How did you all learn about the more advanced workings of your car?

[Deoxyribonucleicvitriol]

I am eager to gain hands-on experience with cars but I don't really know where to start... I mean I could fool around with an old engine all day long but it would basically just suck money out of my pocket and I would still be inexperienced.

I'm kind of a frugal guy, and I don't want to be paying people 1000s of dollars to do things I can do on my own, and probably better, for free (after all... who takes care of their stuff better than the owner?)

I would like to be an auto mechanic or something for a summer, but I know that a shop isn't going to want some ignorant 18-year-old screwing around with expensive car parts.

I'm going to college in August and I have a full-time job up to that. I was thinking maybe something next summer.... I would like to learn how to build engines [img]tongue.gif[/img] It would be pimp to know how to just buy all of the parts and assemble your own engine.

[j_downey50]

check out a vocational school. there's one here and they have a full auto department. everything from body work to engine work. you can actually take your car there to get it fixed for free if there's a problem, but then again you're screwed if they mess something up. you can take classes and they teach you right there, hands on. they also have classes taught in classrooms to go with it.

[SirShaun]

Read books. Im at the same point you are. Im searching ebay for engine building books and etc. Jesse Jame learned everything from reading. Ive also saw alot of other top dogs say they learned from reading.

[94TeaL]

i read books hands on experience and i have 2 years of automotive classes under my belt.

[Mogobs30th]

Hands on experience working on cars while they were broken down in the parking lot of the local Taco Bell. Can't tell you how many times I had a car break on me at Taco Bell. Reading Chilton's and Haynes manuals all day help too. But I have been doing things like that since I was 15, and that was 8 years ago. You just have to get dirty and read up on some of this stuff.

[3.4 [deployed]]

Mogobs learned the finer art of cursing while working on the MANY F*rd P.O.S. vans he had [img]graemlins/rofl.gif[/img] [img]tongue.gif[/img]

I got my hands relly dirty putting a 77 T/A back on the road. Also helped my bestest friend w/his 73 Mach 1. He had to explain to me that the distributor in front didn't mean it was a Bick engine in it. The fuel injection aspect I cut my teeth on my current ride & 2 full engine swaps along w/a complete swap from distributor to DIS ignition & freekin pink wires :mad: :mad: .

So, hands on, a best bud w/experiance & refrence material. Also, many, many mags outthere aong w/message boards like this one.

[Mogobs30th]

HAHAHA, pink wires.

[4thgenowner]

I had a few free weeks during the summer, my dad was away on business (he wouldn't kick me in the *** and call me a dumbass), I bought an engine gasket kit and tore my engine apart and took it out and put it back together. I learned alot, and some help from a Chiltons manual.

[camaronat]

I would get a haynes or chilton (haynes tends to have more pictures). Read it. Use it as a reference when you work on your car. It give you a basic knowledge of what is going on. Mostly just tinker with it, and ask someone when you come up with something that you don't know about.

[12secondv6]

Reading car magazines and books.

I have sooooo many car mag's

Also, with sooo many more car tuner tv shows I watch that too.

Also, watching and talking to people at the track

[maxcamaro]

horsepower tv [img]graemlins/popcorn.gif[/img]

[BLLDOGG]

car tv shows and this website along with my hanyes book. but mainly this website

[Deoxyribonucleicvitriol]

Thanks for helping me out guys! Thanks to you all I know tons more than I used to... which was basically nothing haha. I think Imma get me a hanyes!

[RallyRed 98]

Originally posted by maxcamaro:
horsepower tv [img]graemlins/popcorn.gif[/img]

horsepower tv is good, but they leave a lot out... not that much more than the haynes manual though.

[Deoxyribonucleicvitriol]

Yeah... I only get basic cable... plus TechTV (lucked out). Horsepower TV sounds cool but I'd never heard of it before now and the closest I've ever come to that is Jesse James and that Choppers show.