Kick Tires but Hug Mechanics

With new-car prices rising faster than the level of our life savings--and with today’s better-built automobiles staying stronger longer--nearly 40 million Americans decided last year to invest their trust and money in used vehicles.

That’s up 20% from only four years ago, while new-vehicle sales stagnated at about 15 million for the fifth consecutive year.

As used-car sales have surged, say researchers and overseers of the automotive guilds, so has a population of motorists spending more on dealer maintenance and garage repairs to keep their older vehicles running forever--or at least into six-figure mileage totals unheard of 20 years ago.

“The average vehicle on the nation’s highways is close to 9 years old, up from 8.6 in 1996,” says Mike Morrissey, a spokesman for the National Automobile Dealers Assn. in McLean, Va. He credits sustained longevity to the improved build and durability of the modern automobile, new or used.

“Ten or 20 years ago, 60,000 miles on a vehicle was really getting up there, and at 80,000 miles you were on borrowed time. Today, 100,000 miles is a minimal level. Heck, we’re even getting 60,000 miles on a set of tires.”

Used truck, senior sedan, scuffed sport-utility, weary school bus or retired police car: Last year, it didn’t matter. For every set of new wheels that left dealer showrooms in 1998--at an average price closing on $24,000--two secondhand vehicles were driven off used-car lots. Or found good homes through fairground auctions, newspaper advertisements, AutoTrader and the Internet. Also seeding last year’s bloating pool of the previously owned: more than 3 million vehicles freed for resale at the end of their two- or three-year leases.

But as with old homes and elderly pets, warns Ken Roberts of the Texas-based Automotive Services Assn., whose 12,000 members represent everything from parts stores to transmission shops, senior vehicles require greater loving care, and more often. With the bulging of used-car sales, Americans spent $249 billion on garage services, maintenance, parts and labor last year, compared with just under $200 billion in 1996.

Part of that increase, Roberts reports, results from a dwindling number of driveway mechanics as motorists choose to leave brake repairs, even routine oil changes, to Jiffy Lube, Midas Muffler and diagnosticians at franchised dealers.

“The modern auto is so heavily loaded with electronics, people just don’t have the knowledge or the equipment to make home repairs,” Roberts says. “And as life gets busier, most people simply don’t have the time.”

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Any used car can be a risky buy, but there are reliable rules of thumb. Better to buy privately from someone you know than invest in a freshly painted bargain from a one-man operation on a corner lot that was selling beanbag chairs only last weekend. Shop at well-established new-car dealerships that typically handpick their used-car inventories because nothing squeezes a business reputation faster than one lemon.

Used-car sales programs sponsored by major manufacturers usually offer low-mileage, well-tended vehicles with new-car warranties. Brands and models famous for reliability and value when new stand a better chance of offering those same qualities as mileage matures.

But buyers should beware of recycled rentals and leased cars. Motorists who don’t own what they drive, goes the expert wisdom, are less likely to coddle cars.

People who lease, warns Morrissey of the dealers association, don’t always abide by conditions of their contracts, because they don’t have a long-term devotion to a car they will drive for only 36 months. Such as the 1998 Chevy S-10 truck he leases.

“I don’t have the interest in hitting every maintenance milestone,” Morrissey acknowledges. “I certainly don’t change the oil in the car every 3,000 miles--probably every 6,000 miles. That’s acceptable, but not really advisable.”

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OK, so you are $9,995 into a 1996 Ford Taurus and need a good mechanic to make sure its pickup doesn’t let up. General guidelines again apply:

Franchised dealers--with an average 59% of their profit coming from repair and service bays--have long been the bad cops of the auto business. “Uncaring” and “unreliable” are the common criticisms. Sprawling dealerships are certainly costlier than Ernie and his back-alley shop. Even the National Automobile Dealers Assn. admits that many of its members come from the if-it’s-not-broke-let’s-fix-it-anyway school of auto repair as a logical extension of the free-enterprise system. There’s even a name for it: “up-selling.”

Morrissey, however, chooses to accentuate the positive: Large dealers can afford a $200,000 piece of diagnostic equipment for a heavily computerized car that may be well beyond the budgets of smaller independents. And dealers’ mechanics are typically top talents with mechanical skills burnished by constant updates.

“If you choose to, you can certainly build that personal relationship with a dealer,” Morrissey says. “And despite what hidden cameras on the evening news might tell you, actual fraud is very rare. . . . It might be a matter of ignorance or lack of training. We suggest that for a simple tuneup, don’t go to a franchised dealer. Use one of the smaller specialty shops. But if it is a serious, specific, internal problem, better to go to a dealer.”

And if you don’t like what the dealer tells you, if quotes seem high or the suggested work appears to be unnecessary surgery, then extend that medical metaphor: Get a second opinion.

For those in search of a reliable, personal mechanic, Leon Kaplan, host of an auto radio show on KABC (790 AM) and 40-year owner of Lancer Automotive in Los Angeles, has advice on making an independent your newest best friend. Look the service technician in the eye. Then deal.

“If the mechanic says the problem could be an oxygen sensor, ask him if replacing it will correct the problem,” Kaplan suggests. “If he says, ‘I think so,’ it might be time to look for another technician.

“Ask him if he’ll do the work on the understanding he won’t get paid if the problem isn’t the oxygen sensor. See if that changes the picture. I’ll always deal because we’re supposed to be professionals in this business, and we should all be able to look at an engine and say with certainty: ‘Here’s the problem, and if it isn’t, you don’t owe me a dime.’ ”

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Kaplan believes that the complexity of today’s autos--”15,000 parts go into a vehicle, and breaking any one of them will disable the car”--is causing the extinction of the Great American Do-It-Yourselfers, the driveway grease monkeys who spend weekends skinning knuckles and cursing fan belts.

The DIYers do it to save money, they do it for therapy, they do it because changing oil and spark plugs and windshield wipers was something their dads did. And, according to projections from an Automotive Parts and Accessories Assn. study of 800 licensed drivers, it is something that an estimated 10 million moms also do. Although women are less likely than men to buy motor oil--50% compared with 64% of men--more than six in 10 female car owners shopped for auto parts in 1997, the study found.)

Still, according to studies by the Automotive Services Assn. and Polk Co., die-hard DIYers represent only 12% or so of the nation’s 179 million drivers.

For many, it remains a noble hobby. Take Tom Sousa of Woodland Hills, a former Los Angeles Police Department motorcycle officer who unbolted his first car--a 1956 Corvette--at home in the early ‘70s. Now he’s stemming the groans and rigors of a 1988 Chevy Suburban with 100,000 miles on the odometer.

“My advice is to buy a bunch of how-to manuals and one for your particular vehicle that will teach you how to change an air cleaner, flush out radiators and perform compression checks,” he says. “They’ll even tell you when there’s a need for a new grommet or gasket to prevent you burning up the motor.”

Tim Vargo, president of AutoZone Inc., a national chain of 2,700 parts stores, says that although today’s cars and trucks are more complex, most of the intricacies “revolve around engine management” overseeing fuel and ignition systems.

“But there are lots of parts on cars that have nothing to do with engine management . . . and basically haven’t changed in 20 years,” he says. “These parts drive the do-it-yourself business.’

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And Vargo believes that has helped to keep the population of backyard mechanics fairly stable even though their numbers may be shrinking as a percentage of the entire car-owning population.

An estimated 55% of the motoring public consists of DIFMers--Do It for Me--according to the Automotive Services Assn. About 16% are both DIFMers and DIYers, mostly fair-weather mechanics who work their own wheels in summer but prefer others to change their leaky water pumps in Minneapolis in February.

“We are enjoying the strongest economy in history,” Vargo explains. “So clearly, we have people who used to do it themselves who now have the economic clout to have professionals work on their cars. So some fringe business has gone over to the professional shops and out of the DIY market.”

There is a third group, the DGDers, who just Don’t Give a Damn. Partly seduced by manufacturers who brag about 100,000-mile spark plugs and years between tuneups, mostly disinterested and confused by those 15,000 moving parts, DGDers usually ignore their vehicles until a drive shaft drops out.

“We know that more and more people are not maintaining cars the way they used to,” says Roberts of the Automotive Services Assn. “They don’t understand what is required to maintain an internal-combustion engine, and we certainly see a drop-off between that first level of maintenance [filters, belts, oil changes] and the second tier [rotating tires, changing transmission fluid, belts and hoses].”

Sniffs Kaplan: “They think low-maintenance means no maintenance.”

And so cars that with regular checkups and annual physicals should be finding their second wind at 100,000 miles will be choking on their own oil and uttering death rattles at 60,000 miles.

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But not Arona Luckerman’s 1975 Toyota Corolla.

She bought it 10 years ago. For $900.

Luckerman, a legal assistant in Century City, says she ran the expensive gantlet of giant repair shops that offered little time for older cars but vigorous up-selling that implied to her: “Gee, if you want to live past tomorrow, better get this fixed now.”

Then she found Kaz Parivar and his shop in Reseda.

“If the repair is essential to do for safety reasons, he lets me know,” she says. “If it can wait, he gives me the option.”

Parivar found an air-conditioning unit that Luckerman didn’t know was in her Toyota. He has handled her Saturday drop-ins and fixed the car while she waited. She senses that her bills are about 50% lower than big shops she once used.

The result of all this loyalty and attention?

Luckerman’s 24-year-old Corolla has just turned 160,000 miles and still passes its biennial smog checks.

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Paul Dean can be reached via e-mail at paul.dean@latimes.com. Times staff writer John O’Dell contributed to this story.