Automotive News & Information - Hipps Automotive

At Hipps Automotive in Simpsonville, SC, we work hard to be the maintenance and repair shop your fleet needs.

Alignment is the position of your wheels in relation to your vehicle and how they interact with the road. When your vehicle is properly aligned, your wheels will point in the same direction as the vehicle. To maintain proper control of your car, you must keep your wheels in proper alignment. Otherwise, steering will become difficult, your tires will wear unevenly and your fuel economy will decrease.

mechanic working on ball joints on a vehicle

If you own or operate a fleet of vehicles or a commercial truck, chances are you’ve encountered a bad ball joint or two. How do you catch one before it breaks, and why is it important? Hipps Automotive in Simpsonville, SC has the answers.

Here at Hipps Automotive in Simpsonville we often do diagnostics and sometimes the problem is obvious after hooking the car up to the computer and reading the codes. However, sometimes it isn't obvious during a test drive or after hooking it up to all those computer programs! You know there is a problem and a Check Engine Light is on with the fleet customer telling you the car has been having issues starting and the light has been going off and on depending on several factors. No pattern, no simple answer but the problem becomes obvious when you start following the "threads of the issue" thanks to all that ASE Technician training.

Does your steering wheel feel like it’s fighting you when trying to drive in a straight line? Does your truck turn too aggressively when you try to go one direction, and poorly when you try to go another? There are a few possibilities as to what it means if your truck resists going in a straight line. Hipps Automotive in Simpsonville has the answers for you.

Your vehicle's engine needs clean air to burn the fuel – and it needs a lot of clean air. In fact, a typical vehicle needs about 216,000 gallons of air for every tank of gas. All that air passes through a filter that catches the dust and dirt. Eventually, the filter gets completely full, and because the filter can only hold so much, dirt starts getting through. At Hipps Automotive in Simpsonville, we ensure you get the best air quality in your vehicle and explain the process of where this dirty air is going to our area drivers.

Sometimes it is EASY to see if your car or truck needs to come into our shop for professional repairs!
1. You see steam rising from the engine!
2. The Check Engine Light is on!
3. The engine starts, but there is an odor that is not right.
4. You hear grinding or thumping noises.

While your exhaust system helps reduce noise output from your vehicle, it also significantly reduces harmful emissions from being released into the air. When your muffler and exhaust system are functioning properly, it significantly reduces your vehicle's harmful impact on the environment. It also significantly improves the functionality of your vehicle and improve fuel mileage for your car, truck, SUV or Jeep.

An exhaust system is made up of numerous parts that work together to rid your car of the exhaust gases that are created during the combustion cycle, as your engine burns fuel. Each part of your exhaust system has an important role to play in removing exhaust gases away from the engine as quickly as possible, allowing another cycle of combustion to begin. The more quickly and efficiently an exhaust system does this the more efficiently an engine can run. The main parts of an exhaust system are an exhaust manifold, catalytic converter, oxygen sensors, exhaust pipes, and the muffler.