Pacific Highway Auto Repair

San Diego drivers may feel intimidated when they take their vehicles to a service center. They have questions but aren't sure how to ask. They don't want to feel embarrassed about their lack of knowledge. They don't want to make the service technician feel that they don't trust him.If your service advisor at Pacific Highway Auto Repair uses a term you don't understand, just ask him to explain. Remember, they are the auto service experts. If they came to your place of work, they probably wouldn't understand the jargon, either. When you take your vehicle in to be serviced, make sure you understand the financial issues up front. Ask about payment policies, warranties and, of course, the cost of the work being done.It helps to understand basic services your vehicle needs. Know the difference between a quick check-up and a thorough inspection, which you are getting and which you are asking for. Understand that diagnosing a problem takes time, and time isn't free. If you have concerns ... read more

People near San Diego, CA, often ask Pacific Highway Auto Repair how often they should have a particular service done. It's a great thing to ask. You can look at your owner's manual or have your San Diego, CA, service advisor at Pacific Highway Auto Repair look up your vehicle in a service database. What you find is often a surprise to people – there are actually two service schedules.One is the regular schedule and the other is the severe service schedule. Service intervals are shorter on the severe service schedule. When asked, most folks in San Diego will say that their driving is normal and that the 'regular' schedule probably applies to them. 'Severe service' sounds pretty extreme – 'I don't drive like that.'Well, here is what the manufacturers say constitutes severe driving conditions; you can draw your own conclusions. Most of your trips are less than four miles (six and a half kilometers). Most of your trips are less than ten miles (16 km) and outs ... read more

Every car in San Diego, CA, is at risk for theft. So it's up to us 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: Common sense Visible and audible devices Immobilizing devices Tracking devices Let's review each of these. One is common sense; you would be surprised how many vehicles are stolen in CA 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. San Diego 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 ... read more

  How do San Diego drivers know if an odometer is telling the truth?Well, back in '86, Congress passed the Truth-in-Mileage Act to protect CA consumers against mileage fraud. It says a CA seller must certify the mileage reported is the actual mileage.To have your odometer checked in San Diego, CA, stop by Pacific Highway Auto Repair: Pacific Highway Auto Repair4306 Pacific HighwaySan Diego, CA 92110   If it isn't, the seller must say why; for example, maybe the odometer is past its mechanical limits. Some older odometers only go to 99,999 and then start over at 0. Or, the odometer has been tampered with, broken or replaced.If the seller tells you the mileage isn't accurate, there's not much chance of putting a good number to it. And there's the unscrupulous seller who claims the reading is true, but it isn't. What can San Diego vehicle owners do?You can go to www.CarFax.com, where, for a small fee, they'll ... read more

Here is a questions for San Diego drivers: What is a cabin air filter?Is it: A filter for a house in the middle of the woods? A fresh, piney scent? A filter for the passenger compartment of your car? Clever you, it's 3.A cabin air filter cleans the outside air before it comes into the passenger compartment. It filters out dust, pollen, spores, bacteria, pollutants, sparrows, exhaust gas and odors.These high tech filters can block particles larger than 3 microns. By contrast, a grain of sand is about 200 microns.Now not all vehicles in the San Diego area have cabin filters. They are fairly new on the scene in CA. About 40 percent of new vehicles come with cabin air filters, but the number is growing every year.Cabin air filters can make for a very nice driving environment for San Diego. Your car can be a haven during CA allergy season with very little dust and pollen getting into the cabin. However, like all filters, your cabin air filter eventually ge ... read more

Today we're going to talk about on-board diagnostics and the questions we hear from folks around San Diego, CA, who need answers about diagnostic services. They want to know what diagnostics are, what's involved and what the benefits are. They really want to understand the value of diagnostic scans by a trained technician in San Diego.These are valid concerns. If you don't understand something it's really hard to know its value. Let's start with some history.Since 1996, all cars and light trucks in San Diego, CA, have been required to use a standardized diagnostic system to help repair technicians determine what's wrong with your vehicle. The diagnostic system works with the vehicle's Engine Control Module – the computer that controls many engine functions.The computer monitors dozens of components and processes. Depending on what the sensors read, the computer will make adjustments to compensate for conditions and minor problems. When there is a condition that it can't adjust fo ... read more

Most auto manufacturers recommend an interval for an air conditioning system inspection. The inspection uncovers leaks, worn hoses and assesses the condition of the other components.Environmental laws in some around San Diego require leaks to be repaired before refrigerant can be added. Also some parts manufacturers require other components to be replaced along with certain failed parts in order to maintain the new part warranty. This is because a given failure may be the result of another worn or damaged part that will, if not replaced, prematurely damage the new component.Pacific Highway Auto Repair in San Diego is fully equipped to restore your flow of cool air.Pacific Highway Auto Repair4306 Pacific HighwaySan Diego, CA 92110619-299-7700http://www.PacificHighwayAutoRepair.com  

Hey San Diego - this is something really amazing: Your vehicle uses 12,000 times as much air as fuel when you drive it. All of that air has to be filtered to keep your engine clean.That's like 100 gallons (380 liters) of air every block! The engine air filter is just another example of a very important but inexpensive part that has to do a tremendous amount of work. And when it works, everything goes well. But, when it doesn't, well, it can lead to problems. Of course, your vehicle manufacturer recommends how often to change your air filter. But like most service intervals, where and how you drive your vehicle in CA affects when your filter needs to be changed.Dusty conditions around San Diego or polluted city driving means you'll need to change your filter more often. Our trained professionals at Pacific Highway Auto Repair can check your filter for you. In fact, it's often a routine part of an oil change.When you think about it, a clogged ai ... read more

San Diego drivers want their tires to last as long as possible. Two ways to extend tire life are wheel balancing and tire rotation.When wheels are out of balance, they wobble and vibrate. That makes the tires wear in a cupping pattern. If a front wheel is out of balance you'll feel it in the steering wheel. If it's a rear wheel you'll feel it through your seat. To fix this, your technician at Pacific Highway Auto Repair puts weights on your wheels to balance them out.That brings us to tire rotation. The front tires on a vehicle wear out faster than the rear tires. As they push through turns, the shoulders of the front tires wear down. So rotating front and rear tires allows them to all wear at about the same rate over the life of the tire.Proper tire inflation will also help San Diego folks' tires last longer. Underinflated tires wear more on the shoulder and may even overheat. This could cause tire damage or a blow out. Overinflated tires wear too fast in the middle.F ... read more

There's a reason we use the word “diagnose” when we talk about fixing cars in San Diego. Figuring out what's wrong with your vehicle has a lot of similarities to figuring out what's wrong with someone who is ill. Vehicles are a mass of complex systems that can produce a variety of symptoms when something goes wrong. As with human diagnoses, a specific symptom may be indicative of a number of problems, and figuring out the specific cause takes training and experience.Sometimes the diagnosis of your vehicle's trouble comes down to a matter of trial-and-error. This can be frustrating for San Diego drivers because time and money are on the line. You may feel you should only be paying for repair work. Of course, you only want to pay for the right repair – and a proper diagnosis is part of getting it right. Like at the doctor's office — some of what you pay for is the doctor's time and effort to figure ... read more