Mobile Car Detailers Are Expanding Into An Auto Detailing Shop

Well, having been in the auto detailing sector as a young man and then expanding the business to include mobile car washing, truck washing, boat detailing, and aircraft cleaning I can tell you that there is always plenty of business for those who work hard, give great service, have a fair price, hustle, and do a quality job. There is just so much business. Of course, that means you have to go from being a little company to becoming a real business. Now then, let's talk about how to expand a mobile car detailing business and turning it into an automotive detail shop.

Just the other day someone had contacted me because they live in a small town where the weather is not always cooperative for their auto detailing business, their operations now are primarily mobile. The have plenty of business and cannot get all the work done, sound familiar? It should, because if you are in this sector and doing everything right, that's a space you know all too well. In any case, he knows he has to keep his employees busy, gainfully employed making money, or they will quit and find more consistent work. Right, so he needs to get his business out of the elements and into a shop.

Only one problem with all this, the costs for renting a building where he's at are a little high, and he only really needs a shop certain times of the year. Second, he doesn't want to sign a 5 or 10-year lease right now, because he also has other business ventures too. Okay so, one solution might be to get set up with a nice portable building system; what you ask? Yes, a portable expandable enclosure. There are several companies that make these. One company is CSS USA, and I think they call their buildings something like the; carcoon workstation - get it; car + cocoon? Yes, cute right, funny too, but the darn thing works.

It pumps up like one of those "jumping party enclosures" for kids. Then you can drive the car right inside, and it's durable for I suppose anything, painting cars, doing auto motive repairs, or what have you, and I'd say just the ticket for auto detailing. I was in one not too long ago, it was okay, good ventilation and it was dry inside but raining outside.

Anyway, I discussed this potential option with the young entrepreneur trying to overcome the weather obstacle, as this might be one option for him. The other was a trailer enclosure to drive to the job site where the trailer sides expand. There are two companies I know about who make these especially for mobile auto detailers; one is in CA and the other in FL. Or you could get a Featherlite racing trailer and use that, but I suppose that would be pretty expensive. When there is a will there is a way in the auto detailing business, I always say. Please consider all this and think on it.

Critical Aspects of Automotive Cooling Systems

One of the more easily neglected systems in cars is the engine cooling system. More than ever, it is a critical component in today's highly-stressed and high-efficiency engines. As you may already know, the cooling system's principal function is to carry away the heat generated by the combustion of fuel from the cylinder head and the engine block. This is why the water, or coolant, inside the radiator has to be circulated. There was a time when all the car owner had to do was to just look for the radiator cap, fill the radiator with water to the brim and off he went. With modern systems being sealed systems, new car owners don't even have to think about them until a year or two down the road.

There is more than just a radiator, hoses and a cap to a properly functioning radiator system. You also have a thermostat, water pump and coolant temperature sensor plumbed into the system. And a fan. Today's cars almost always use an electrically-driven fan, but older cars had the fan connected to the water pump drive assembly. Now, while you can drive home with a faulty temperature sensor or a leaky radiator cap, having a blown water pump can destroy your engine in minutes. The same thing can also happen if an electrically-driven cooling fan quits.

It used to be too that all the temperature sensor did was to send an electrical value to a gauge, which you would look at to see if the car was overheating. Now, it is a significant contributor to engine performance, because it helps the ECU choose the proper ignition map for best performance. Even the lowly radiator hose nowadays has to withstand higher temperatures and system pressures, as well as a different coolant formulation. Where copper was the material used to make radiators, together with iron engine blocks, plenty of cars now use aluminum radiators and aluminum blocks and heads. So, the coolant itself has to have different anti-corrosion properties. As we said earlier, new car owners don't need to worry about these components early in a car's life. But it's good to know that any number of things can go wrong in an automotive cooling system. Knowing this, a car owner should follow a manufacturer's specific maintenance and component replacement schedule, so that you don't get stranded by the side of the road with a blown hose, leaky fittings or worse, a warped engine.