Car Life Hacks thread

[Marky]

Everyone has their life hacks they use for car stuff, and some of them are fcking genius and you may just assume everyone knows it already

For example: T pieces, you can buy them for $5 each at stuporcheap, or you can spend 50c at mitre ten in the gardening dept for the same thing

Hose clamps: $5 each at Repco, or $10 for a 10 pack at most plumbing supply places

Silicon joiners: Want to cut one smoothly? Use a -wet- craft knife, just plain old water. Slides right through them rather than the horrific hack job most end up with

Solid mounts: Spend big $ on fancy gear, plan B is windscreen urethane - it is very pliable out of the gun, but goes rock hard in minutes, voila you now have that solid gearbox or north-south mount you always wanted (useful on FWD's or mitsi's)

Share yours - go on I showed you some of mine

[Joker]

Don't have a big bunch of keys on your ring, flogs out the ignition over time

if you see the oil light STOP

[ADIKT]

Working on/under your car alone? No1 home?

Keep your phone on you or close by incase you **** up and have a gearbox on your leg.

[boon]

Chop the bottom off a 1.5L coke bottle (wash it well) to make a quick disposable funnel for oil/coolant/misc fluids

[ADIKT]

 boon said:

Chop the bottom off a 1.5L coke bottle (wash it well) to make a quick disposable funnel for oil/coolant/misc fluids

Can even re-use it for a 'bucket bong'

[lachlan]

repco is a fkn waste of time . go to supercheap and buy what you want . aslong as you can get it without asking the people .

[megamac]

ripco lol bunch of scam artists

[SpeedySub]

 megamac said:

ripco lol bunch of scam artists

Yip, had to buy some front suspension bushes for the missus mazda, Ripco said they were $190, BNt $46 + gst (and she ended up getting them cheaper). Also they qouted $1200 for head gasket set for my old Mk2 mondeo, I could get a set on ebay for undr $300 delivered.

Also the hack for the solid mounts is a common one in the UK for fixing damaged mondeo engine mounts, the use something called tiger seal (I think)

[Disruptz]

get a oil drain valve also get one for the radiator drain, then you can connect a hose and drain it neatly into a bucket rather than ****ing every where.

[rocker]

If you don't mind spending more time at the gas station, but you want to save money, only fill your car half full. Half a tank of gas weighs over 25kg and lugging that around actually affects your fuel economy. But don't let your tank get too low otherwise it'll pull all the crap out of the bottom of the tank through the fuel filter.

Also, when you do fill, make sure you fill enough so that you get the maximum loyalty points. E.g. if your card gives you loyalty points at $20, $40, $60 dollars, etc, don't put $50 in because then you've spent $10 for no loyalty points; you'd get the same number of points as putting $40 in. (Note: not all loyalty points schemes work the same way).

[Zenki]

Change oil regularly? Get one of these. (Lisle 63600) Paired with the right extensions and a 3/8" drive ratchet, it will get the spin-on oil filter off just about everything.

Like this thing; (Toyota JZ - depending on the particular car, ranges from "somewhat difficult" to "I wish I had smaller arms")

This thing: (Some Nissan SRs, especially in transverse FWD applications causing the filter to be stuffed into a weird space between the brake booster and strut tower - because Nissan)

Especially this thing: (NA EJ253, A.K.A "burning ring of fire")

[Guest]

What are those headers? Twin to single scroll?

[Percy]

One Litre Castrol oil bottles will screw into a Subaru oil filler neck.

Cut the bottom out, and Bam one "factory" oil filler funnel that wont blow/ slip/ spill oil all over the place.

No charge for that one, other than buying the one litre of oil in the first place.

[Joker]

I always screw em in to get every last drop out of the bottle

[lachlan]

Clutch rebuilds will grind a flywheel for **** all . 50 to do a flywheel and cage for twin plate . 40 to do a standard flywheel . All round general good guy . Will build performance clutches etc . Said he often solves problems for bnt lol . And dont even mention those two other bs clutch places in chch

[Joker]

[B4 I was 250T]

0000 grade steel wool removes rain spots on glass fantastically well. Just make sure you get all the fragments of steel wool off later or you end up with little rust spots on your paint. Also Jif is fantastic for cleaning headlights

[STiNGR]

What a great thread! Nice marky!

[Clam129]

Breaks at super cheap/ repco that are normally $53, could be found at Sta parts for $26 quality isn't too bad either Imo.

 

Edited October 18, 2016 by Clam129

[ADIKT]

15 minutes ago, Clam129 said:

Breaks at super cheap/ repco that are normally $53, could be found at Sta parts for $26 quality isn't too bad either Imo.

 

Brake pads? 

[boyracer693]

Autosol also removes water spots pretty good 

 

Go into any Supercheap and ask for a Trade Cash Card. Will give you an instant 10% discount everytime you use the card on stocked and ordered items. And you get awesome trade deals too

[Andy_Mac]

Is the trade cash card the same as their club card or whatever it is? They always ask if i've got one but never actually bothered looking into it.

[SpeedySub]

37 minutes ago, Andy_Mac said:

Is the trade cash card the same as their club card or whatever it is? They always ask if i've got one but never actually bothered looking into it.

I have a club card, one good thing about it is if you purchase something and then it goes on sale within a certain time frame they will credit you the difference to the card.

[Clam129]

6 hours ago, ADIKT said:

Brake pads? 

Yeah, I'm not sure if they do ceramics probably do but if you're looking for a cheap break pad that'll do the job well then check out STA parts 

[Joker]

I'm sure its purely semantics & being pedantic but I thinks its more to do with your spelling

 

brake =/= Break

 

tomatoes / potatoes however you want to say it, the spelling is differnce etc

 

same with guttered / gutted, one carried water, the other is your guts being ripped out, or a stink feeling