Hey all,
I am wondering how to learn about auto work. I am self taught in many things but this subject evades me somewhat. It seems like the kind of thing that someone would teach to you directly but most of my learning comes from self study interacting with things directly and reading texts.
My brakes are starting to make a squeaking noise when I come to a stop and as a result I have gained an interest in learning about some basic auto work.
Does anyone have any good resources where you can learn about these things in a sequential manner? That is to say, learning the most basic concepts up to the more advanced concepts?
Thanks.
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Training courses and apprenticeships; there are a lot of specialized tools, techniques, and diagnostic procedures that aren’t obvious. Self guided usually results in doing a lot of things the wrong way.
Usually its being too poor to have a shop fix something for you, and being forced to do it yourself.
Used to buy a book like the Chilton’s manual where it has instructions for performing repairs on your vehicle. They have an online version:
Oh this is great! My vehicle is in there as well, thanks a lot!
BE CAREFUL!!!
i taught myself how to change my own brakes because they were also squealing and i nearly killed myself because i didn’t do it right the first time i tried using them.
in retrospect: i should have tested my new brakes as hard and as heavy as i could before trying to take it onto the freeway and not just trying them a side streets going slower than 45mph.
The manuals and third-party books mentioned are great resources, but YouTube videos and old auto forums are also very helpful. There’s nothing quite like watching someone do the process on video.
Another resource that’s helpful is online auto part wholesale stores like rockauto.com where you can often get parts cheaper. The problem with fixing your own car isn’t usually the parts, but the tools. They are a big up front coat, but pay off in the long run. I like AutoZone tools because they have a lifetime warranty, but they aren’t always the best.
For your squeaky brakes, you can probably fix everything for less than $100 in parts (maybe less than 50 if it’s just the pads that need to be replaced). To do this, you’ll need the following.
Tools (none of these are suggestions, they are random links I grabbed as examples):
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a Jack/lift, a hydraulic trolley jack works well
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jack stands and wheel chocks (for safety)
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a socket wrench and appropriately sized sockets or one of these. One that rachets and extends is nice. Do not get universal sockets, they are garbage. Get 1/2 inch or thicker connections or they will break.
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a breaker bar (long connector for sockets). Optional, but very helpful in turning very tight nuts on the wheels.
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a big c-clamp to compress the caliper piston (you can get a piston compression clamp, but this is much cheaper)
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gloves
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calipers (if you want to measure brake drums to see if they need to be replaced)
Parts:
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brake pads and hardware (usually some included metal clips) example
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drums (rarely need to be replaced, based on thickness measurement)
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brake cleaner (only if replacing drums)
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if you get into changing the brake fluid, you will need fluid and potentially hoses/attachment parts as those wear down. You don’t usually need anything fancy to bleed them, I use a piece of silicone tubing and a plastic bottle.
Start small and work up in complexity. It sounds like your pads need to be replaced. There is a piece of metal on the pad that starts grinding on the drum when the pads get low, this means just the pad and pad hardware need replaced unless you ignored it for too long. If you ignored it, the drums may need to be replaced too. It’s typical for the brakes to squeak a bit (different sound than the low-pad scraping) after you put new pads and hardware on. There are tricks to fix this if it even happens, but it’s more annoying than harmful and will go away on its own. I won’t tell them here, because it involves grease and I don’t want you to accidentally grease your brakes so they don’t work.
Normal brake service cost from 15 years ago before I started doing it myself: $300-400. Cost from doing it on my own: $30-50 and ~15-30 minutes.
Cost to replace my broken radiator at a shop: $600. At home: $80 and 1 hour outside in frigid winter weather.
Long-term, I think it’s worth learning to do the service yourself, but I’d stay away from more dangerous work like changing your suspension (springs under tension).
General brake pad changing procedure:
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put on parking brake, emergency brake/handle brake
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put chucks behind tires on opposite side of where you will be lifting. Kick them into the tire so they are snug.
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loosen wheel nuts
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lift car and place on jack stands (look up how to do this properly)
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remove wheel nuts, remove wheel and set aside
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loosen caliper nut, lift so it sits out of way (caliper is on a hinge)
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remove old brake pad, replace with new pad and hardware
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inspect drum and replace if necessary (new drums are greased, you will need brake cleaner to remove this if you are replacing drums)
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open hood, unscrew cap to brake fluid reservoir
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use c-clamp to depress caliper piston, retighten cap to brake fluid reservoir
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reassemble in reverse. When you put the wheel on, get the nuts finger-tight, then lower the car.
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right wheel nuts. This needs to be done in a star pattern like you are drawing a five-point star. Do not tighten one and then the one next to it, tighten one, then skip a nut and tighten every other nut. Continue until all are tight while the wheel is on the ground (or it will rotate)
Wow, this is highly informative, thanks for taking the time to put that much effort into your reply!
I expect the drums are probably fine as the squeaking only started very recently and only occurs at the very end of coming to a complete stop (it does not happen during otherwise normal brake usage).
The cost effectiveness that you have noted for a few different maintenance items really affirms my interest in this. My auto-dealer gives me free oil changes, but only under the condition that I stay with their service schedule. I know how easy and cheap it is to change out oil so while that might sound appealing to other people, it really is not for me because as you have shown, I could be saving much more money if I learned how to do the other kinds of maintenance myself.
I guess I can use whatever the dealer has on their service schedule as something to orient myself on what items I should go learn how to do, but I think something that would be handy in that regard would be to first learn how to diagnose what should be getting replaced or fixed.
As you noted, I can use calipers to check the brake drums to make a determination on replacement there, and the fact that I can hear the brakes beginning to squeak implies that the pads should be changed.
I wonder if there is a resource somewhere which has information on this specifically - just how to make these checks to make that determination on what should be done. Surely I know a few others. I know how to check if the oil is low, or the washer fluid etc, but would be really interested in other items like this, because for me I think it would be a really great jumping-off point.
Thanks!
Diagnosing info:
I usually find this in YouTube videos or on auto forums, but every now and then they are written in the manuals.
If you feel a wobble (push in and out) on your brakes, then your drum is warped. If it feels mushy, then there is probably air in the fluid system that needs to be bled.
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As others have said, search YouTube for brake pad changes on your make/model of car. If that still leaves you with questions, you can also find a self help book specific to your car (Chilton or Haynes).
Good news, based on how you’re describing your own technical level, I think you’re going to find this is pretty easy actually. Only concern is if you live where they salt the roads, then some of these things will be rusted together. So, good to watch the video again & see how it’s supposed to come apart.
Once the calipers are off, you need to support them somehow so they don’t hang on the brake lines. I usually just slide a cinder block underneath them, but others like using bungie cords / zip ties & tying them to spring/strut. (Depending on the car, you may not even need to fully remove the caliper - many of them pivot upwards).
Probably worth mentioning, the pads themselves are cheap, but you should also resurface or replace the rotors. One of the important steps to making sure they last is having a clean & smooth surface when they’re new, so that they will mate together smoothly. There’s a lot of neat stuff going on with the transfer of pad material to the rotor itself, I can’t pretend to cover it all, but “bedding” the pad material to the rotor properly ensures long life. And the short-short answer is that to accomplish that, you need new rotors or you need to have the rotors machined smooth when you replace the pads. I find it’s usually more cost effective to just buy cheap rotors from Rock Auto online.
Lastly, you may want to watch a video on brake bleeding (getting the air out of the brake lines). In theory you might not need to even open the brake lines, but often you need to do so in order to get the caliper pistons to retract far enough for the new brake pads. (I like to bleed the brakes on every pad change just to have fresh fluid in there). I mention this because brake bleeding is usually a 2 person job. There are special tools to work around that, but you need to know in advance if you’re going to need them.
Thank you, this is really informative!
You just start doing it. Back in the day, someone show you things. Now you can use YouTube for that.
True enough, thanks.
YouTube University mainly. Plus getting the service manuals for my cars.
With these I managed a turbo swap in my garage. Brake pads (which it sounds like you need) are waaaay easier.
I coveted my haynes repair manuals while I was drastically poor and could only afford shitboxes.
Good news is you can pay like $30 and download all of them as PDFs and just print what you need rather than getting a whole book greasy
As others have said, get a manual for your car if its available (typically Haynes or even a factory service manual if its cheap). Aside from this i think ChrisFix on YouTube does one of the absolute best jobs of explaining tasks such as replacing your brakes in a way that even someone without any knowledge can follow along and using basic hand tools. A lot of other channels can show you similar tasks but he can explain it all without leaving knowledge gaps as many others assume you already know how to turn wrenches.
I learn similar to you and do almost all my own services on my vehicles and have quite a bit of experience working on cars, but even still I like to Google to find specific videos on services that I haven’t done before and watch them several times in the days leading up to performing the service. This helps me absorb all the steps, so I feel more confident that I’m not going to miss something or get overwhelmed and put myself into a bad situation (like breaking some ancillary part or getting halfway into something it turns out I don’t have the skills/tools for).
I would pay special attention to how things work so that you can transfer and reuse what you’ve learned across different makes and models even if they’re put together differently as well as helping you with future repairs that might share similar components.
Thanks for the recommendation!
Replacing brake pads (not shoes for drum brakes) is a fairly straight forward activity and possibly one of the best (besides perhaps changing engine oil) to perform yourself. Youtube is a great place to start. You can likely even find a full video of pad replacement for your exact model of car.
What is your current knowledge with using basic hand tools such as screwdrivers, hammers, and wrenches (for hex head fasteners)? Do you know how to replace a flat tire? There’s lots of overlap with that procedure and changing brake pads.
I can replace a flat fine, I understand how to use a jack and a torque wrench and have tangential knowledge regarding a little bit of mechanical engineering from a previous job.
The feeling I get is that auto work goes much much deeper though, and I am interested in resources that offer that knowledge.
You’re right… it does go a lot deeper. If you’re in the USA, your local community college might have classes. Consider starting with some formal instruction. The problem with YouTube is that you (the one lacking knowledge) has to decide whether the YouTuber knows what they’re doing. There’s a lot of great stuff on YouTube, but there’s plenty of wrong and unsafe stuff too.
Also, avoid super cheap tools for the tools that interface with screws, nuts, and bolts, like wrenches, sockets, screwdrivers, hex and torx drivers. Cheap tools make it wasier to damage screw heads and bolts.
If you know not only what a torque wrench is, but how to use it properly you will likely have no trouble changing brake pads.
The feeling I get is that auto work goes much much deeper though, and I am interested in resources that offer that knowledge.
Full engine rebuilds, or even troubleshooting intermittent CANbus issues, sure. But basic maintenance like brake pads or changing out a failed alternator just require basic hand tools and some minor knowledge you can get from youtube.
Thanks!
