Marysville Auto Repair

We are going to start a new regular Friday post called Bud's Car of the Week! To kick off our new string of posts we are going to start with one of our favorite vehicles. Our techs love to work on Subaru’s. Maybe it's because most everyone here owns their own; or maybe it's because both of our current techs have over 30 years’ experience servicing and repairing them them combined. This is a 2005 Subaru Legacy. It came in for diagnosis because it was overheating. After talking with the customer about its symptoms we learned that it had also been leaking coolant and power steering fluid. The loss of power steering fluid was probably the reason the customer was also mentioning a noise with the power steering. Our Subaru tech did our full 29 point inspection and then over another hour on top of that to check out every little area of the cooling system and power steering system to look into the specific complaint. He found that to be safe the legacy ... read more

Recently we had a 2008 Dodge Avenger in the shop. The customer’s complaint was that there was a “coolant leak”. They stated that there was coolant leaking from the radiator cap. During inspection, our tech determined that there was a blown cylinder “head gasket”. The head gasket seals the engine block and the cylinder heads. When the engine over heats, has excessive miles or is just getting old, the head gasket breaks down and can leak. When there is a leak in the head gasket fluid can get out and it is now considered “blown”. Many people know that a “blown head gasket” is bad and expensive but they don’t know why. It’s easy to question why one gasket can affect so many components but this really is the case. Since the head gasket seals some of the most essential pieces of the engine it needs to be in working order at all times or the engine fluids can leak, combine or let contaminants in. This was the case for this veh ... read more

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So, this past weekend our team had the privilege of attending the 2015 Automotive Training Expo, also known as simply ATE by local automotive professionals. ATE is a weekend event here in the Pacific North West that caters to independent auto shop owners and their teams. There are management and technical classes as well as lots of time for meeting new and interesting people in the industry after class time is over. Technicians are able to pick the brains of other techs and owners are able to recruit trainers to come help improve their shops. Service writers are able to take classes to ensure they have the skills to offer the best customer service around! Bud’s is so lucky to have an owner who believes in constant and continuing growth. With key note speakers at each event meal, every team member was offered new perspectives and a chance for open discussion with different teams. The keynote speakers were just the icing on the cake as far as Bud’s team was concerned though ... read more

This is what an overly corroded battery looks like. This happens naturally over time on vehicle battery terminals. Since you check your oil with every gas/fuel fill up (or, you should be at least!), you should also be keeping an eye on the amount of corrosion that’s building up on your car or truck battery. There are solvents that we can use here in the shop during a battery maintenance service that will help slow the corrosion process but nothing that can prevent it 100%. It is sometimes suggested that vehicle batteries are good for 5 years. We don’t believe this is the case. That 5 year life span is set by the manufacturer with the battery only being used to start the vehicle. This does not take into account any “extras” being turned on, you know, the computer systems, the lights and radio, those extras. Since most of us use those optional and non-optional items, we should really be changing our battery every 3 years. Bud’s suggests changing your battery ... read more