A slow turn into a parking space should not feel dramatic. The car is barely moving, the steering wheel is wound around and there is little opportunity for anything exciting to happen. Then a front
The key slides into the ignition normally, but refuses to turn. The steering wheel feels almost solid. Trying harder only makes the key flex in a way no piece of metal that small should ever flex.
The car drifts gently toward the shoulder, and suspicion immediately falls on the alignment. That is understandable. A car should travel where it is pointed, and anything that seems to tug at the s
The tire-pressure warning light is not one of the dashboard’s more mysterious creations. It looks like a sagging tire with an exclamation mark inside, which is a fairly direct way of saying, &ld
There is no graceful way to discover how ABS feels for the first time. Something enters the road. The brake pedal goes down hard. Then, at precisely the moment when calm would be useful, the pedal beg
The sticker inside the driver’s door says 35 PSI. After an hour on the highway, the dashboard says 39. Four extra pounds of pressure sounds like a problem. The tires were set correctly that morn
At the tire shop, the choice seems too obvious to question. The front tires on a front-wheel-drive car handle the steering, put the power down, and do most of the braking. They usually wear out first.
A tire can look almost offensively healthy for its age. The tread grooves are deep. There are no nails in sight. The sidewalls still turn glossy after a wash, and the car has covered so few miles th
Here is a mildly alarming experiment: open the trunk of your car and lift the floor. There may be a spare tire under there. There may also be a little black compressor, a bottle of sealant, and a
A car can sit unused for several days without concern. Stretch that pause into several weeks, however, and the first signs of neglect may begin to appear. The battery loses charge, the tires remai