Archives for December 2014

Every car in Eagle Lake, MN is at risk for theft. So it’s up to us Eagle Lake car owners to make our cars a less appealing target and more of a challenge – hopefully sending potential thieves to look elsewhere.

The National Insurance Crime Bureau recommends a layered approach to protecting vehicles:

1. Common sense
2. Visible and audible devices
3. Immobilizing devices
4. Tracking devices

Let’s review each of these. First, common sense: you would be surprised how many vehicles are stolen in MN where the keys were left in the ignition with the doors unlocked. Always take your keys and lock the doors. In fact, in some places it’s against the law to leave a vehicle unattended with the keys in the ignition.

And don’t leave spare keys in the car or hide them outside – because a thief will find them. Eagle Lake drivers would be wise to park in well-lit areas that have a lot of foot traffic. If possible, park near the end of a row and near a light. Back your car into a parking space or your driveway to make your car more visible to passersby and harder for a thief to work under the hood without being seen.

Eagle Lake auto owners should know that it’s important to roll up their windows completely and avoid leaving their car in public lots for a long time. If you park in a lot that has an attendant, only give them the ignition key.

Keep valuables out of sight: purses, wallets, cell phones, clothes and even change are attractive “smash-and-grab” targets. And pay to have your Vehicle Identification Number, or VIN, etched into your windows – it makes your car less attractive to a thief who wants to send your car to a chop shop.

There are lots of vital visible and audible devices available for Eagle Lake motorists. A steering wheel lock is highly visible and will deter some thieves. Loud alarms can alert you and others that your vehicle is being tampered with. But if your alarm does go off, be careful. Observe what’s going on; get descriptions of suspicious people and vehicles, including license plate numbers.

Now, if you catch a thief in the act, call 911 but don’t approach the person. Your safety is more important than the car.

And here’s a great one – immobilizing devices. They actually shut off your car’s electrical or fuel supply. So without a key, or knowing where the hidden switch is located, a thief can’t drive your car away.

Finally, Eagle Lake motorists can also get a tracking device that allows Eagle Lake police to track their car down and recover it quickly.

Remember, where you live, work and drive around Eagle Lake, MN has a great impact on your decisions. If you’re in an area with high theft rates, you may want to spend more money on security systems. And check with your Eagle Lake, MN auto insurance company to see if they offer discounts for adding any of these items.

Of course, the common sense suggestions from Hughes Automotive Inc don’t cost anything and go a long way toward keeping your car safe from thieves. Take a look at the attached video auto tip from AutoNetTV.

Come see us at Hughes Automotive Inc in Eagle Lake for practical advice on keeping your sedan safe.

Have you ever noticed that your vehicle manufacturer has a schedule in your owner’s manual for what is called “severe service” maintenance? Let’s define what severe driving conditions aren’t: The easiest driving a vehicle experiences is traveling on the interstate for twenty miles or more at a constant rate of 65 miles per hour in 75°F weather with only passengers on board. Change any one of those parameters and you are adding stress to your engine. Change them significantly, and you are driving under severe conditions.

Let’s look at the important parameters one a time. First, the length of the trip. Short trips around Eagle Lake are harder on an engine than longer ones. As your engine cools down, water in the air condenses onto the engine. When you heat the engine again, the water evaporates off. This is healthy. But on short trips, the engine doesn’t stay hot enough long enough for all of the water to evaporate so it starts to build up in the engine oil leading to sludge, which can clog up your engine and lead to serious engine damage. If most or all of your trips around Mankato are less than four miles, you should reflect on using the severe service maintenance schedule. Changing your oil more frequently at Hughes Automotive Inc in Eagle Lake will help prevent the formation of sludge.

Each sedan engine has a “power band,” or the range of RPM’s in which it runs most efficiently. Generally this power band falls in the range of MN highway speed driving. So if you’re driving around town in Eagle Lake all the time, your engine has to work harder. That’s why MPG ratings are so much better on the freeway than in the city. Again, this type of driving is considered severe and requires more frequent maintenance for your transmission, cooling system and brake fluid.

Most of us Eagle Lake motorists think of severe MN weather conditions when we think of severe driving conditions. And we’re right. Cold Mankato area weather takes its toll on the oil in your vehicle. Remember how water has to evaporate out of the oil to keep your engine healthy? It can take up to ten miles of driving for an engine to get hot enough to get rid of moisture in the oil when the weather is cold.

Hot Eagle Lake weather is also dangerous for sedans. When an engine runs, it gets hot. The longer it runs, the hotter it gets. If it gets too hot, it breaks down. So it has to be constantly cooled to keep running. Hot MN weather means your cooling system has to work harder to keep your engine from getting too hot.

Another critical element of severe driving is the conditions we drive through. Dusty, polluted Eagle Lake areas are dangerous to your filters. Dirt, dust and contaminants will also get into your fluids, and they’ll get dirty faster, so they’ll need to be changed more often as well. Finally, when you’re pulling a trailer around Eagle Lake, carrying heavy loads or using a car-top carrier, you are putting more stress on your engine. The engine, transmission and brakes are all working harder to handle the extra load.

So, in the end, most of us Eagle Lake drivers drive under severe conditions some of the time. Smart Eagle Lake car owners will ask themselves the question: “Should I follow the severe service maintenance schedule?” An honest evaluation of our driving habits is the best way to determine which schedule to follow.

Every Eagle Lake vehicle owner has to purchase tires at some time or another, so it’s a good idea to understand what the choices are. The best seasonal performance is achieved by purchasing tires to match the season you are driving in. Summer tires are designed for hot temperatures. The tread is engineered for good traction on dry or rainy MN roads. But the rubber compound in summer tires gets stiff when temperatures drop below 45°F, and snow and mud can pack into the tread, reducing the traction of the tire.

Winter tires are designed for good traction on snowy surfaces. The tread actually throws snow off of the tire as the wheel turns. The rubber compound in a winter tire is soft so that it will remain flexible at Mankato temperatures below 45°F. At higher temperatures, however, the softer rubber wears down rapidly.

All-season tires sacrifice some of the extreme performance of summer or winter tires, but they maintain adequate traction in either type of Eagle Lake weather.

So your first consideration when buying a tire is where you live in MN and where you usually drive. If you require maximum summer and winter performance you can go with dedicated summer and winter tires; you would just need to change out your tires each spring and fall.

For serious winter driving in MN, look for tires with a severe snow rating. These tires are labeled with a mountain-and-snowflake logo.

Your second important consideration is the quality of tire to purchase. Summer, winter and all-season tires come in a variety of grades and styles at MN tire stores. Eagle Lake auto owners will want to purchase a tire that will give them good wear and that will handle their driving style and road conditions. Your Hughes Automotive Inc tire professional can give you auto advice as to which type of tire will best fit your needs.

Eagle Lake auto owners who drive off-road around MN may want to look at a high-grade tire that is designed for off-road use. These tires are designed to handle the extra wear of off-roading while still giving good performance on Eagle Lake streets and highways. There are a number of options to choose from so that you can find the right tire whether you are only an occasional off-road explorer or a serious rock climber.

New wheels can be purchased in Eagle Lake as a statement of style or to add personality to your sedan. There are almost unlimited options. If you change the size of the wheels on your sedan, however, you will need to get some professional help to make your vehicle compatible with its new wheels. Talk to your Hughes Automotive Inc service specialist for more information about tires.

When your sedan has a problem, or just needs some routine service, you might get a little nervous. Your car’s so important to your life in Eagle Lake, you need to back on the road as soon as possible – with the problem fixed right the first time.

If you’ve ever checked into some of the technician training Hughes Automotive Inc professionals receive, you may be surprised at how much specialized knowledge and skill goes into diagnosing and repairing a modern car. For example: Today there are four cylinder engines that generate more power than the 1980s-era V-8’s. I mean a new V-6 Toyota Camry could beat Sonny Crocket’s Ferrari in a race to sixty.

Our engines are more and more powerful and at the same time their fuel economy keeps inching up – even with steep Mankato gas prices. They are also amazingly reliable: Kudos to the automotive engineers at the leading manufacturers. But the advances come at the price of simplicity. The modern cars Mankato motorists drive around MN expressways are so much more complex from a mechanical standpoint that it makes your head spin – not to mention the electronics.

Some sedans have several networked computers controlling most of the engine functions and many other vehicle operations as well. Mankato motorists take all of this sophistication for granted – but somebody has to fix it when it breaks. It’s a real challenge for Eagle Lake Hughes Automotive Inc technicians to keep up, but we work hard to stay ahead of the technology. It requires a high level of commitment on the part of the technicians and the Mankato service centers as well.

Hughes Automotive Inc technicians receive training through a combination of formal classroom training, training provided at Hughes Automotive Inc by parts and equipment manufacturers, on-line courses and home study courses.

In addition to the expensive training, there’s the financial commitment for Hughes Automotive Inc to purchase the diagnostic and repair tools.

There are many independent certifications available at Hughes Automotive Inc all the way up to Master Technician. The ability to repair your sedan requires a strong combination of training and resources. No one can know everything, so Mankato auto service centers subscribe to data services, technical libraries and even on-line communities that can help them when they run into a difficult problem.

It’s like those medical diagnosis shows on TV. Here are the symptoms – what’s the diagnosis and treatment? Diagnosis is every bit as much an art as a science. At Hughes Automotive Inc, we want everything to be simple, straightforward and inexpensive – but sometimes it just isn’t.

The next time you bring us your sedan, don’t worry. You’re in good hands at Hughes Automotive Inc.

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Today in our Hughes Automotive Inc blog, we’re going to talk about following recommended service intervals. Your sedan isn’t the only aspect of your life in Eagle Lake with recommended intervals: Let’s start with twice yearly dental check-ups and regular physical exams. How about laundry, watering the lawn and paying the bills?

Now, what would happen if you didn’t follow these intervals? Well, you’d get more cavities. You’d may not discover health conditions that could be more effectively treated with early detection. And you’d have to wear dirty clothes, be embarrassed by your brown lawn and have your utilities shut off.

Clearly, there are some things in life that we have to take care of regularly. If we don’t, there are negative consequences. Our quality of life in Eagle Lake takes a hit and it inevitably costs more money.

So why is it so hard to remember to follow regular preventive maintenance on our sedans? Probably a couple of reasons. One is that automotive maintenance items just don’t seem that urgent. All our Eagle Lake neighbors can see our dead lawn, but no one knows how dirty our transmission fluid is. It’s easy to put off. The other reason is that we’re just not as familiar with automotive maintenance, so it’s a bit intimidating.

From a practical standpoint, Eagle Lake people don’t need to memorize their sedan owner’s manuals. You can let your Hughes Automotive Inc advisor remind you of the guidelines established by vehicle manufacturers: he has checklists of what the manufacturer recommends and can find potential problems when he inspects your sedan. You really can rely on Hughes Automotive Inc professionals to help you make good automotive decisions.

For Eagle Lake drivers who want to be more proactive with their sedan care, here are some simple ways for Eagle Lake auto owners to remember what has a maintenance interval.

First: Fluids. If it’s liquid, it’s got a replacement schedule. Oil, transmission fluid, coolant, power steering fluid, brake fluid, differential fluid, etc.

Then think tires. They need air, rotation, balancing, and alignment. And while you’re thinking tires, don’t forget brakes and shock absorbers.

And what makes your sedan go? Air and fuel. Air filter replacement, fuel filters and fuel system cleaning. Of course there are more items, but if Eagle Lake car owners remember to take their car or truck in to Hughes Automotive Inc for these things, their service advisor will help them with the rest.

And if you don’t follow recommended service intervals? You get lousy fuel economy, your sedan doesn’t run as well, your safety is compromised and you’ll spend more money in the long run. So it’s the same as everything else: The quality of your motoring life takes a hit and it ends up costing you more.

Reason enough for me to follow recommended service intervals.