Automotive Industry News & Information - Oliver Automotive

Your car’s radio and headlights, plus a slew of other important functions, are powered by an electrical current generated by your vehicle’s engine. A vital part of generating electricity is having a place to store it while it’s not being used. This is where your car battery comes into play. The battery of your vehicle holds electrical energy while the car is off in order to help the engine turn over and create a spark to start internal combustion. Without a working battery, your car will not be able to start. If you allow our team here at Oliver Automotive to perform proper maintenance, an average car battery can start your car reliably for roughly four years.

In the old days, when your headlight burned out you just replaced the entire thing with a new glass bulb. Modern headlights are plastic assemblies, with a bulb inserted through the back. What this means, is that the plastic lens that light shines through never gets replaced, and eventually will begin to oxidize and deteriorate due to time, weather, and heat from your bulb. Today you will learn when it’s time to fix or replace your headlight assemblies, what options you have in doing so, and what the benefits are.

At Oliver Automotive in Novato, we know that the difference between a vehicle that runs for 80,000 miles and a vehicle that makes it to 400,000 miles depends on one thing; maintenance. Here are a few tips to avoid some of the most notorious vehicle killers out there.

Losing a belt on the road can turn a small problem into a big one instantly. At Oliver Automotive in Novato, we know efficient and cost-effective operation begins with preventative maintenance.

At Oliver Automotive in Novato, we know how annoying a dead battery can be. Here’s some information on the subject, that will hopefully help you understand your battery issues a little better. If your battery dies after your car, truck, or SUV sits for a few hours, the battery itself isn’t necessarily the problem. While having the battery tested is a good place to start, many people mistakenly make a bad battery diagnosis, when actually something in the electrical system is to blame.

At some point or another, it’ll happen to you. You leave your headlights on, your battery finally fails, or for some other reason, you don’t have enough juice to start your car. Don’t call a tow truck just yet, though...Oliver Automotive in Novato has the info you need to properly jump-start your car.

Spark plugs have been around since the beginning, and play as important a role now as they did a hundred years ago. It’s a good idea to replace them as a set at regular intervals, but sometimes one will go bad sooner than the rest for one reason or another. How do you know if you have a bad spark plug? Here are some indicators, from Oliver Automotive in Novato, CA.

Your vehicle's engine needs clean air to burn the fuel – and it needs a lot of clean air. In fact, a typical vehicle needs about 216,000 gallons of air for every tank of gas. All that air passes through a filter that catches the dust and dirt. Eventually, the filter gets completely full, and because the filter can only hold so much, dirt starts getting through. At Oliver Automotive in Novato, we ensure you get the best air quality in your vehicle and explain the process of where this dirty air is going to our area drivers.