Properly caring for your vehicle is no easy task, especially if you plan on owning it for years. It might happen slowly, but the abuse your car takes on a daily basis will slowly wear on its appearance, damaging the finish and paint. Sure, routine washes help keep that coat of paint shiny and nice, but to truly preserve it for years, you’ll want to regularly give it a coat of wax. But we all know that takes quite a bit more effort than just washing your car.

There’s more than one example on this Earth of entrepreneurial people needing a product, discovering a suitable item doesn’t exist, and inventing something of their own to fill that gap. The same can be said for businesses as well—particularly your author’s local performance shop that was founded 25 years ago by a gearhead unhappy with the selection of speed parts in town.

If you are looking to get more power and better fuel economy from your vehicle, one of the simplest and most efficient options is an aftermarket engine tuning device. Some people might refer to these systems as performance chips, as in the early era of computerized automotive tuning, they were literally microchips that you would plug into the vehicle’s computer system.

As recently as few years ago, sedans dominated the roads, while sport utility vehicles or SUVs were the vehicles people drove because they had to, not because they wanted to. Owners took about as much pride in their SUVs as thoroughbred horse owners took in their mules. But then something happened: SUVs got better. Sedan owners started to realize that an SUV could offer greater capability, comfort, and safety. Minivan owners looked across the lot, and saw that SUVs could do almost everything a minivan could do, and look better while doing it.

Newton’s third law of motion states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. In your vehicle, the engine provides the action with acceleration, and it’s your car or truck’s brakes that provide the reaction of slowing things down again.

If you live anywhere that experiences harsh winter weather, you don’t need us to remind you of the inconvenience wintry conditions present when it’s time to go driving. It can make your work commutes unpredictable, adding minutes to your travel time or even doubling it. If you didn’t set your alarm early to compensate, well, you’re going to be late for work. And don’t forget that, before you can even get behind the wheel, you have to clear that snowy, icy mess off your vehicle so you can safely see where you’re going.

When it’s cold outside, it’s also cold in your ride. At least until the heater gets a chance to warm everything up, that is. If you live in an area that experiences cold temperatures, you need a set of winter driving gloves to keep your fingers and hands warm until the heater does its job, but not just any pair will do. You need something that will let you grip the steering wheel and let you use your radio, navigation, and heater controls without having to take them off.

Driving is one of life’s greatest pleasures. It’s also an inherently risky proposition.

Like most of your vehicle’s mechanical systems, a transmission requires quality, consistent lubrication if it is to be reliable and perform according to the manufacturer’s specifications. Transmission fluid is especially important in automatic transmissions, in which the fluid not only lubricates the transmission’s moving parts but also provides the hydraulic pressure needed to make smooth gear changes.

Buying a car isn’t exactly cheap and you likely want to make that investment last as long as possible. While maintaining what’s underneath the hood should be your main priority so that your car lasts hundreds of thousands of miles, you’ll also want to make sure the exterior of your car looks great for years to come. In the past, that involved regularly washing your car and doing a coat of wax from time to time, but car detailing supplies have come a long way. Now, you can be completely overwhelmed with all the available options for polishing kits, waxes, clay bars, and other detailing supplies that are designed to keep that new car shine.

Motor oil has evolved a lot over the decades, and today’s advanced synthetic engine lubricants would be virtually unrecognizable to the chemists of yesteryear, with their detergents, dispersants, viscosity modifiers, and other high-tech additives. For drivers, the proliferation of advanced synthetic motor oil options means better engine protection, longer oil change intervals, and even improved fuel economy; the thinner the oil, the less energy is lost trying to pump it, and modern chemistry has opened the door to a whole new crop of low-viscosity oils.

It isn’t every day that a new tool company comes along to challenge the likes of Snap-on and Matco. Taking a slice of the pie from well established brands is tough, no matter the segment. When you’re talking about something as important as hand tools, that job becomes a whole lot more difficult. After all, a mechanic’s wrench set is as important and personal to them as a knife is to a chef or a tube of hair gel was to James Dean.

If you own a pickup truck, you know there is no other vehicle type that can match its utility. A typical full-size pickup can handle thousands of pounds of payload and trailer towing with a cargo bed that can accommodate almost anything you need to move.

Second to your home, your car is one of the biggest investments you’ll ever make. In an ideal world, your car would be parked safely in a climate-controlled garage whenever you’re between drives. But not every car owner has an open garage slot available at all times. So, what’s a car-loving person supposed to do? Thankfully, an outdoor car cover can protect your vehicle against the weather, the sun, and even against accidental damage, vandalism, and theft.

Not that long ago, a list of best welders would only have been relevant to trained professionals. Thanks to advances in welding technology, today’s welding rigs are smaller, safer, and easier to use than ever before. Shade-tree mechanics and hobbyists can reasonably expect to buy a welding rig off the shelf at a local hardware store, and with guidance from a few YouTube tutorials, be welding successfully the same afternoon.

If you often travel with your four-legged best friend, you probably want to keep them as safe as possible in your vehicle. Just like humans should always be wearing a seat belt while in a car, you’ll want to make sure your dog is restrained while you’re driving. There are a few obvious reasons, such as making sure your dog doesn’t jump out the window or go flying inside your car from harsh braking. But more importantly, in the situation of an accident, an unrestrained dog could get seriously harmed or cause harm to passengers inside the vehicle.

Cars were made to be driven in a variety of elements, but are oddly vulnerable between uses, even when they’re parked indoors. Dust, dirt, and airborne contaminants settle onto painted and polished surfaces, quickly dulling finishes and inducing corrosion. As a result, any car you’re planning to store for a long period should be protected with an indoor car cover in order to preserve its condition, value, and appearance.

Photo credit: REDPIXEL.PL / Shutterstock.com

Few parts of the car ownership experience are as vexing and confounding as fading, discolored plastic…

These days, it’s likely your car is sitting parked for an extended period of time and not being driven. That means there’s a good chance that when you do go to fire it up, the battery’s dead and the car doesn’t start. Unless you’ve invested into a battery maintainer to keep your car’s battery fully charged, you’re going to need to jump start your car. If it’s stuck inside a garage, using jumper cables might not be the easiest solution. Instead, you’ll want to have a portable jump starter handy, and quite honestly, it’s a device you should keep in your car’s glove box since you’ll never know when you need to jump start your car.

Production cars began using alternators in the 1960s. As part of the electrical system, alternators made it possible for cars to use higher voltage, and led the way to the modern car charging system. The road to progress has not been without its speed bumps and potholes, however. The alternator must be considered as a possible cause whenever electrical problems arise in a car. The device is not particularly complex or fragile, but it does seem to be a frequent candidate for failure and replacement far ahead of other components under the hood.

There are many reasons why the Jeep Wrangler is so popular and passionately loved by its owners. But that doesn’t mean the SUV is perfect straight from the factory. In fact, most Wrangler owners see their vehicle as a foundation for upgrades, and there are plenty of accessories offered by the aftermarket to truly make your Wrangler unique.

Brembo, one of the world’s leading brake manufacturers and possibly the most iconic has announced its commitment to a greener future.

I love all dogs—big and small, fluffy and sleek. And the thing about dogs—they don’t know how big or small they are. A little dog can be just as packed with personality as a big bruiser. Yet many owners fail to train their small dogs, and give them free rein to do what they please. How many times have you seen a Pomeranian or Chihuahua in a driver’s lap on the highway? Cute, but potentially tragic.

The garden hose can be a wonderful thing, if you have the strength to wrangle it, the storage space to store it, and the patience to coil dozens of feet of hose. For those who don’t, there is a solution. The expandable garden hose. A hose that can stretch up to three times its normal length when you turn on the water and that shrinks back when you’re done using it.

It may seem like there are about a million and one different types of car seats out there, but it helps to group them into the four stages of your child’s growth. Newborns come home from the hospital and spend at least their first few months in an infant seat, then move up to a larger rear-facing child seat, then onto a forward facing car seat with full harness, and finally a booster seat. However, many companies have designed seats that work well for more than one of those stages, adjusting to accommodate the growth of your child, so one seat can be perfectly safe for many years of service.

Are you a BMW owner who is happy with their vehicle, but feel like it’s missing a certain touch to make it their own? There are tons of aftermarket parts and accessories that can do the job, but sometimes a four or five-figure custom build just isn’t in the cards. In this article, we’ll take a look at the top 10 BMW accessories that won’t leave you wondering if you can pay rent at the end of the month.

Life seems to always find a way to put a ding in your car or truck, but that doesn’t mean you have to pay an overpriced body shop to get your car looking factory fresh once again.

Health and safety aren’t things you want to skimp out on, so having a well-stocked first aid kit in your car should be something you’re willing to spend on.

When you think about the evolution of vehicle design, things like styling, safety, and technology have changed in the most obvious ways since the automobile was created. But that evolution has also forced automakers to change how they think about the more minor elements of a car or truck’s design, including the speakers that play the music you listen to as you drive.

To this day, the Honda Civic remains one of the most popular cars to accessorize and modify, with dozens of aftermarket companies offering products for the compact car. If you own a Honda Civic and want to add a little excitement to your car, you’ve come to the right place. In this article, we’ll take a look at the top 10 best Honda Civic accessories you can get your hands on, all of which are affordable and easy to install. Some of the products on our list are purely aesthetic, while orders are functional and make your Civic even more practical.

During your baby’s first year, one of the most important accessories you’ll own is a car seat/carrier. The most important accessory for that accessory is likely an infant car seat cover. Sure, you can use a car seat without the other, but together they transport and shield your precious cargo from adverse conditions as you escort them, waypoint to waypoint, often through hostile territory. The best of these pod-like combinations provide protection from environmental extremes and prying eyes while deflecting laser fire and featuring autonomous propulsion via whisper-quiet repulsorlifts.

When a tire brand reaches out about a tire test day, what you typically expect is a bit of time at the wheel on a closed course, packaged with hours of brand execs preaching to you about the countless ways they believe that they are the best game in town. While the first half of this was true about my recent test session with the folks from Sailun Tire, the brand’s communication practices were equal parts refreshing and informative. Sailun tire is no small organization, having first opened its doors in 2002 in Qingdao, China—smack in the heart of where the majority of Chinese manufacture tires are produced. The brand has been growing steadily in the North American market over the years, continually proving themselves as a manufacturer that delivers solid quality and great value, as well as exceptional customer service and support.

ith the advent of built-in vehicle immobilizers and keyless entry remotes, the aftermarket car alarm isn’t as common as it used to be. Gone are the days of driving a loud car down a quiet street and leaving a dozen honking parked cars in your wake. But that doesn’t mean that car alarms went away, or that you don’t still need to think about installing one in your vehicle. Alarms today have far more features than ever before, including the ability to lock and unlock your car from anywhere in the world through your phone.

These days, we’re always on the go and living in a connected world. That means we constantly need to have our smartphone charged and on the ready. Nothing is worse than dealing with the anxiety you get when you realize your phone’s battery has just a few minutes of life left.

“Runs good!” You’ve seen that a lot of times looking at Craigslist ads for cars and motorcycles, especially older ones. But what does that even mean? Why wouldn’t it  “run good,” anyways Shouldn’t every car run like it was designed to? How do you get it to do this so-called good running?

If you’re an experienced home mechanic, it’s easy to spend thousands of dollars to build yourself a well-organized garage with practical storage and spacious work surfaces. But no matter how much money you invest in a workspace to make it easier to repair and maintain your vehicle, built-in cabinets and benches have one major drawback: you can’t rearrange them to suit each individual task.

Your car or truck’s horn probably isn’t something you think about very often. It’s just there, and it works until you hit the button. Until one day it doesn’t. Or maybe you’ve decided that you’re tired of the wimpy factory horn and want something that’ll give you a little bit more authority in traffic. Or you’ve decided that your car is too cool for that standard parp parp and you want something with a little more flair. No matter your reason, our picks for the best car horns can deliver more noise, more style, and even better looks than the boring honker that came with your vehicle.

A clean windshield is an integral part of having a safe driving experience. Along with high-quality windshield wipers, you’ll want to make sure you’re using a proper windshield washer fluid to keep your front windshield clean in between car washes. You’re probably thinking most windshield washer fluids are all the same, but that’s hardly the case. Some formulas are so ineffective that they’re basically like water. Proper windshield washer fluids will break down dirt, dust, debris, and even bugs on your windshield for a proper wipe. For this reason, you also want to avoid refilling your reservoir with water when you run out unless you have absolutely no other option. Think of wiper fluid as a liquid detergent for your windshield.

If you have done any home plumbing repairs, you’ve probably worked with hose clamps. One of the most common types of hose clamps uses a screw and a worm gear to secure it and prevent leaks.

Sometimes, the best place to ride your bicycle isn’t right outside your front door. Where I live, the local streets are treacherous for bikes—we’ve got dirt shoulders and high-speed limits with no dedicated bicycle lanes. It’s great for cars, but when it’s time to ride, I’m better off loading my bike in the bed of my F-150 and driving to a safe starting point.

Most new parents believe once they purchase a baby car seat, their newborn is set for any sort of commute. But that’s hardly the case, as parents quickly learn they need more than just a car seat. One important accessory to purchase is a baby car mirror, so parents can keep an eye on their newborn throughout the drive.

“^$@&%*!!!” That’s the sound of you as you drop a bolt (again) into the depths of your engine compartment, after tearing a dime-sized patch of skin off your knuckle (again). After stanching the blood with duct tape, you wonder: how do I hold onto something in a tight space firmly enough to get something else in place? I only have two hands!

Plink! The sound of a small stone dances in your wheel well for a moment as the air shimmers in the heat of summer, radiating up from the rolling asphalt ahead. It’s hour three of your road trip and you’ve long since grown weary from hearing “Baby Shark” on repeat. The kids are asleep, but you know the moment you switch the playlist, it’ll be all tears and tantrums. It’s an uneasy peace, but you’ll take it, trying to let the music fade into the background, instead of focusing on the regular thrump, thrump, thrump of the expansion gaps on the highway.

Turbocharging is an effective way to add performance to your vehicle, even if it didn’t come equipped with it from the factory. And if you already own a car with a turbocharged engine, there are many options open to you if you want to make it even more powerful.

Is your vehicle’s dashboard faded or scratched up? Is the sun reflecting off your polished dash, and impairing your vision? Do you feel uneasy about the OEM interior?

Antifreeze plays a vital role in keeping your car’s engine in optimal condition by protecting it from heating up, freezing, or corroding. The liquid is passed through the engine bay, where it is circulated via a hose, drawing in the heat wherever it goes. Once the antifreeze has absorbed all the heat it can, it is directed outwards through a separate hose into a radiator. Coolants contain antifreeze to ensure that the liquid doesn’t freeze when the car is in below-freezing conditions. Typically, antifreeze liquids are made from a combination of water and glycol chemicals that are also known to be corrosion resistant and act as lubricants.

Your vehicle’s engine relies on a stream of fuel getting pumped from the tank to the carb or injectors to keep it running. If there’s a problem with that flow, anywhere in the system, bad things start to happen quickly. Low flow can damage your fuel pump, particles can clog your injectors making the car run poorly, it can even cause your engine to run lean and end up with permanent damage.

Manufacturers typically make stock speakers from inexpensive, low-grade materials as a way to cut costs and still provide semi-decent performance. As a result, Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) speakers can make even daily drives feel intolerable. And if you’re a fan of music, there truly is nothing more deplorable than a great song being played on low-performing speakers.   

Unless you own a luxury vehicle with factory-installed leather seats, it would be best to equip your car with leather seat covers—they feel great to the touch, and keep you nice and comfy. Quality leather seat covers also protect your OEM seats from the wear and tear that’s bound to happen, especially from prolonged driving. And if you have an older car, leather seat covers will blanket all the flaws and raise your vehicle’s aesthetic appeal. Not only do they impress passengers and on-lookers, installing leather seat covers is a much cheaper option than completely replacing damaged seats.

We’re all trying to be safer these days, but that doesn’t mean you can’t opt for a change of scenery beyond the four walls of your humble abode. According to projections from the American Automobile Association (AAA), more than 680-million drivers will take a road trip this summer. While that accounts for fewer road-going adventures than Americans took last year at this time, down 3.3 percent, it is far more than AAA projects travelers will take by more communal means of conveyance such as airplanes and trains.

Just as there are different types of bicycles for dirt trails, urban riding, and road racing, there is a similar variety in the vehicle-mounted racks you can buy to get your bike from your home to where you want to ride it.

These days, nearly everything can be constructed from LEGOs. In fact, the company itself has done life-sized replicas of production vehicles, all with LEGO pieces. While most of us will never have the time to tackle such a daunting task, we can likely spare the time to build a LEGO car set. There has never been a better time to be a fan of both cars and LEGOs, with dozens of sets to choose from, including offerings from the more intricate and detailed LEGO Technic series.

Subwoofers are the backbone of a competition car audio system. They provide the bone-thudding, organ-rattling bass notes that will let you impress judges and onlookers alike as you try to outdo your competitors.

You already know that you can’t clean your car with the same thing you use to clean your dishes. The right product in the right place gives you amazing results, but the wrong one in the wrong place can ruin all your hard work. Well, when it comes time to clean that shiny chrome or aluminum trim on your car, or those billet wheels on your truck, or if you’ve got a really big truck those once-shiny diesel tanks, the carnauba wax you use for your paint isn’t going to cut it.

For most car owners, their vehicles are an extension of their personality. So it’s no wonder that they are always ready to go the extra mile to maintain it or even upgrade it. If you want your car to perform exceptionally well, it is essential to pay attention to the radiator and engine. This involves flushing your car’s radiator using the best radiator flush to drain out the oils, dirt, debris, sludge, residue pollutants, and contaminants stuck in there.

Black or dark-colored cars are sleek, elegant, and shine like a million dollars, but it takes a lot of work to keep up with their good looks. The problem with black cars is that any flaws on the body are quickly noticeable—from dust to minor scuffs to significant dents, everything stands out. However, with timely upkeep and regular maintenance, it is possible to keep your car looking like its beautiful self for years. Just make sure that you are using quality products.

When it comes to measuring lumber or hanging a photo, a measuring tape or ruler is just fine, but when you need precision, you need one of the best digital calipers. Just try measuring a bolt thread pitch, or the gap in a piston ring, with your trusty tape measure and see how it plays out.

Struggling with your wiring? Cut it out! Get the right tool for the job.

Get in, sit down, shut up, and hold on: here are the best racing seats for your ride.