After another round of trying to glean from my Chilton's manual information
that just wasn't there, I remembered that I've been meaning to enter this for
sometime now.  I know Marcus has reccommended Haynes general manuals over
Cilton's.  Why?  Also, what else is out there for the weekend mech to use and
learn from?

14 responses total.

Haynes goes into more detail and doesn't assume that you know exactly what
or where something is.  We have both for our Toyota and have usually found
the Haynes to be more useful.  (I usually look at both whenever STeve is
working on the car just to make sure to cover everything, but the Haynes comes
out first.)

I looked up old Chilton's in a university library.  I remembered from my
childhood (from the copies in the gas station on the corner) that each
section had a page of pictures of the fronts of cars so you could identify
what year/model each one was.  I copied some of those pages and used them
for clip-art.

Depending on what it is you're trying to fix, you could try the mfgr's shop
manual for the particular vehicle (if you can find it). Chilton's isn't usually
a bad choice and Motor has published a series of repair manuals for trucks. A
lot of the more mundane things that you should be able to fix yourself are
often not covered in any manual. Examples that I have encountered are
emergency/ brakes backup lights, driveshaft support bearings, and chassis/body
hardware. You have to approach the task with the attitude that "it's just a
piece of junk hardware and I probably can't make it worse ..." Oh yeah,
speedometers and instrument panels are also not well covered. It also helps to
take things part of the way apart and then sit there sipping your beer and
looking at what you've uncovered so far. If it doesn't make any sense to you
(and it won't after 4 or 5 beers), put it back together, ask someone who has
done it before and start fresh at another time (when you're sober).

The major difference between Haynes and Chiltons seems to be, whereas
Chiltons seems to go directly from the manufactor's service manuals,
Haynes will actually buy a sample car and take it apart and put it
together again, for the purposes of doing the book.  That means Haynes
generally ends up with much better pictures of the whole affair, and
helpful hints on how to kludge tools and what to be careful about.  The
manufactor tends to assume dealer service departments, and won't
hesitate to recommend all sorts of special purpose tools which, of
course, they sell to the dealerships.  Since Chilton's is working from
that, they don't seem to necessarily know what to warn you to watch out
for if you don't have those fancy tools.  And if it's too complicated,
they'll just leave it out.  On the other hand, the manufactor tends to
go into a lot more detail than anybody else (there will likely be a
specific manual dedicated to body/chassis repair, for instance.) Haynes
leaves out stuff they feel is beyond the reach of the average backyard
mechanic; for instance, automatic transmission repair.  On the other
hand, they're still willing to talk about manual transmission repair.
Chiltons leaves out even more; all they'll talk about is removing &
replacing it, & shift linkage adjustment.

I like the concept - "if it's broke, remove it" - I use this approach
frequently but you have to know when to stop or the damn thing won't
go/stop/etc. anymore.

I always thought it was, "if it's broke, hide it".
I guess that's more if YOU broke it, though...

No, no, no....

   If it's broke, wrap some duct tape around it.  If it makes some god-awful
noise, get a better stereo!

Duct tape is the modern variation on rubber bands and bailing wire...

Insurance companies refer to Chilton's and MOTOR magazine's shop manuals to
estimate costs & labor.  At least American Way does...

Well, that sure explains a lot.... ;-)

The better insurance companies pay based on parts and labour; with
labour being calculated based on "blue book" rates -- essentially, the
amount of time it would take a competent mechanic to do the job.  Not
sure if Chilton's publishs those blue books, but they're certainly not
the same Chilton's that you buy at the local mall.  The average backyard
mechanic is not going to find it helpful to know just how fast a
competent mechanic with the right tools can do the job -- but instead
with knowing how to do it right despite having the wrong tools.  And too
many mechanics seem to like taking one short-cut too many, and making
you take it in again anyways.

If I could find a book by Hayne's that would tell me anything about my car,
then I would use it. However, the only information that I can find on my
car is in Chilton's. Nobody will cover everything!

I usually buy the service manual for any new car I buy.  However I decided
not to get the one for our Subaru.  Each volume was $50 and it's a three
volume set.

I bought the factory service manual for my VW Jetta, and it is a bit dense.
I'll probably buy a Haynes manual also, since those (as mentioned above) are
about the best one for home fixits.

The absolute best ever was the "idiot's" guide to the VW beetle.  this was
written around 1960-70's (somewhere around 1970 or a bit earlier) and was the
very first (that I know of) manual of its type.  It explained in very clear
ways how to fix everything, how to rebuild the engine, etc, how to buy a used
car, and all sorts of little hints.  I used to have one for my Subaru which
was written by some of the same people.

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