I heard a few months ago from one of my old car company media pals, that the word around was that I had died. Well folks I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the old geezer is still around and kicking.

For those of you, who do not have the foggiest notion about what I am talking about, let me explain. My name is Brad Sears and I have been in the automobile industry since 1949. In case you are a math and dates whiz that is more than one half the total life of the auto industry. I have been teaching and doing media stuff since 1957 and that is longer than I want to remember.

But I guess that mostly I would be recognized as the guy from PBS-TV's Last Chance Garage, which ran nation wide in the early to mid eighties. Beside that I did spots on CBS radio titled "At your service for car owners", wrote for numerous newspapers and was, for a time. the "Saturday Mechanic" in Popular Mechanics. I also did syndicated radio call in shows dealing with cars for a 30 year period.

But always my first love is teaching and at an age near 70 I am still working and have no plans on retiring. I am the lead instructor at the Sugar River Valley Regional Technical Center in Newport New Hampshire. I am still an ASE certified technician, and still referred to by my peers as not the guy that follows the book but the guy that wrote the book.

During the early eighties we worked with Autolite and produced one of the first after market clinics on the then new computer controlled systems. I spent close to a year on the road for them all over the country producing a 2 night clinic. It was a huge success and I met a lot of great techs all over the country.

At present my life mate Lucy and I share our 1840's country farm house with a cat that is indifferent to the various mice that scurry about. Our barn houses a country book store that draws folks from up and down the east cost.

For those that remember the TV show I am still driving the blue 1979 Pontiac that we used on the show, but only during dry warm weather. The rest of the time a 1997 Tahoe is the prime mover. However a 1984 Ford F150 pick up with better than 150,000 miles showing is the bounce around vehicle in the fleet and it is also the plow truck. Lucy drives a 1993 Dodge pick up that is bumping 200,000 miles. I guess that the reason for mentioning the vehicles is to point out that old is not bad and maintenance is the key to getting your money's worth out of a vehicle, thing.

Last summer we toured the eastern part of the country in the Dodge never thinking once about the fact that at that time it had over 175k on the clock. And the old truck never missed a beat. In future columns I will spend time on maintenance that is often over looked and stuff that the back yard Saturday Mechanic can do to keep the machine fit.

With the price of new autos near the "take a mortgage not a loan" level it is the owner's best interest to get the maximum performance out of the machine. Along with getting the best performance and ride from your ride, you will get the best fuel efficiency that your machine can deliver.

We will also look at some of the gadgets that are re-appearing on the market that are supposed to give better fuel economy. It appears that every time the price of gasoline goes up we see a resurgence of these miracle products.

Just a little side note here, we used to rate the difficulty of a repair procedure on the TV show by how many thumbs you have. The old expression that a mechanically inept person was "all thumbs" rates that person as a "ten thumber". A qualified technician would be rated as a "two thumber". So projects like changing an air filter could be a three thumber and overhauling front disc brakes could be a seven thumber, well you get the idea.

Well I'd better find a way to end this thing now or it will go on for a dozen more pages. But just remember that 10 pounds low on tire pressure will eat up to 20% more fuel.

See you next time.
Brad "Last Chance Garage" Sears.