Real English Vocabulary: Taking care of your car

Hi.

Welcome to engVid.

I'm Adam.

In today's video, we're going to look at basic car maintenance.

Now, some of you are thinking: "Okay, I don't really need to know this because I don't have

a car", but it's always a good idea to know as much as you can about as much as you can,

including cars.

And keep in mind: It's still English, so it's still a good idea to listen.

And you never know when you may be able to help a friend or family member with his or

her car.

Now, I'm not going to get too serious about this; I'm just going to give you the general

things you need to keep in mind when you're looking at your car; a little bit inside,

a little bit outside, get a general idea of how to take care of your vehicle.

So, the first thing you want to do always...

Or every once in a while, depends on the situation, depends on how old your car is: You want to

check fluids.

"Fluid" is basically any liquid, anything that flows throughout your car.

For example, oil.

Now, how do you check your oil?

Well, you have a little oil tube sticking out of your engine, it has a dipstick - so,

basically you pull it out, you clean it with some tissue, you put it back in, and then

you pull it out again and then it shows you how much you have; what the level of the oil

is.

And all of these things...

To check all of these things or most of them, they each have their own little dipstick.

Okay?

So make sure you know where the dipstick is to check your levels.

Now, if you're driving and you have windshield wipers, you also make sure...

You always want to make sure you have enough windshield washer fluid.

So, when you press on the windshield washers...

On the wipers, the spray that comes out.

That fills up; make sure you have enough.

Especially, for example, you live in Canada, in the winter when the streets are full of

snow and ice and salt, and they come on your window, if you don't have this fluid, you

could be in a lot of trouble.

Okay?

So make sure you always have some.

Once in a while check your transmission fluid.

Now, your transmission is what makes the engine...

The power from the engine comes to the transmission and it basically turns your tires.

Now, if you have gears...

Some of you...

Most people, actually, these days have an automatic transmission.

You put in drive and you go; you don't have to think about all the gears.

Some people still have manual transmission where you put it into first gear, second gear,

third gear, fourth gear, fifth gear, etc., you have your clutch that you have to engage.

Okay?

So this is your transmission; that's what makes the wheels turn.

Make sure there's enough fluid so you don't kill your transmission.

And, again, brake fluid.

Your brakes work on hydraulic power.

Make sure there's enough fluid in there so the brakes engage and you can actually stop

your car.

Make sure there's always enough coolant in the radiator.

The radiator is that part of the engine that keeps it cool; it doesn't let it get too hot.

So the coolant is a special type of fluid that flows through the radiator, it cools

as it works, and it goes back into the engine, keeps the engine nice and cool.

Make sure you have gas; no gas, no driving.

Even electric cars still use some gas, right?

So...

Then always make sure that your car is fully equipped with the tools it needs.

Now, you have a tire, here; imagine that's a tire on your car.

The thing that keeps the tire connected to the car, these things here-there's four or

five of them-these are called lugs.

Lug nuts.

So make sure you have a lug wrench.

It's usually in your trunk with your spare tire or underneath it.

Make sure you have one that properly works.

If you have a lock on these lugs, make sure you have the lock so you can open it.

A jack.

A jack is the thing that you put under your car, and you pump, pump, pump, and it raises

your car so you can take the tire off.

If you have a flat tire...

Basically like this...

If you have a flat tire and you need to replace it, you put your jack underneath, you pump

it, raise the car; lug wrench, take off the lugs, take off the tire.

You might have to take off a hubcap first.

The hubcap is a cover; some cars have them, some cars don't.

You take off the tire, put on the spare, put the lugs back, tighten them, lower the jack,

you're good to go.

Okay?

Always make sure you have jumper cables.

Jumper cables are cables that you can connect from your battery to another car's battery.

If your battery is dead and you can't start your car, you connect the jumper cables, somebody

will give you a jump.

A jump is sometimes called a boost.

So if your battery's not...

If your car is not turning on, you think the battery is dead, maybe you left the lights

on all night, find a stranger and ask him: "Can you give me a jump?" or "Can you give

me a boost?"

They connect the cables, turn on the engine, you're good to go.

Make sure you have a pressure gauge to check your tires; make sure there's enough air in

the tires, and check for, again, PSI - pounds per square inch.

You should have enough.

It might be written on the tire, you can see how many...

How much PSI you need.

If you open your car door, on the side, it will also say how much PSI your tires need;

make sure they're full.

Now we're going to look under the hood.

So, the front of the car, in most cars, there's the front of the car, you lift the hood and

there's the engine.

So we're going to look under the hood: What are we going to see there?

Again, I'm not going to get too much detail; the things that you need to know that you

can fix by yourself, without having to go to a mechanic.

Mechanics can be very expensive.

Spark plugs, so these are the things that basically blow up the gas when it comes into

the engine, and move the rods and all that; you don't need to know.

Spark plugs, they're going to be like two, four, six...

Well, not two anymore, but four, six, eight, whatever, however many valves you have.

Pull it out, make sure it's clean, make sure the space between is big enough so you have

a spark.

A spark, gas, power, movement, engine.

Okay.

Fan belt, make sure you have a fan belt; make sure it's not scratched, make sure it's tight

enough.

It moves things in the engine; that's good enough.

Very easy to see when you open the hood.

And the alternator is what basically goes back and forth from the battery to make sure

there's always power.

Make sure that it's working properly.

If this goes...

If you're turning on your...

Trying to turn on your car and it doesn't turn on, maybe the battery is dead, maybe

the alternator is dead; you might have to replace it, or the starter, etc.

Air filter, this cleans the air that comes into your engine.

Okay?

The cleaner it is, the better the air, the better the burning of the gas in your engine.

Every once in a while, clean it; every once in a while, replace it.

Just a...

It basically...

Usually, like...

Depends on the car, but different sizes, it looks like paper...

Like...

How do I say?

Like this.

It has grooves, and you can see it gets dirty.

Just replace it.

Of course, the whole thing is the engine.

And then you have your carburetor.

Old cars have carburetors; new cars have fuel injection systems.

These are the things that control how much gas is burnt, and how much air mixes with

the gas to get the proper amount of burn.

So you want to make sure that this is always clean.

Every once in a while you can go to the auto shop, you can buy a fluid, a cleaner, put

it into your gas tank and it will clean out the carburetor, clean the fuel injection system,

and you get proper air and gas flow.

Okay?

So, basically this is the inside of the car.

We're going to look at little bit outside and inside the car cabin.

Okay, so now we're going to look a little bit around the car and inside the cabin.

So, you have your windscreen, that's the glass in front of you as you're driving, so make

sure, like, rocks don't hit you.

So that's called your windscreen or your windshield; depends, some people call it differently.

You have wipers.

Make sure that the wipers are good.

Make sure that they're flat, make sure that the rubber part is still good and solid, it

doesn't have cracks in it, because it's not going to work properly.

It's going to leave streaks if you don't take care of that.

Streaks, basically it's going to leave lines all along your windshield and makes it very

difficult to see, especially on sunny days.

Okay?

In the front of your car, like the front part that...

If you're going to hit something, that's going to be the first thing to hit, that's called

your bumper.

Make sure that's solid.

The side pieces, like the...

On top of the wheels and basically the doors in the back, these are all called fenders.

Now, some people think: "Okay, if I have a scratch or if I have a ding", basically...

A ding or dent, basically if somebody took their shopping cart and hit it, and it had

like a little dent inside my fender: "Ah, I'll just leave it; I'll fix it some other

time."

Keep in mind, especially in a place like Canada, in the winter we have a lot of salt on the

street - when salt gets in there, it becomes rusty very quick, so you probably want to

fix that as soon as possible.

Your muffler.

So here's your car...

We'll pretend that's a car, and...

So this is your tailpipe, that's where the emissions come out.

Okay, that's a tailpipe.

We also call it an exhaust pipe.

And underneath is the...

A box that makes sure that your engine doesn't sound like an explosion; makes all the noise

very quiet.

It muffles the noise.

To muffle: To make less, to make quiet.

So make sure that your muffler is solid.

If there's any hole in it, you will hear it; your car will be very, very loud.

If there's any white smoke or black smoke coming out of your exhaust pipe, probably

means you're burning oil or you're burning some other type of fluid - you might want

to check where that leak is coming from; maybe just need to replace the whole exhaust system.

Okay?

And shocks.

So, when you're driving and you, like...

Let's say you're on the road and there's, like, a big pothole...

Again, this is something that happens in cold countries because the ice breaks the street,

and you have sometimes holes.

When you go on the pothole, if your car goes really hard down, that means your shocks are

worn.

Okay?

So you might want to replace the shocks.

Shocks should be soft; bumps shouldn't be too hard, you shouldn't feel, like, shocked

by the bump.

Okay?

Inside or a little bit outside, you have your side-view mirror so you can check your blind

spot, you have your rear-view mirror so you know who's behind you.

Okay?

Make sure these are good and not cracked.

You have...

If you have a manual transmission, then you have your stick shift; first, second, third,

fourth, etc.

So we also call it a gear shift.

Automatic, you have parking, rear, neutral...

Sorry.

Rear, neutral, drive, etc.

Manual, you have your stick, go into all your gears.

Where your feet are, automatic - gas, brake; if you have manual transmission - clutch.

If your clutch is grinding, like: "Err", every time you probably try to put it into a gear,

like: "Err, grr", it's grinding, might need a new clutch; you might need to replace that.

Odometer, make sure your odometer is working; it's checking your distance.

Every time you move, the odometer goes up and collects the total number of kilometers

or miles travelled.

If you play with that, in Canada, for example...

If you try to turn it to go back to reduce the mileage, you can go to jail for that;

that's actually a crime.

A speedometer, make sure your speedometer...

Sometimes we just call it a speedo; not like the bathing suit, just like a speedometer,

but short: speedo.

If your speedo is not working and you don't know how fast you're driving, that could be

a big issue; fix that as well.

Before the winter comes, make sure your defroster works so your windows don't get all foggy.

Make sure your heater works, make sure your vent works.

You have a...

There's basically a fan under the hood, make sure that it's working properly, everything's

good, you're safe for the winter.

Now, this is all very basic.

The reason you need to know this stuff is so if you go to a mechanic and he...

He probably sees you don't know anything about cars, he can charge you for things that you

don't know, that you don't need.

Be careful about that.

Have some basic knowledge of your car.

If you're going to go on a road trip...

And I have a very good video about getting ready to go on a road trip - watch that.

Make sure your car is in good shape.

Make sure if you're stuck in the middle of nowhere, you know at least a little bit of

basic maintenance things that you can do to help yourself.

Now, if you want to know more about actually driving, check out some of the other videos

we have on engVid from some of the other teachers; Alex and Emma have a video on these; very

good lessons.

Just put "driving" in the search box at www.engvid.com, and you will see these.

And if you have any questions, please go to www.engvid.com, join the forum; I'll be happy

to answer your questions.

There's also a quiz where I'll basically test your knowledge a little bit about all this

stuff.

If you like the video, please subscribe to my YouTube channel; I'd love to have you and

love to be part of your English lessons.

And yeah, come back again soon, see us, and we'll see you then.

Bye-bye.