the spring months of the year, it is much more likely to become relevant and useful when the hotter summer months rock around. Most manufacturers recommend that all A/C units should be regassed every couple of years. You should also get into the habit of using the system on a regular basis throughout the course of the year. The fluid is there to lubricate the washers and the seals in the system. If it is not used for an extended period, this can mean that the gas can leak. As you would expect, this is bound to be a much more expensive and difficult problem to put right further down the line.

Check All the Fluid Levels

While the fluid is a necessary part of a car, far too few vehicle owners know about maintaining the levels properly. So, if you have not learned how to check the oil for any reason, now is the time to brush up on these skills. Similarly, you need to make sure that both the brake fluid and the windscreen washer fluid are properly topped up. Of course, these are the things that you do not realize you need until it is too late, so you are much better off sorting out this issue sooner rather than later!

While there are all sorts of different maintenance tasks that could be discussed in a greater level of detail, these are just a few of them that can end up making a big difference to the running of your vehicle. So, if you have found one or two that you have been overlooking for too long, now is the time to put this right. This way, your vehicle is more likely to keep running smoothly right the way through until the time that the next winter rolls around again.