My Auto Shop Info Hub

Without a doubt, everyone has their own special brand when it comes to driving.  From the pedantic to the problematic, we’ve seen it all here at My Auto Shop.   Whether you’re riding the clutch, resting your hand on the gearstick or overloading your vehicle, there’s a limit to how much we can put our cars […]

To keep your engine running you need air to combine with your fuel, at the set air fuel ratio. This mixture is what gives your engine the potential energy to combust. What amount of air and what amount of fuel though? Well you have a fuel injection map to scale up and down depending on […]

Your internal combustion engine does many interesting things. Most noticeably, it powers your car. To do this it needs fuel and air. When it has combusted the mixture, it needs to get rid of the byproduct – exhaust gas. These exhaust gasses are passed through the exhaust valves when they open, through exhaust pipes to […]

Your car’s wheels spin around, the pistons go up and down. So the question is how you take the lateral movement of your pistons and turn it horizontal to make it rotational energy? The answer is your crankshaft. It takes all the energy from the pistons and sends it to the transmission. This is super […]

Your car idles at about 750-900 revolutions per minute, rpm, this requires the valves to open and close 750-900 times a minute. Without the camshaft you wouldn’t have a working engine. It is what allows air into, and exhaust out of, the engine via the intake and exhaust valves. What is a camshaft? What a […]

Your car needs a certain kind of fuel to run smoothly. If your car requires premium fuel, that usually means above 95 octane. If it needs diesel then it needs, well, diesel. What it doesn’t need is petrol when it runs on diesel. That is not an ideal situation to be in. DO NOT PUT […]

Your car’s engine gets really hot. Mainly due to the thousands of explosions per minute. To cool the engine your car uses coolant, to cool the coolant, you have a radiator. Modern cars use newer and more high performance radiators for coolant to pass through the cooling system. So whether you’ve got an aluminium radiator, […]

I’ll confess, when electric vehicles (EVs) hit the market in 2010, I wasn’t aware of what their arrival truly meant for the future of motoring around the world.   The car in question was, of course, the Mitsubishi MiEV, which appeared in 2010.  A nifty, 4-door hatchback that promised to power you through 120 electrified kilometres.  […]

Asides from staring at an actual deer in headlights, potholes are probably the next (and far more common) enemy of drivers in New Zealand.  They’re no fun, plain and simple, although they do bring the benefit of giving you an idea just how much shock absorption is build into your car. It’s pretty hard to […]

Buying a project car can be an incredible opportunity, offering a rewarding way to spend your time while building up your mechanical muscle.  However, it’s best to keep a clear eye on the road ahead.   Project cars are notoriously time consuming and can lend to things going financially awry if you’re not aware of the […]