How Long Does It Take For a Car Mechanic To Diagnose a Problem?

If you’ve ever had a nose around your car’s engine bay or seen it hoisted into the air on a ramp, you’ll no doubt be aware of how complex these machines are. Thousands of components are required simply to make your car go and stop, let alone allow it to turn corners – and modern vehicles are the most advanced of them all.

Fitted with a battery of sensors, control units, switches and other electrical systems, modern cars are engineered to keep you safe and help protect the environment. When they’re working at their best, they’re fantastic – but their increased complexity can make them more costly to fix and more time consuming to diagnose.

It depends…

The short answer to this question (if there is one) is that it depends!

1. If the problem with your car is intermittent, you can expect it to take longer to diagnose. Faults like this first have to be reproduced in order for the mechanic to offer a diagnosis, which can take a while in itself.
2. The age and complexity of your car plays a significant role. As touched on above, the complex systems at play in newer cars (particularly those made in the last decade) can make diagnosing issues harder – simply because there’s more to go wrong.
3. It depends on the area of your car that’s affected. Suspension and brake-related foibles are often more simple to rectify, as the parts are usually easily accessible and serviceable. Untoward noises from the engine can be a lot harder to trace though, as an engine has so many moving parts – and disassembly may be required to offer a confirmed diagnosis.

Get your car diagnosed today

Here at Vital Vehicle Care, we have two decades’ experience diagnosing and repairing cars of all makes and models. So, whether you have a Vauxhall or a Ferrari, our trusted car mechanics in Peterborough can track down the issue and get it sorted. Contact us today!