SIKI MGABADELI:  It's call-in Friday today, with an open line on anything car-related. We have with us Warren Tucker, who's The Car Guy. Warren, I was thinking that with long weekends like this people tend to travel. What I normally do is I just take my car in and say: "Look at it, is everything okay, can I just go?" Is that the best thing to do?

WARREN TUCKER:  Well, first off, good evening and good evening to the listeners. Look, you should, before you go on any sort of journey, you should walk around your vehicle and do a series of checks. We'll go through the checks right now.

First and foremost is you've got your safety checks. Your safety checks are your tyres and lights and your brake lights on your vehicle. So get one of your friends – or if you've got kids they'll enjoy it. You can make it a family activity. Let one of them sit in the car and check the indicators. You stand outside and have a look if these things are working. Check all the globes when you put your lights on – that your brights, that your dims are working. Most modern cars today will tell you that one of your globes is fused. But not all of us have the luxury of buying these modern new cars that beep at you and have conversations with you.

SIKI MGABADELI:  Yes, I love that.

WARREN TUCKER:  So once you have done your safety checks as far as your lights are concerned, now we need to look at your tyres. Most people do not have a tyre gauge, they are not knowledgeable on the tread thicknesses – what should and shouldn't be. And most people look at just the outside. That tyre runs all the way to the inside, and you'll find that sometimes the inside of the tyre is worn completely through. My suggestion there is just when in doubt, take your vehicle down to one of the accredited tyre-repair places and just ask them to have a look at the tyres for you. They'll tell you, no your tyres are good to go.

They must check your tyre pressures. Always check your tyre pressure when your tyres are cold. In the morning, when you start to drive to work, try and get to a garage that's as close to you as possible. Don't do extended trips and after you've been on the highway for 45 minutes then check your tyres, because the tyres on the road generate friction, friction generates heat and the air in the tyres expands and you'll get a false reading.

SIKI MGABADELI:  Oh, right.

WARREN TUCKER:  When you check it then, it will say 2.8, and you'll let air out. But later when it has cooled down it might be below the spec that you require. Most cars have the recommended tyre pressure indicated on a little sticker – in the fuel cap if it's a Mercedes Benz. For most of the German cars you'll find it on one of the door posts. Just follow the instructions. They've got a drawing there that's says…

SIKI MGABADELI:  For this many people…

WARREN TUCKER:  …people and luggage, it's X amount. Once you've done your tyres, and you are satisfied that your tyres are fine, you need to do the other checks, which are of the fluids in your vehicle.

SIKI MGABADELI:  Before we talk about that, just staying with the tyres, how often should one get their tyres checked, re-aligned and all of that? Just in general.

WARREN TUCKER:  What happens is motor manufacturers will tell you that a tyre will expire after five years. So if you are not doing the mileage but you've got tyres on your vehicle that are five years old, generally they are going to say to you they are now past their safety point. That's because a tyre goes through heat cycles; it's made from rubber and various materials, and they'll start cracking and showing fatigue. Most people end up changing a tyre, a set of tyres every two years. So it's normally every two, 2.5 years, depending on the vehicle you drive. All the people out there that drive GTIs or these fast cars…

SIKI MGABADELI:  Repazz?

WARREN TUCKER:  Rapaxx. They'll tell you that they can go through a set of tyres – well, front tyres – in 10 000km, depends on how heavy their feet are.

But look at your tyre life. There are little markings on your tyre and, once you get to those markings, your tyre is past it and you need to replace it.

Wheel alignment – what I say to people as far as wheel alignment goes, at your service you can ask the dealership to have a look at the vehicle. I always stress this.

Your dealer is only as good as the information you provide. You drive the car, you own the car. Bear in mind that some roads have a camber, a slant to the road. If you are driving down a straight road and you let go of the steering wheel and your car pulls heavily in either direction, there is something wrong with your wheel alignment. Potholes also play a role when your wheels are out.

I would say to you, when your vehicle goes in for a service – if you are still servicing the vehicle at the manufacturer – most of them have wheel-alignment bays and they can check it for you. If not, you've got Hi-Q, you've got Supa Quick, you've got Tiger Wheel & Tyre. Take it down there, speak to them. But again, the information you give to the wheel-alignment technician is what's going to help.

SIKI MGABADELI: Let's get to the fluids in the car.

WARREN TUCKER:  Yes. Most modern cars will tell you when they want oil. The BMW's will flash it at you; the Mercedes-Benz, the Audis as well. They'll flash it at you on the on-board system to say the vehicle needs oil.

If you don't have that system, the oil test needs to be done like this: in your garage on a level ground, not on an incline, not on a decline. It must be level, and preferably when the car is ice gold in the morning, before you start the vehicle, before you leave.

This also applies to water. On your water bottle you'll see there are always two lines – minimum, maximum – don't overfill it past the maximum line because you are going to cause a problem. It's going to push water out, it's going to suck air in, and you are going to end up with an issue later. Always try to use distilled water if you are going to top up your fluids in your vehicle – as far as your water goes.

With the oil, when you pull out the dipstick –  normally if you open the engine bay, the top of the dipstick will be either yellow or orange. You pull that out, take a tissue and wipe it off. Push it back in, have a look, wait a couple of seconds and pull it out. You'll see there is normally a minimum and a maximum mark. For most vehicles from the minimum to a maximum is a litre of oil, or a pint. Refer to your handbook and have a look there and see as per your specific vehicle. If you are short of oil, again, look at your owner's manual, put the correct grade of oil in. That's a whole other conversation that you can have.

SIKI MGABADELI:  I always trust that the guy at the garage knows what he is doing.

WARREN TUCKER:  The guys at the garage normally have two options. They say: "Do you want the cheap one, madam, or the expansive one, madam?"

Normally the one is fully synthetic and the other one is midgrade oil. If you drive a Mini your Mini used a fully synthetic oil, so it's the expensive one. Remember we can't all expect petrol attendants to know exactly what goes in your vehicle. But just for yourself you should know that your vehicle takes either a fully synthetic or a partly synthetic oil – for your own reference.

Once you've checked your fluids and made sure that all the fluids are correct in your vehicle, give your car a nice wash, get it clean. It's always nice to travel with a clean car. Try to limit what you put into the car, as in the passenger area of the vehicle.

SIKI MGABADELI:  Why?

WARREN TUCKER:  People will have tissue boxes in the car on the back rest and on the panel there. They'll have Coke and glasses and a whole lot of stuff.

SIKI MGABADELI:  Teddy bears…

WARREN TUCKER:  These become missiles in an accident. They become very dangerous in an accident. Also, if you think about it, the space that you are going to be in for six hours should not be cluttered because it's going to work on you mentally. Some people travel with pillows and blankets. Some people were travelling with chickens on the back seat the other day! So try and minimise what it is that you are trying to do – less stress on the road. Stop every two hours or 200km in a safe place. Get out of the vehicle, have a walk around the car, stretch a bit if you've got kids with you. Make it a little bit of a family things there. Look at the zebras if there are zebras in the bush, whatever is out there. And then move on your way.

SIKI MGABADELI:  So that you can relax. Let's take an SMS from Sabelo from KZZ, who says: How long can I test drive a car before I'm certain it's the car for me?

WARREN TUCKER:  That's a difficult one because, when people buy a vehicle there is more emotion involved there. The sales people are trained to work on that emotion, and you generally only really know that car after about six months to a year of using the vehicle and travelling with the vehicle. A ten-minute test drive in the car is not really going to do much for you, other than they are going to show you the gadgets. You are going to see how well the car drives, and the sales person is going to be in your ear while this is happening.

And with the vehicle industry the way it is at the moment, sales are tight, so the sales people are hard-pressed to get the vehicle sold. The dealers right now will generally bend over backwards to accommodate their clients to get the vehicle sold.

But what I'd say to the gentleman is take the vehicle for a test drive. Then go away from the dealer for a week. Go back to the dealer again, and drive the vehicle again, because now the emotions have had time to settle down. Go back and drive the vehicle again. This time drive a different road from the one that you went on the first time and take the vehicle and say to the guys, "Listen, I'd like to drive for more than 10 minutes". Once you've done that, you'll have some idea in your mind: Okay, right, I like this or I don't like this.

The other thing is a lot of people only talk numbers after they've gone on a test drive.

SIKI MGABADELI:  And by that point you are sold.

SIKI MGABADELI:  You are sold. Talk numbers before. Think about what it is that you're going to get into. Remember also there might be an interest-rate hike coming. You want to fix your interest rate if you can. Look at all of these things because they will impact on you.

SIKI MGABADELI:  And all the other things. It's not just about the instalment. It's fixing the tyres…

SIKI MGABADELI:  A lot of people will buy a car with these specials, where they say new vehicle R6 000 a month. You don't mind the fact that it's got 19-inch tyres on and when it comes time to replace them, the tyre cost is R14/15 000. So look at all of the running costs around the vehicle. The instalment is not the beginning and end-all on the vehicle.

SIKI MGABADELI:  And fuel efficiency? How do you figure that out?

WARREN TRUCKER:  Remember that the fuel efficiency or the numbers that are quoted by the manufacturer are done in a very stringent testing area, done on a rolling road. They've got an urban cycle that is generated by a computer system. I treat that as a guide. A lot of the time you can go onto the internet and you'll find write-ups and forums where they talk about the fuel consumption of vehicles. Some vehicles will be better than others. We've had the diesel conversation as for the mileage that you'll get on a tank versus the maintenance on the diesel.

But your fuel-efficiency figures are quoted on most vehicles. Take them as a guide. Most people would brag about the Toyotas being light on fuel. That was their thing in the nineties, and they used to punt that big time. They had a Toyota Camry drive from Johannesburg to Cape Town on a single tank of fuel. That was in the nineties. There was a big write up.

SIKI MGABADELI:  Was it real?

WARREN TRUCKER:  Ja. Again, remember, that car was monitored the entire way. They were adjusting the fuel usage the entire way, they were driving at 100km/hr. So they worked this thing out. But the vehicle went there on a tank of fuel. So again, when it comes to your fuel consumption, you need to be mindful: am I buying a juice guzzler? Am I buying something that gets 22 litres per 100km – because you are going to go broke on that fuel card quite soon.

SIKI MGABADELI:  And the way you drive it also makes a difference. We are going to have to leave it there. Thanks so much for your time. Until next time, Warren. Warren Tucker is The Car Guy.