Automotive Industry News & Information - Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair

When you are having trouble with your car or truck starting and you open the hood up to take a peek to see this....you'll see what an overly corroded battery looks like. This happens naturally over time on vehicle battery terminals. If you are like 99% of normal Jefferson City drivers, you don't check your oil or your battery so you don't keep an eye on the amount of corrosion that's building up on your car or truck battery. Here at Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair, we do and 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%. Way before it gets to this point, we will be suggesting you consider replacing the battery.

At Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair in Jefferson City, we understand all too well the importance of changing your oil regularly. Three to five thousand miles sounds like a lot, but it doesn’t really take that long to rack them up. The busier you are, the more you probably drive, and the more likely you are to forget it’s time to change your oil. Here are some reasons to pay attention to your oil changes, and help you better understand why oil changes are so important.

If you drive a car, truck, or SUV with a manual transmission, you may have heard the term “pilot bearing” or “pilot bushing” before. At Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair in Jefferson City, we know that the first step to keeping your vehicle maintained is knowing something about how it works. Here’s some helpful information on the pilot bearing, and how to know if yours needs to be replaced.

In the diesel world, "blow-by" is a term you're bound to run across at some point if your line of work involves diesel-powered vehicles of any kind. What is blow-by, what causes it, and how concerned should you be? At Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair in Jefferson City, MO, our fleet maintenance and diesel technicians see it on a regular basis. Here we'll take a quick look at blow-by, correcting it, and preventing it.

What is Blow-By? - Diesel blow-by is a term that describes an event of lost compression into the crankcase. Blow-by occurs whenever a burnt or unburnt fuel and air mixture escape from the cylinder and past the piston rings and into the crankcase. In a perfect world, the piston would be sealed tightly in the cylinder, able to move up and down but keeping all the air and fuel and exhaust that enters or exits the cylinder during the combustion process out of the crankcase. As you'll see, this perfect world doesn't exist, but it is important to minimize the amount of blow-by in a diesel engine.

Changing the oil in big trucks and commercial vehicles is an expensive, but necessary, part of keeping your vehicles going. You don’t want to wait until it’s too late to change your oil, but changing it too early can be a waste of time and money. Having your oil tested regularly helps us to hone in on exactly how often your oil needs to be changed, to optimize reliability and efficiency.

If you drive a car with a manual transmission, you’ve undoubtedly been told that you’re supposed to downshift to slow down, instead of relying completely on the brakes. But what is the science behind that, and does it matter? Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair in Jefferson City explains.

Diesel engines are known for their reliability - that’s probably at least partially why you bought one. However, like all things, diesels and their components wear out eventually. Fortunately, the technicians at Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair in Jefferson City, MO have you covered. Here are some fuel system issues to watch out for.

Transmissions are one of the more mysterious and unknown aspects of automotive engineering, to most people. In the modern world, this is more true than ever, making technicians with expertise in transmission maintenance and repair more of a necessity than a convenience. At Donnie Braun & Sons Auto Repair in Jefferson City, our technicians have the skill, knowledge, and equipment necessary to diagnose and repair any sort of transmission issue you may be experiencing with your Dodge, Chevrolet, or Ford diesel pickup.