Kenvil & Lake Hopatcong Auto Repair

When I walked into MY auto repair shop on April 1st, 2003, I was thinking, “This has got to be a joke!”. I had been working on cars for years already. Starting with my dad in the driveway, then moving on to chain shops. But I was sick of busting my butt, providing top-quality repairs faster than anyone else, only to be underappreciated by shop managers. Don’t get me wrong, my customers always appreciated me and my work, you are the reason I struck out on my own. I was burned out by people around me not caring as much as I did. The culture was, “sell everything you can, whether the customer needs it or not.” That stuff just doesn’t work! So, I built the Automotive Magic brand around a different philosophy – serving people while just happening to work on cars. Humble Auto Repair Beginnings April Fool’s Day in 2003, I had two bays, two lifts, two telephones and one me. I did it all. It was in that first year that I learned that serving peo ... read more

Here we have a 2012 Ford E-350 Super Duty with a 6.8L V10 that was having multiple cylinders misfiring. After checking for the basics, air fuel and spark all were working as they should. Checking compression showed the engine was having issues in the cylinder sealing d.epartment. Our technician Pete then performed a cylinder leak down test compressing the cylinder with air while the valves are closed. In doing this he was able to determine the cylinder was leaking past the intake and exhaust valves. This is from “burnt valves”, a condition that causes pitting at the valve “seat” where the valve seals the cylinder. Burnt valves happen for many reasons but no matter the reason, the cylinder heads needed to come off and they received a full rebuild from our favorite machine shop.   Before getting the heads back we also decarbonized the pistons and rings to make the bottom end fresh and sealed. The customer took our advice while we were there doing the timing ... read more