Like to do your own mechanical work, Cincinnati? We get it. Cars are beautiful machines, that beg for you to get underneath the hood for DIY car repair—especially the European models. Even though we get to repair cars all day, we still get excited every time we get to handle import car maintenance on a new model. We get to fix your cars during the week at our auto garage, but on the weekends? We repair our own cars. Our garages are equipped with some of the best car repair tools known to man. Here are 4 of our favorites.
Get In Deep: The World’s Greatest Ratchet Extender
When it comes to car repair, some projects are easy. The bolts are within easy reach when you pop the hood. For all of the other repairs—the type where you need about two more elbows per arm to get to the correct position— you’ve got Tite-Reach ratchet extenders. Tite-Reach extenders are pure magic for getting into those really tight places around an engine bracket for your car repair. If you’ve done some DIY auto repair and changed your spark plugs in in the past few decades, you will know how essential a tool like this can be. They are simple to use as well. Slide it on the end of your socket wrench and throw your socket on the other side and you are good to go. It is available for 1/4-in. and 3/8-in.-drive sockets/ratchets, so you can be ready for DIY import car maintenance at a moment’s notice.
A Comfy Creeper to Keep You Off of The Cold Garage Floor
Whenever you take care of some at-home car repair, there is the point where you have to crawl under the car on the cold and dirty garage floor. It doesn’t matter how clean you keep your home garage, anything you park your car on isn’t going to be like lying down on a memory foam mattress. Luckily, we are here to tell you about the Pro-Lift Convertible Creeper. Not only is it a comfortably padded wheeled creeper, but it also converts to a wheeled seat as well. So, when your latest auto repair project is giving you trouble, you have a comfy place to take a seat and have a beer while you do some car troubleshooting and figure out your next step.
(Just About) Everything You Would Need In One Ratchet Set
Every mechanic, whether amateur or professional, needs a ratchet set. Sure, if you work on import car maintenance regularly you probably have your metric socket set, but this 204-piece socket/wrench set from Dewalt should get you through just about any at-home auto repair—whether import or domestic. Not only does it have metric sockets, it includes SAE sizes (which are useful for home repairs, even if you drive a Volkswagen), both shallow and deep socket types, Torx bits, hex keys, simple ratchet extenders and more. If you want to take your home car repair kit to the next level, this is the ratchet set that you are looking for.
An Oil Extraction Pump Gives The Professional Touch
Even if you have your brand new creeper to keep you off of the garage floor, if you can avoid getting down there, all the better. There are plenty of modern cars these days where you don’t have to crawl underneath to change the oil filter for your oil change, so why bother to crawl under to pull the drain plug. Enter the oil extractor pump. Sure, it looks like something you’d find in your kid’s college dorm room, but this Briggs & Stratton oil extractor pump is no pipe dream. You can use this little number to extract the oil directly from the dipstick tube, without the risk of stripping the threads in your drain pan. And installing a new oil pan is a much more complicated car repair. You’ll never look at this routine import car maintenance task the same way again.
