Automotive Industry News & Information - The Wrench Automotive

Changing the oil in big trucks and commercial vehicles is an expensive, but necessary, part of keeping your vehicles going. You don’t want to wait until it’s too late to change your oil, but changing it too early can be a waste of time and money. Having your oil tested regularly helps us to hone in on exactly how often your oil needs to be changed, to optimize reliability and efficiency.

Your transmission cooler is an integral part of the reliability and proper function of your transmission. At The Wrench in Greeley, CO, we’re well equipped with the knowledge you need about coolers, and the ability and equipment necessary to keep your transmission in good shape.

Whether you drive a Porsche, Audi, BMW, Subaru, Land Rover, or other performance and luxury vehicles, your ball joints are an essential part of your car or SUVs performance and safety. From us at The Wrench, here’s what to watch out for, to make sure your ball joints are in shape and ready to go.

At The Wrench in Greeley, CO, maintaining your fleet and keeping your business reliably on the road is our primary focus. As trucks wear out, and they always do, you will inevitably be faced with this dilemma - “Should I fix this truck, or replace it with a new one?” This isn’t always an easy question to answer. As your fleet specialists, our team here at The Wrench is here to help you decide.

In the diesel world, "blow-by" is a term you're bound to run across at some point if your line of work involves diesel-powered vehicles of any kind. What is blow-by, what causes it, and how concerned should you be? At The Wrench in Greeley, CO, our fleet maintenance and diesel technicians see it on a regular basis. Here we'll take a quick look at blow-by, correcting it, and preventing it.

What is Blow-By? - Diesel blow-by is a term that describes an event of lost compression into the crankcase. Blow-by occurs whenever a burnt or unburnt fuel and air mixture escape from the cylinder and past the piston rings and into the crankcase. In a perfect world, the piston would be sealed tightly in the cylinder, able to move up and down but keeping all the air and fuel and exhaust that enters or exits the cylinder during the combustion process out of the crankcase. As you'll see, this perfect world doesn't exist, but it is important to minimize the amount of blow-by in a diesel engine.

It’s easier than ever to keep your fleet running smoothly for thousands of miles. If a vehicle has less than 50,000 miles on it today, chances are it still has 75 percent of its driving life ahead of it. That’s good news if you’re a company managing a fleet of vehicles. It wasn’t that long ago that hitting the 100,000-mile mark on the odometer was a major milestone. Today, vehicles are built to last. With the proper maintenance and attention, there’s no reason you shouldn’t expect to see that 50,000-mile reading on the odometer one day roll right past 200,000 and keep ongoing. Here at The Wrench, we're going to give you some tips on how to make that happen!

Obviously, the dirtier your fuel system is, the bigger the improvement you will see in performance and fuel economy after a fuel system cleaning. But it is important not to wait until your system is running poorly. If you do, by the time you get a cleaning, you’ve wasted hundreds of dollars in gas or even possibly damaged your fuel injectors and catalytic converter.

Dirty Hands Working on a diesel truck engine

Keeping your fuel system maintained will prevent premature parts failure and poor running conditions. Here are some important aspects of diesel fuel system maintenance, to keep your fleet running smoothly. While your system and components should typically be serviced by a professional technician, there are some things you can be conscious of that will go a long way toward keeping your engine in good shape.