10 tips for preparing your car for the winter-the truth about cars

2021-12-10 10:39:00 By : Ms. Alice Li

Temperatures are falling across North America, and snow has fallen in parts of the United States and Canada. In the next few weeks, there will be more snow in the northern half of the African continent, leading to slippery streets and poor overall driving conditions, usually in cold snow-covered cars.

If you are one of many drivers in North America who have been living in heavy snow areas, then you are certainly familiar with preparing for winter. On the other hand, if you have recently moved to a snowy area after driving in a warm, snow-free climate for many years, you may be worried about driving in snow and ice. Frankly speaking, you should be worried, because the elderly in winter will make driving more difficult and cause road hazards on streets that are otherwise completely safe. Increasing poor visibility in snowstorms and winter weather is indeed a nightmare for novices driving in cold climates.

Fortunately, there are many steps you can take to prepare your car for safer winter driving. We have put together a list of things you can buy or do before the first snowfall to make your driving experience safer, but most of them can be reused, even in warmer months .

Whether your car has it or not-if you live in a snowy area, you should be equipped with suitable special snow tires. Although many tire manufacturers insist that their all-season tires will work well, there is no doubt that good snow tires can provide better ice and snow grip during acceleration, cornering and braking than any all-season tire. .

Many people believe that Bridgestone Blizzaks are the best snow tires on the market. Blizzak tires are available in a variety of models and are suitable for almost all cars, trucks and sport utility vehicles sold in North America. The thick block system creates strong inner and outer edges for firm handling, but the micro-patterns running through each block of the tread create incredible grip on the smooth surface. The micro sipes allow the various parts of the rubber to move slightly when the tire touches the road, acting as many tiny edges that can be dug. There are also thick grooves from the center to the outer edges, allowing these tires to move water and slide out under the tread.

These are the types of tires you don't want to drive all year round, because the softer rubber compound wears out quickly on hot and dry roads, so you will want to change to a different set of tires in the spring.

If you have a newer car, truck or SUV, you may have a built-in tire pressure monitoring system that can easily display the tire pressure on the dashboard, but for old cars, you need to check the tire pressure yourself with the handheld tire pressure. Measurement. When the outside temperature drops sharply, your tire pressure also drops. This is true for very new tires, but as tires age, it may become a bigger problem. For newer tires, a drop in external temperature will cause the air density in the tire to decrease, thereby effectively reducing tire pressure. For used tires, cold temperatures can cause aging, hardened rubber tires to crack. When temperature changes cause the pressure to drop normally, cracks in the sidewall and tread will cause rapid loss of air pressure. In any case, low tire pressure will cause various driving performance problems, and in the most extreme cases, the tire may fall off the wheel.

Fortunately, all of this can be avoided by regularly checking tire pressure. Some people recommend using digital meters that look like thermometers because they are easier to read, but we prefer this device from Rhino USA. It has a large and easy-to-read gauge with a pressure of up to 75 psi, so it is suitable for almost all consumer vehicles and some smaller commercial vehicles. The hose design allows you to place the head of the pressure gauge on the valve stem, while the head of the pressure gauge is away from the wheel for easy viewing.

Winter weather is the worst for wipers, so when we enter the snowy season, it is a good idea to install new wipers now. When the leaves rest on the hot windshield all summer, the rubber becomes hard and brittle when baked in the sun. When the cold temperature hits, the rubber becomes more brittle, causing it to not bend effectively to contact the windshield. In the most extreme cases, the rubber will become so hard that it will crack and break into small pieces, leaving gaps in the glass contact area.

Fortunately, the wiper blades are cheap and easy to replace by themselves, so the cost involved in preparing for winter driving is very low. In most cases, you only need to measure the frame of the blade assembly and purchase the same size product. From there, you can find videos of wiper replacement on almost all modern vehicles on the Internet, but even the most sophisticated wiper assembly system requires only a small screwdriver to replace the wiper.

There are many wiper blades on the market, but Bosch Icon wiper blades are the first choice for all our vehicles. They are close to the high end of the price range, but usually cost less than $50 for two people, so with the development of auto parts, they are relatively cheap.

Once you have good tires filled to the proper pressure level and a good set of new wiper blades, the next most important items for winter driving are good ice scrapers and snow brushes. Even if your car lives in a garage to prevent snow from accumulating overnight, it will inevitably eventually freeze on the glass. Some people can wait for the combination of the windshield wiper and defroster system to melt everything, but others are not so patient. Some impatient people will try to use wipers to wipe the windshield, but this is usually ineffective and can cause excessive wear on the wiper blades.

If you have lived in a snowy area for a long time, it is very likely that you have used various items to clear ice and snow, from CD boxes to empty beverage bottles, even if you can get a good scraper/brush combination for less than $10 .

The device shown here has a 4-inch scraper on one end of the telescopic handle and a 10-inch brush on the other end. The scraper will remove ice and snow from the glass, and the brush will remove it from the vehicle. The handle can extend to nearly 24 inches, but when not in use, it can be folded to 16.6 inches for easy storage.

If you live in an area with cold winters, you are likely to drive with your windows open in the next few months. Between the heater and the defroster, the fan system in your car is working most of the time of driving in winter. It is not only about comfort-the mobile defroster can clear the windshield faster, Thereby creating safer driving conditions. The problem is that the air-conditioning filter of some vehicles can become clogged. Over time, the clogged filter will negatively affect the air flow through the ventilation system. In terms of cleaning the air, the dirty filter is not very effective, so the impact of cleaning the filter is twofold, which can improve the safety of the vehicle to the occupants and other people on the road.

In most cases, the cabin air filter is simple to replace, and it is relatively cheap to replace the filter. In some very new vehicles, cabin air filters may only be purchased from dealers. In this case, they will be a bit more expensive, but most popular car models have internal filters that are not available on eBay. Buy it for $20. New filters are usually better than OEM equipment, so they will filter better, but there are also many OEM filters available on eBay.

One fluid that is often overlooked during routine maintenance is engine coolant. As the coolant ages, it decomposes and becomes dirty, resulting in higher freezing temperatures, lower boiling temperatures, and reduced ability to absorb heat from the engine during long-term driving. The easiest way to avoid these problems is to replace the coolant, but for those who are unsure whether they need to replace the coolant, there is a cheap and easy-to-use tool.

It works like a turkey applicator, sucking coolant through a tube into the main body of the tool. On the side of the tool is an instrument that can display the freezing point of the engine coolant. The transparent body of the tool can also give you a good understanding of the condition of the coolant. In addition to showing you that the freezing point is too high, your engine is more likely to freeze in the worst case, which can be very expensive. By using this simple tool, you can prevent this from happening.

While checking the freezing point of the coolant, you can also check the liquid level to make sure the tank is full. In addition to purchasing the tool online, you can also get a discounted price for high-quality coolant. Check your user manual to find out which type of coolant your engine uses, but there is a good chance that Prestone will make coolant for you.

In many parts of North America, the sun sets and the roads are dark during the morning and evening peaks, so most commuters drive in the dark throughout the winter. The headlights of some newer vehicles can provide a lot of light through high-tech LED systems, but if you drive an old car with original headlights, you may benefit from a new set of headlights.

There are many options for replacing headlight bulbs online, most of which will provide lighting that is at least similar to OEM bulbs, but if you plan to buy new headlights, you should buy the best. In order to get the best headlights, Sylvania Silverstar headlight bulbs are one of the best choices. Many people consider these car headlight bulbs to be one of the best product lines in the industry. Compared with most OEM bulbs, they provide brighter light and better projection modes.

Due to the popularity of Silverstar headlights, Sylvania has manufactured many different sizes of bulbs, so most cars, trucks and SUVs in North America can choose. Their cost is usually about twice that of a standard bulb, but the quality of the beam is well worth it.

For many people who commute to work every day, the winter work schedule requires them to drive from home to work and return home in the dark. Therefore, the lights and other electrical functions (such as the heating system, window defrosting system, and sound system) are on during most of the driving time. This continuous, heavy electrical load is difficult for the battery, but even worse, the battery does not work well in cold temperatures.

If your battery is broken or the alternator is not working properly, you will most likely find it in the first severe cold stream in winter. If you are lucky, the battery at home is dead, it will be easier to charge or replace the battery there, but if you park in a heated garage, your battery is likely to die in the cold, open the parking lot. When this happens, you can wait for roadside assistance to start your vehicle, or you can wait for a trailer to tow your car to the store while waiting for a friend or family member to ride home.

If you want to prevent being trapped in a cold, dark parking lot, a portable starter box is a good starting point. This compact device has enough power to quickly start your vehicle without the help of other vehicles. Most importantly, in the summer, when you no longer worry about running out of car batteries, you can use this handy device to charge your personal devices on the go.

Many people avoid driving a rear-wheel drive car in the snow, but for those who have no choice, there are ways to make your car, truck or SUV more capable. The first is to buy a good set of tires, like the Blizzaks mentioned at the top of this article, but when you only spin the real wheels, sometimes you need to put some weight on the drive wheels. This is especially true for trucks and SUVs, whose cargo area has almost no weight distribution on the rear axle.

One way to solve this problem is to add ballast to the rear wheels. There are many options to add weight to your vehicle, many pickup truck drivers will even carry a small amount of cinder blocks or stones, but there is a neater option-especially for those who have a rear-wheel drive and don’t want looseness in the trunk Stone.

A set of sandbags is the easiest way to add weight to the drive wheels of a rear-wheel drive car, truck or SUV. These sandbags are actually used to secure tents, but they are designed to be filled with sand and sealed neatly, so they can be placed on carpeted suitcases or unpainted beds without messing up or causing any damage. For those who want more weight, there are some heavier options, but if you want to add more than a hundred pounds to the drive wheels, these bags are a good choice.

If you like your car, truck, or SUV, you might prepare microfiber towels to clean the exterior, but in winter, when you want to clean the window glass, they are also very convenient. Due to the condensation caused by the temperature comparison between the cold outdoor air and the warm indoor air, your windows may have difficulty seeing the outside, causing you to wipe the windows with your hands in frustration. This may help in the short term, but once the glass becomes hot, dry, and clear, the area you wipe will become a mess.

In some cases, you can park your car in the garage. When the weather is warm, you can clean the glass properly, but many cleaners do not work well in severe cold temperatures. In addition, you usually don't have cleaning supplies when driving in severe winter, but when the windows are a little damp due to condensation, a clean microfiber towel is usually the best tool to get clean, clear glass.

These cheap microfiber towels are small enough that you can easily place a few of them in the center console or glove box. If you find yourself walking around and there is fog on the windshield, which makes it hard to see through, using one of the cleaning windshields can remove the fog and remove all dirt.

Feature photos courtesy of Jaroslav Moravcik/Shutterstock

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My knowledge of ice scrapers/snow brushes: they are made in Canada very well.

Not manufacturing in China is the key.

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