In a slight deviation from the typical posts I make here on The Track Ahead, I wanted to detail a small project I worked on over the weekend for my kids. We have one of these Power Wheels in the backyard that hasn’t been used in years. This model is the Power Wheels Dune Racer, which is powered by a 12-V battery that comes with the car.

In this post, I will be going over the installation of the Barrina T5 LED 4-Foot Shop Lights in my garage. My 3-car garage is about 10′ deep by 30′ wide, with a third of the garage used for storage. After installing the lighting in my garage, the amount of light produced has been tremendously improved over what I had before. Apart from the application of epoxy flooring in my garage, this is hands-down one of the best investments I’ve made in my garage. In addition to showing you the installation of the shop lights, I will also go over some things you should consider when planning your install.

If you are having trouble with getting your dash cam from falling off your windshield like me, then you’re probably wondering what you can do to make it stay up there more permanently. The answer is to apply an adhesive; the best way to do it is to get a VHB tape. VHB (a.k.a. Very High Bond) tape is a very strong double-sided tape, that will help keep your suction cup stuck to your windshield while holding up the weight of you dash more than adequately. You’ll typically find 3M VHB Tape as the VHB tape is proprietary to 3M.

Since my garage cabinets are all metal, I thought that the easiest and fastest way to get the roll of shop towels up and out of the way would be to get a magnetic shop towel holder. There are a ton of options available on Amazon, but I found one that I liked the look of best.

I tested several methods out to see what would be most effective at keeping birds from pooping on the side mirrors of a car. These methods also deter birds from pecking at and attacking your side mirrors as well. These are all pretty easy methods to employ, but you’ll have to consider the steps required every time you park your vehicle somewhere. Here are the methods I tested and my results from testing each one.

If you want an easy installation and want to avoid issues with safety with a window air conditioner unit, another convenient option may be to use a portable air conditioner and punch a hole through your wall for the vent hose. Just like the window air conditioner, a portable unit will likely not have ability to fully cool down your garage space, but it can certainly keep a small section of your garage cool and at least bring the temperature down a bit overall.

This deadbolt lock is called the U-Bolt Pro WiFi Smart Deadbolt. It can connect to your home’s WiFi and to an app on your smartphone, allowing you to remotely lock and unlock your door, as well as configure various settings and users on the device. You can even set up your fingerprint (or other family members’ or guests’ fingerprints) to unlock as well.

I ran across a Facebook Marketplace ad for a 2002 Audi TT that was initially advertised as the 220hp variant of the 1.8T. However, the seller made a mistake… turns out it was the 180hp variant with a 5-speed manual transmission. I went to check it out anyway because I have always been fond of these cool little cars.

Sometimes, the battery has drained down so low that you are in the single-digit voltage, or even 0 Volts. In times like these, a jump start will not be sufficient to start your car. This is because portable jump starters will have a built-in safety that won’t enable the jump starter if it doesn’t sense enough voltage on the battery that it’s connected to. Using a trickle charger also will not likely work because trickle chargers work only if your car’s battery still has sufficient voltage to start out with.