30 Dec A Day In The Life
Once you hand us your keys for some routine maintenance, you might not know what actually goes on behind the scenes. Not many people do. But today, we’ll show you.
For most of this little rundown, we’ll be following Zach as he does an oil change for Dick Cook’s M3. Let’s begin, shall we?
Once the vehicle arrives in the service area, its hood is raised, and we check out everything in the engine bay, inspecting belts, hoses and fluids to make sure that everything is in perfect working condition (and if it isn’t, we’ll let you know):
After the initial under-hood check, we’ll hoist the car up and start the meat-and-potatoes of the visit, in this case the oil change:
While the oil drains, we’ll proceed to give your underbody the same treatment we gave the engine bay; a thorough check of various suspension and drivetrain components helps to identify potential problems before they become frustrating calamities. We’ll also look at your tires and brakes, and with winter just starting to kick into full gear, it’s important to ensure that everything is in working order:
With the oil change now completed, if your engine bay’s starting to look relatively gnarly (and not in the mid-90’s, surfer-talk sort of way), we’ll clean it out for you using our pressure washer. And yes, these pictures were taken out of order, hence the silver M3 turning into a blue 328i:
Now that the pressure washing is over, it’s one more quick trip back to the service bay for a treatment with the air gun, to make sure everything’s dry and pretty:
Finally, we’ll clean off your floor mats for you, since the winter tends to bring with it a lot of dirty snow and salt residue, none of which looks good inside a vehicle. Here’s Keller, looking thoroughly pleased with his handiwork:
When everything is said and done, the oil change you received actually comes with a lot more. We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again, we’re incredibly proud of the work we do and we’re all incredibly devoted to automobiles. We want to make sure that you don’t end up on the side of the highway at some point, when a cursory glance at your tires could have yielded the discovery of an errant nail in your treads. Better safe than sorry — and since we firmly believe in that idea, we’re going to do what we can to ensure the livelihood of both you and your automobile.
We’re going to be out of the office from tonight until Monday, but before we all leave, we had to do a little “pruning” of the icicles above the garage doors, which were becoming increasingly large (thanks to the snow) and increasingly dangerous (thanks to the current thaw we’re experiencing). And who better to undertake such a task than Craig. Taking the simple approach of “poking it with a rod until it falls,” Craig managed to clear the roof of ice and icicles without a single knock to the head. Which he wouldn’t have had to worry about, if he would have put on the hard hat that’s resting on the ground, just outside the frame. No harm, no foul, we suppose:
Have a safe and happy New Year! See you all in 2011!
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