These Are The Minor Fixes On Your Car That You Keep Putting Off

Maybe I should crawl under my pickup and put air in the spare tire. Maybe I should replace that spare tire since it came with the truck 16 years ago. I don’t know, seems like a lot of work.

Ugh. I need to replace the door on my Suburban. It’s an ‘87 so it’s like a handful of bolts, a few screws, and some rubber seals but UUUUGGGHHHH what a pain. LOL!

Last year, i got rear ended while making a right turn on red, which pushed in the rear bumper facia on the driver’s side. Essentially, my Mazda now has a ‘Camry Dent.’

I got several quotes to fix the damage, submitted the highest one to the other driver’s insurance company and got a check a few weeks later.

However I still have not gotten around to getting the bumper pushed out. To me, doing without my car for 2-3 days for such a minor issue doesn’t seem worth the hassle, especially with the current price of a Lyft to/from work ($30 each way.)

I have a 2012 Honda Odyssey that’s just shy of 150K miles. The power door locks on the front doors no longer work. I can hear the mechanism trying to lock, and the sliding doors and rear hatch all lock. But the physical locks on the driver and passenger door just don’t fire. Most of the time. Sometimes the passenger door will lock, especially when the automatic lock kicks in as you start to drive. That’s especially annoying when I don’t notice it and the next day try to open the passenger side, find it locked, then have to go around to the driver’s side and lean across to unlock it.

Because I work remotely and drive about 250 miles a month, I figure the cost isn’t worth it at this point.

My 98 Volvo has a dash squeak when I hit bumps. I just gotta get under there and tighten a couple bolts probably…. Or maybe just drop some silicon adhesive down there. I don’t know, but also i really don’t care that much.

My 92 Chevy could probably use some fresh u-joints on the driveshaft. They’re sitting on my desk right now. I don’t get a vibration while driving, so it’s probably not an issue. quick fix… I just gotta do it.

My 58 Volvo needs the driver door latch adjusted so it doesn’t pop open around corners. It’s only happened twice. 2 bolts. I’ll get to it when I get to it. It doesn’t go fast at all, and as long as I crack the window and slam the door shut it’s not an issue.

My 2000 Volvo race car just needs the motor reassembled and dropped back in there. Should be a quick weekend or three. Gotta run the block and new pistons over to a machine shop really quick. Might do that this afternoon.

Last year, I bought a dash cam after a close encounter with a dump truck merging into my lane on I-285.

I set up the dash cam and powered up with the cigarette lighter cord that came with it. It looked a bit sloppy but I was okay with it.

Until I needed the outlet for my phone, then I wasn’t

So back to Amazon i go to purchase the hard wire kit for the dash cam.

The hard wire kit has been sitting for nearly six month on my work bench, mocking me.

First it was too cold, then i cracked a rib and didn’t want to try to contort myself under the dash to hook up the wiring, then I took a look at the interior trim and couldn’t decide how to route the cable without completely tearing up the car.....

And still the hardwire kit continues to sit on my work bench...

Mocking me.

I’m pretty sure I heard it say ‘Nevermore’ the other day...

I’ve got two.

My car was in a minor fender bender before I bought it resulting in a solid price for minor cosmetic damage that had been repaired. One thing got missed in the repair, something that is a ‘thing’ for BMWs that have the fancy headlights that turn with the wheel, was the right headlight pointing down. The derp headlight happens when the plastic ball falls out of the little socket/joint inside the headlight assembly. This happens typically after an accident and can be fixed but you have to take the entire bumper off to get the headlight assembly off and I’ve been neglecting it for a couple years now.

The other is welding the front sway bar frame mount to the first gen Montero, the prior owner rigged it crappily and the part is irreplaceable so I get to graduate to garage mechanic 201.

Windshield - several dings (most repaired with resin from Amazon and a thingy that forces it into the divot. But got struck by a stone from a truck near the edge and started an edge crack which grew...

I taped it with surgical tape (with threads in) and covered that with the resin and it’s stopped growing and is only a few inches big. I know it’s a hazard but Progressive is a PITA with windshields - you have to report it and have a claims adjuster look at it first since that crappy glass company that comes to your workplace to sell you “free windshield” replacements have scammed so many people.

Eventually...

Fixing my window tint.

Bought the car used and the previous owner had already had it tinted. It’s darker than I would ideally like, but not a big deal. But then recently the rear glass has started to bubble. Looks pretty terrible. I’ve contemplated removing the tint myself but then will it look weird not having rear tint? Should I remove all the tint? Should I just take it to a reputable tint shop and have it all re-tinted to my liking. With two young kids and a busy/expensive summer and fall calendar, time and money are working against getting it fixed professionally.

I was changing the cabin air filter in my car and it dumped something into the fan under the dash.

Epic pain in the back to get to that fan to drop it and suck out whatever is in it.

I keep running the fan on high and it sounds like a Harley with a bad muffler hoping it will throw whatever is in it out.

Might be worth having someone else do it. Same thing happened on my wife’s van and it was $75 to remove the dead RAT from the fan. Worth every penny.

Dome light. The very old adhesive wore out, so I have the holder jammed up into the recess sideways. I have the new holder. I have some RTV. I have a new LED bulb, so that I don’t have to do this again any time soon. But I have the light switched off at all times, because when you’re on stakeout you don’t want them to see you when you open the door and then leave it open because noise. So I just haven’t gotten around to it.

Clean and reseat the TCM connector.

I’ve got a 2013 Smart ForTwo that has a sequential transmission that has a bad habit of forgetting what gear it is in. You get the hamburger icon where the gear indicator should be. You have to turn off the car, turn on the power, row through the gears while it clears its head, then turn the car off and back on again. It’s worse when it’s cold outside. From what I can tell in researching it all I have to do is pull the transmission electrical connector, clean it out, hit it with the dielectric grease to keep the water out, then put it back together. I know its simple, but I don’t know where that connector is and it’s tight back there. Besides, I don’t feel like pulling the sub out of the cargo area to get the engine cover open. I’ll just keep dealing with it till it gets so bad I can’t ignore it any more.