Fox and Fox Service

My dad was interviewed for 21Alive concerning our business and our 50th Anniversary! Watch as he tells you a little more about our history…

Did you know that October is Fall Car Care Month. Fall car care is essential in ensuring that your vehicle is ready for the winter driving season. Colder temperatures and more challenging conditions put greater strain on your vehicle and make safe driving more difficult.  It is especially hard because no one wants to get stuck anytime, let alone in cold weather.

Don’t end up like this driver: http://youtu.be/68c7TxT_MD4

Let us take a look at your vehicle and make sure it is weather ready. Call us today for more information 260-424-1630.

There will be construction on Van Buren just south of our business starting today and ending October 15th. BUT HAVE NO FEAR. There is still easy access in and out of our business. Superior and Sherman remain untouched. If you have any questions or need help rerouting your ride in, please give us a call! 260-424-1630.

Social media is here to stay. For many of us, it is integrated into our social life, our work, and is unavoidable. We also know that distracted driving can be dangerous, even fatal, yet many of us engage in texting and driving. According to a poll taken in November of last year by HealthDay of 2800 Americans many engage in distracted driving. Here are some of the statistics from that poll:

• Over 1/3 of drivers (37%) have sent or received text message while driving, and 18% said they do it regularly.
• About 13% of adult drivers have surfed the Internet while driving.
• Results of the poll showed that younger drivers were more likely to engage in distracted driving. Men were more likely to drive while drowsy, drive after drinking, read a map, use a GPS system, and use the Internet.

A large percentage of the people said they know distracted driving is dangerous, but do it anyway.

Another statistic worth noting, about 6000 deaths and a half a million injuries are caused by distracted drivers every year.

So we know that distracted driving is dangerous, to ourselves and others, but what can be done when a common day requires timely responses to text messages, emails and tweets?

Here are three options:

PhoneGuard

This app automatically turns on when the vehicle is gong faster than 10 miles per hour. Once the car reaches 10 on the speedometer, the keypad on the cell phone is blocked, so that driver can’t read text messages, send a text or surf the web. Once the car slows down to below 10 miles per hour, the app turns back off. It will also send an automated response to whomever texted you explaining that you are driving- a message that you can customize.

For more information visit: http://optionsmedia.com/

Text Toggle

You must turn this app on when you get in your car. Once turned on, the app makes sure that you don’t get phone calls, text messages, emails, etc. Once you turn the app off, all of your texts and phone calls you may have received while driving show up on your phone. The app also features a customizable automated response that will be sent to those who have contacted you while you were driving.

For more information visit: http://supportsafety.org/

We’ve all seen or heard of 5w-30, 10w-40 and SAE 40 before, but for many of us we have no clue what those Viscosity Grades mean -or even that they are called viscosity grades. Let me act as your decoder ring. In this blog I will give you a little background on grades. I’ll explain how they come up with those wacky numbers and explain the basic differences between the grades.

 Before I go into all the great benefits of different oils for your vehicle, let me first explain what motor oil does for your engine.

Motor oil lubricates engine components and cuts down on friction. Friction causes increased heat (which increases wear) and the engine parts to slow down. Motor oil creates a small barrier or film between the parts in order for them to slide past one another. The slippery portion of parts increases efficiency, power and performance. Another important thing to note is that a properly lubricated oil uses less fuel than one that isn’t properly lubricated.

One more piece of the puzzle to consider: when the engine isn’t running, oil drips off the engine. That’s why the majority of engine wear comes from start up. Less lubricant on the engine = more friction and More friction = more wear.

With those factors in mind, let’s talk about engine oil differences.

The main difference between basic oils is their viscosity grades. Don’t let the word overwhelm you, it is really quite simple. Viscosity is a measurement of how quickly the oil flows through your engine. Since thicker or higher viscosity oils take longer to flow, it makes sense that an oil with a higher viscosity grade would run more slowly through the engine components. This means that SAE 30 moves faster than SAE 60, for example.

Oils with a higher viscosity provide more lubrication and a greater level of protection to your engine. The downside is that these oils also take longer to initially cover the engine components after vehicle start up. And remember; start up will cause greater wear on your engine than the general running of the engine.

Oil with a lower viscosity provides a quicker flow of oil to cover the engine components, thus minimizing the amount of dry running. However, lower viscosity oils provide less lubrication during normal running of the engine.

So what are you to do- protect your engine at start up or protect your engine while it is running? Luckily, it doesn’t have to be either or. Some oils react differently in different temperatures. These oils have two numbers in its viscosity grade. You are probably familiar with 5W-30 or 10W-40, they are examples of these types of oils. 

Let’s look a little more closely at 5W-30. Anytime you see a number with a W,  it represents how the oil will react in colder temperatures (when the engine is just turning over versus when it has been running for a while). As you can see, it has a very low W viscosity grade. That allows a quick flow of oil when the vehicle is first started. This coats the engine components quickly so there is less dry rubbing. Then as the temperature of the oil increases it becomes thicker and more lubricative.

So there you go! The mystery of oil viscosity is now solved!

We all know that July’s storms have cause a lot of disruption to our normal summer routine. Many of us lost power, some of us had home damage and others had vehicle damages. Although many of us can prepare the best we can for the unexpected, when that time comes it is hard to know exactly what to do.

These last few weeks we have helped many individuals, families and companies allievate some stress and work with their insurance companies to get their vehicle back to pre-storm (or better) condition. We are here Monday through Friday 7:30AM to 5:00PM to write free estimates and assist you. Appointments aren’t needed for estimates. Give us a call (260-424-1630) or stop on in!