An expert mechanic with a lifelong love of cars reveals the three things people do that sometimes leads to mechanical disaster
Jean-Charles Dahout has lived in Singapore for more than six years, working as a Technical Specialist for Citroën at Cycle & Carriage, but his fascination with cars goes all the way back to childhood.
With his long experience in the workshop, he’s seen it all. Here he shares three ways that people abuse their cars, knowingly or otherwise...
Skipping oil changes
As a mechanic I find it hard to believe that some drivers would skimp on something so vital to the health of their cars, and yet so relatively inexpensive.
Lubricant is an engine’s main defence against wear and tear. It has so many important jobs: it reduces heat, prevents corrosion, absorbs impurities and most of all, manages friction.
Every time you run your engine, the lubricant degrades a little bit and loses its ability to do all those things.
I’ve seen total engine failure in cars just because their owners neglected a simple oil change — trying to save less than a hundred dollars on lubricant resulted in a workshop bill in the thousands.
My advice: Stick to the recommended servicing intervals, and use only oil that meets or surpasses the grade required by the manufacturer.
Abusing a cold engine
When a car has sat overnight, the engine’s lubricant tends to drain down into the oil sump. When you start the engine it takes a moment or two for the oil to be pumped around to the various areas where it’s needed. These few seconds actually account for the majority of an engine’s wear.
When the lubricant is cold, it’s also relatively thick and less free-flowing than when it’s up to working temperature.
So one of the worst things you can do to an engine is to rev it hard when it’s yet to reach its operating temp. When I see car in the workshop with worn piston rings, I tend to wonder if the owner is a habitual oversleeper, who starts up his car and then rushes off immediately to work!
My advice: You don’t have to sit in the carpark and warm the engine up, but try to drive as gently as you can until the engine reaches its operating temperature. Wait for the “cold” light to go off (it’s usually a blue light in the shape of a thermometer) or watch the temp gauge — you can drive when the needle is midway between the extremes of the instrument. In the absence of indications on the instrument cluster (some models have no temp. gauge), a 5-minute gentle drive is a safe precaution.
Fitting non-genuine parts
Not all parts are crucial to the safe running of a car, but there are some that really do matter. I can think of two offhand: the air and oil filters.
The air filter sifts out dust and particulates from the atmospheric air before it is fed into the engine. I’ve seen imitation filters fit so badly that they let dirty air slip through. This particle-filled air is terrible for an engine; the grit inside it can actually act like sandpaper and cause abrasions in the cylinder walls.
Likewise, the oil filter has to sift out dirt and sludge and keep it from blocking up the lubricant channels inside an engine. An imitation filter might not do the job properly and end up giving your mechanic all sorts of headaches.
Those are just two small parts, but the main principle is that a car works as a system of interacting and interconnected components. Genuine parts are important for that reason.
The same even applies to accessories. Some are designed with the manufacturer’s blessing and will interact perfectly with your car, and others may cause havoc with the electrical systems and so on — in a Citroën C4 Picasso there are about 40 computers that work on four different networks. It amazes me that someone would take the chance that an accessory from who-knows-where would play nicely with the car’s electronics. Factory approval is there to protect the customer.
My advice: Get your parts or accessories from an authorised distributor. It’s the only way to ensure that you are buying original or factory-approved items.
*ICE : Internal Combustion Engines
