We often field queries concerning a repair or upgrade to a particular part and vehicle. How do I replace the heater core on my 1973 Ford Pinto wagon, or swap out a dead alternator on my 1982 Toyota Cressida? There are really two answers to these questions. The first is we don’t know, exactly. The second is about the same way you would on any other car. The specific answers to these and countless related questions lie in the vehicle service and repair manual.
While there are certainly a large part of the wrench spinning public who would throw directions to the wind, guidance can be a good thing when it comes to parts not flying off the car, arriving in one piece is victory! Finding the service manual can be half the battle. Read on for a few tips in locating the books for everything from a 1979 Plymouth Fire Arrow to a to a 1987 Mitsubishi Starion.
There are more or less two kinds of books when it comes to automobile repair. The most expensive are the factory service manuals. These are the same books the dealership consults to return out of orbit planetary gears and the like. Next in line are kinder, friendlier manuals. Companies like Haynes and Chiltons use factory service manuals along with cameras and editors to dismantle and reassemble automobiles to produce their own repair books. These are usually geared towards the amateur mechanic.
The first and most expensive option is to step up to the parts counter at the dealership. If the owner’s manual in the glovebox has the same year on the cover as that magnetic calendar on the fridge, then forking over a pile of cash may be the only option until some time passes. This is usually a fairly painful financial experience. Forgo the tru-cote and ask for a copy of the factory sevis or repair manual instead.
We’re on the internets, but we still cling to the antiquated idea that a bookstore is still a good place to find books. Bookstores that specialize in motorized interests are an excellent place to find a service manual for that oil-spewing NSU, or Fiat 500 you found stored under 20 years worth of Sunset magazines at a garage sale in Ben Lomond. A number of booksellers that specialize in automotive concerns have computers to help reunite books and car owners.
Summer means the return of flip flops and swap meets. The factory issue service manual and NOS windshield wiper knob for that ’63 Plymouth Fury are out there. Don’t just hit the automotive swaps. Branch out into flea markets and garage sales and keep your eyes open for a dog eared copy of the Chevy II twin-book set. Sometimes a book can garner interest in potential car purchases. Warning! A sawbuck plunked down for a seemingly innocuous service or shop manual can result in countless thousands of dollars sunk into project cars.
One of the best ways to gather information about a particular make and model of automobile is to join a community that already exists. If you’re the proud owner of something worthy of having its own message board then chances are good that someone truly dedicated has spent the time to either scan in the pages of the service manual, or host a digital version for members. Another great feature of forums is that someone, perhaps even the chiseler upstanding citizen that sold you the very clunker you own now, has had the same mechanical problem before.
A search of the internets will reveal hundreds if not thousands of used automotive service and repair manuals. Some of these are of genuine dog eared greasy fingerprinted factory service variety. Others the Haynes or Chiltons sort. While we have scored quite a few manuals from eBay and other fine online retailers, there are also a great deal of lousy bootleg deals floating around. Let us know how you found your dog-eared book of knowledge.
I need a manual for a 1970 Honda N600
For copies of both factory and aftermarket manuals, I’ve found Powell’s Books to be a good source. I’ve scored complete factory manual sets for Toyota, GM and Ford products going back to the 1950’s, my MGB and even for obscure stuff like Ramblers and oddball European marques.
Caveat: While the aftermarket manuals are generally easy to find on their website, It can be a challenge to track down their used factory manuals. But they do have them… I can tell you from personal experience that their brick-n-mortar store in Downtown Portland, Oregon generally has several shelves full of them. It’d be worth a direct call to their Burnside store to see what they have in stock.
Not an employee, just a happy customer.
http://powells.com/
I’ve got a service manual for the honda z and n 600 in pdf format available upon request.
Honda Hookup hosts nearly all modern Honda cars and quite a few motorcylces as well. You have to sign up for a user account to login, but its free and easy. And it’s well worth it for the documents contained inside.
Don’t forget your public library. I use mine all the time for repair manuals.
That made me laugh. Does Haynes or Chiltons ever reassemble the car though? What is the quote? “Reassembly is disassembly in reverse,” or something very close to that has to be the most common phrase in those books.
I spent $ for a GM factory manual for our family’s POS minivan, a ’98 Olds Silhouette. I was replacing the struts – a feat worthy of major bragging after you see where the upper strut nuts are and how obstructed they are, and they had locking feature and had to be wrench turned all the way off…no socket would clear. The factory manual says remove upper nuts, then remove lower nuts and attachment bolts. OK – but no mention that the bolts are splined and swaged in! I tried tapping them, wd-40, etc.
I finally after over an hour of head scratching called a professional mechanic friend 1500 miles away at home and he says “You have to bang them out with a sledge hammer, just pound on the ends and they will come out”. Might have been nice to know that little piece of information. Another useless feature is when the manual says cryptically “See removing trim section 9.4″…a section that is typically in the other of the three volumes than the one you have handy.
In contrast, my ’88 Dodge Shadow ES factory manual was a joy to use. It even was fun to read, and had sort of a history section and theory in the front of all the chapters on why the thing was designed the way it was, was the advantages were and how it worked. I loved that manual. Although the car was OK, it went through 3 head gaskets!
I bought the factory service manual set for my 1985 Cutlass Supreme and my 1998 Nissan Frontier off E-Bay. Some of the best money I ever spent as they have helped me do far more detailed work than any lousy Chilton’s or Haynes manual ever could. I also have a complete set of factory 1973 AMC manuals from a sadly departed Javelin AMX I used to own, I also downloaded the factory manuals in PDF format for my departed 1995 Sentra for free off the web on a site that no longer exists. Nothing beats a factory manual.
MetallicaMan0258,
I am going to restore a couple of N600’s in Texas. I am having trouble finding the Haynes manual. Can you help?
Also, if anybody has advice and recommendations to ease the pain, I welcome your comments. I will be recording my progress and will make available periodically to help anybody after me.
Thanks,
Funk Ambassador
Funkambassador@aol.com