Any tips on Car maintenance?

[Snickle1980]

I have a Scooby Doo van That i found in the first week. She's a sturdy ship, but that front right tire is getting to 50% quality awfully fast.

What i DON'T want to happen is a breakdown during a run into town. I need to pick up some heavy clues this next run into town, and I need a reliable Mystery Machine.

What sort of mechanical skills do i need to start maintaining this thing? What can i do to build up the XP? I've read some books and have my multipliers up. Is there something similar to carpentry where i can take things apart?

Googling PZ things will often bring up previous builds and out of date info...whats the latest intel on Vans?

[⛩️ BOT Mushin ⛩]

Mechanical skill, car battery charger, toolbox with everything required.

Same way you pop open a trunk is the same way you interact with car parts just at the front instead. You can swap parts in and out or repair current ones. Some parts are standard, performance or heavy duty.

[Nordil(Hun)]

First things first.

1.In order to be able to do maintenance you need to have read the appropriate Manual.
There are three types, one for commercial, one for sports and the third one for vans and pickups (heavy duty???). Also take into consideration that for vans and pickups nearly every kind of replacement and repair skill requirement is one level higher than for commercials. (Not sure about sports, did not bother to check.)

2.Tire quality. There are still (supposedly!) three kinds of tires, regular, something and performance. These three kinds are actually different in quality if i know well, Performance type is the best quality.

3.Thirdly: In order to do maintenance on your car, first you need skills, secondly you need either spare parts, or certain items.
As in you can fix trunk, and car seats (however i think you need to remove the seat first!), but you cannot fix a door and tire. (At least for now.)
So to repair a trunk or a hood, you can use a welding torch and some metel sheets.
To repair a car seat you need some duct tape and/or other stuff, you can check this when you look under the hood.

4. Engine Quality vs Engine Status:
Engine Quality cannot be improved. If it is around under 40 the car occasionally will just stop, as in the engine stops. The lower the number the harder to start the car. You can find 100 Engine status cars with 0 or 1 Engine quality and those will never even start. Status can be repaired Quality can never be increased.

5.Fifth: Maintenance. This is where it gets tricky:

You can gain xp every day for every single part that you remove and replace. However, some parts can get damaged while you do this. And the damage chance is NOT necessarily tied to your skill level.

Folks and I as well will suggest you to replace the front and rear lights every day and also the battery and the radio. Nothing else. With this you can get to level 2 skill level pretty easily and steadily without damaging your car. You can actually continue this until you reach max level. (Safe route!)
If you get more cars, you will be able to do this more times per day. With about 4 cars you should be able to get to level 2 within a week or 2.
However if you find some of those wreck cars, that have nearly everything under 10%, you can remove and replace everything there. (Except for the engine! check the engine as usually they are VERY VERY HIGH ENGINE QUALITY, so might be worth to fix em up!)
Because you can do it until you succeed or completely broke the part. For instance removing the windshield requires for heavy duty cars i think level 4. With level 3 you can start trying to remove it since you will most likely damage it a few times while removing it. However, even if you have level 4 skill, if your STR is not high enough, or you are encumbered etc. You will still have a good chance to damage the windshield even though you are able to remove it with 100% success rate.
If i recall well: Car seats, hood, trunk, windshields and windows of a car are like this. You have a good chance to damage them if your STR is not high enough, even though you have the required skills. Not sure about the breaks and all the other 3-5 weight stuff though.

Without amateur mechanic, and fast learner and books read, you should be able to advance with one car to level 2 i think in about less than 10 days. But i might remember wrong.