Keep car on the road for less with these tips
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HERE are some top tips for lower-cost car maintenance.
- Take an evening courses in car maintenance. Try local community schools or colleges such as Pobalscoil Rosmini's in Drumcondra, Dublin, Scoil Mhuire in Clane, Co Kildare, or the Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology.
- Buy a Haynes car manual, the original and still the best DIY motorist bible. You can find a Haynes manual for just about any car. It has easy-to-follow step-by-step instructions and ranks each job in terms of difficulty.
- Shop around for motor parts. Main dealers will usually be the most expensive place to buy original replacement parts, but you can get the same parts (or pattern or secondhand parts) much more cheaply from your local motor factor.
- Scrapyards can be a goldmine for cheap secondhand parts. Try www.partfinder.ie, a free service that allows an online search for parts in 30 participating car dismantlers around the country.
- Look for good independent garages -- www.bestgarages.ie contains over 400 user-submitted reviews and recommendations for about 80 independent garages. The same people run www.carforecourt.ie, where you can request a quote for a service or repair of your car from participating garages.
