Sometimes busy Marion residents dream about going back to the “simpler” days of our grandparents. But if you could travel back in time and take a road trip around Iowa in a Model T, you might change your mind. The improved designs and quality of today's automobiles have significantly reduced the amount of time Marion residents spend at the side of the road during breakdowns. With proper maintenance, today's vehicles can stay on the road longer than ever before.

Some of those improvements, however, have led to higher repair costs. For example, older cars often broke down from vapor lock. Gas vaporized while traveling from the gas tank to the fuel pump. No gas, no power. The car quits going. The solution was simple — you just sat by the road until the car would start up again. Today's Marion drivers would hardly tolerate that kind of inconvenience, and it's likely that yesterday's Marion drivers didn't care much for it, either. So on today's vehicles, the fuel pump is actually located inside the gas tank. Problem solved. No more vapor lock. The downside is that now it costs a lot more to repair or replace a fuel pump at Marion area auto service centers.

Marion drivers certainly should be grateful for the improvements in auto design that keep us off the side of the road, but it comes at a price. Vehicle care in Iowa  simply costs more than it used to. So if you think about it, Marion drivers can avoid many vehicle repairs by preventive maintenance. If we plan for maintenance, we can avoid a lot of costly repairs.

Just a bit of auto advice from Blair's Ferry Automotive: If you like new vehicles and can afford them, then buy them. But if you are buying a new vehicle every few years because you're afraid of the higher repair costs for older vehicles, then you ought to take a second look at the numbers. You can save a lot of money on car payments and Iowa auto insurance with an older vehicle and preventive auto maintenance can help you avoid most car repair bills. And if you budget for preventive maintenance you have done at Blair's Ferry Automotive, it can become as routine as a car payment — only a whole lot less!

Blair's Ferry Automotive
1565 Blairs Ferry Rd.
Marion, Iowa 52302
319-447-6310
http://www.blairsferryautomotive.com