OUTFITTING YOUR AUTOMOTIVE WORKSHOP

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A tool kit for self-sufficiency in auto maintenance and repair.

By John Vivian

Illustrations By Barry Ross

I hear a lot of new-to-the-country people claim that they enjoy working with wood or garden seedlings, feel compatible with the warmth and vibrancy of life, but are put off by engines...by inanimate metal. I felt that way, too, when I first quit the city for a life on the land. Fossil—powered machinery seemed contrary to the earthly values that motivated me, and engine exhaust and the humming of gears were too reminiscent of city smog and clatter.

But once hard reality skinned the romantic gloss off country life, I came to realize that, just as a modern farmer is as much or more heavy-equipment operator/mechanic as husbander of the land, self-sufficient country living is as much keeping trucks and tractors running as it is gardening or cutting firewood.

Country life is by definition lived far from town and from convenient services like auto repair shops. But this very distance makes us even more dependent on reliable vehicles than townsmen. Perversely, a major objective of country self-sufficiency is freedom from the consumerist rat race-in particular, $45 per hour, often unreliable auto repair services. We keep our engines running ourselves.

An Approximation of Life

And there is a satisfaction to maintaining machines. They aren't alive, but they approximate life in their mechanical way with metal-on-metal components running at high speeds and high temperatures... prevented from grinding one another into iron filings only by precision tolerances and a thin film of oil or grease. Auto work consists of replenishing those lubricants, refining fine tolerances between moving parts, and replacing worn components before they fail (and leave you stranded at night, 50 miles from home, in a raging snow storm). The tasks include raising heavy weights to work on what's in or under them, and removing, adjusting, and replacing metal, plastic, and rubber parts. To do the work you need tools to grip the fasteners that hold the parts together plus jacks, hoists, and ramps to elevate the work, and a place to get it all done most efficiently.

The equipment is different from common household and woodworking tools, but choosing and using it is as satisfying as any other hand craft. Following is my list of tools a countryman needs to keep the homestead wheels turning reliably. Not that you should expect to overhaul engines or change transmissions in a home shop ...unless auto mechanics becomes a paying trade or personal avocation. The time and expense of obtaining the specialized equipment and skills of a mechanic are too great for servicing a single old farm truck, the passenger car, and your garden tractor. However, using the equipment that I'll describe for a conscientious program of preventive maintenance and minor repairs should go a long way to assure that you'll seldom, if ever, have to perform—or pay to have a pro perform-really major vehicular surgery.

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