Boulder Auto Repair

You’re looking to travel the open road again and make some new memories. But you aren’t sure if your car is up for the task.  It’s been pulling to one side on straight, level roads, and your steering wheel is vibrating when you hit 50 mph.  It’s obvious something isn’t right with your car, but what could the problem be?  A trained auto mechanic can tell you right away that your car most likely needs a wheel alignment and balancing.  But what is the difference? Wheel balancing is a service that is performed more often than a wheel alignment.  When a car’s wheel gets off-balance and one part of the wheel is heavier than another part–even if that difference is only one ounce–it will cause vibrating.  Typically wheels in the front cause vibrations in the steering wheel and wheels in the back will cause vibrations in the seat. Unbalanced wheels will cause the tires to wear unevenly, eventually ... read more

While we often think to switch to snow tires during the winter, there are also advantages of using summer tires for car travel. This is particularly important if you are going on a road trip and are unfamiliar with the climates you will be driving through. Summer-performance tires are not made for use on snow and ice. They are designed to handle driving on slick, wet surfaces as well as dry ones. Tire designers balance these safety qualities with a smooth ride and noise reduction. What differentiates summer tires from snow and all season tires is grip. Compound, or the rubber that makes up treads, is what determines traction. A soft, sticky compound grips both dry and wet roads better. Summer tires loose this flexibility in the cold. The pattern itself, or the grooves in the tire, is what helps prevent hydroplaning. Shallow water can cause your car to loose contact with the road surface, resulting in a loss of control. The grooves on summer tires allow water to flow through them mor ... read more

Hello, welcome to John’s Auto Care. Today’s focus is batteries. It seems like everything in Boulder runs on batteries. Of course, the batteries we’re most concerned with here at John’s Auto Care are those in our customer’s vehicles. Just like the batteries in our smoke detectors or TV remote, car batteries wear out and need to be replaced. There are a couple of things Boulder drivers should know when looking for a new battery. Look for two measurements that come into play: cold cranking amps and reserve capacity. Let’s start with cold cranking amps. This can be thought of as the power output used to start a cold family car engine. The number of cold cranking amps you need depends on your vehicle and where you live in CO, specifically how cold it is. (Many CO auto owners have first-hand experience trying to start their car on a cold winter morning.) The two fac ... read more

Eldorado Springs auto owners may have an alignment problem if their car drifts or pulls to one side, the steering wheel’s off center, they notice uneven tire wear or the car doesn’t feel like it handles right as they drive down Boulder, CO streets and highways. When all of a vehicle’s wheels are lined up exactly with each other, your wheels are in alignment. Running into potholes, smacking a curb or other objects around Boulder, CO are great ways for Boulder drivers to knock their car out of alignment. Then one or more of your wheels starts pulling in a slightly different direction and the problems begin.The team at John’s Auto Care in Boulder wants you to know that driving for an extended time when your car is out of alignment causes your tires to wear unevenly and excessively. Sometimes the tire can be worn so badly that it will fail. At the very least, Boulder auto owners who drive with wheels out of alignment will have ... read more

Our vehicles are not massage chairs. While we may enjoy a good vibration in an overstuffed recliner, us Boulder auto owners generally want as smooth a ride as possible in our vehicles. One way to achieve this is to keep a vehicle’s wheels in balance.When a tire is mounted onto a wheel, it is usually out of balance. This means that as the wheel spins, there is a slight wobble to the path of the tire. For best handling performance and safety on the road, Boulder drivers want to minimize this wobble as much as possible. So we balance our tires. To balance a tire, your cheerful John’s Auto Care technician spins it on a machine or drum to determine where it is off-balance. He then attaches weights that counter-balance the uneven weight. Most Boulder drivers are surprised at how much balancing improves the smoothness of their ride.High-quality tires generally hold their balance well. But over time, wear and tear take their toll and tires can become unbalanced. B ... read more