Deidre Parker

How to Be a Tourist In Your Own Backyard

Jim Lawrence, left, a Vintage Flights pilot with Randy Dotson after flying in one of Vintage Flights’ World War II training planes, the AT-6 Texan, 2018.

4Geocaching in Boling Park Geocaching is essentially an outdoor treasure hunt, in which participants use a GPS or mobile device to navigate to geocache containers. The geocache containers, or “caches,” typically have a small notebook to log your visit and little souvenirs for you to take with you and replace with a small item you brought from home. There are geocaches hidden all over Cherokee County, but Boling Park happens to have three in close proximity, GC Codes: GC1H79N, GC5DC0 and GC6A26, hidden along the Etowah Trail System. Go to www.geocaching.com/play to download the free app, search by location or GC Code, and start finding!

5Polo Matches and Concerts at Chukkar Farm Chukkar Farm and Polo Club hosts polo matches at 2 p.m. on Sundays, May through October. These matches are open to the public, and are often held as fundraising events. The event facility in Alpharetta also hosts concerts on the first Friday and Saturday of each month, May through October. Check out https://chukkarfarmpoloclub.com for the calendar and more information.

6Horseback Riding with Georgia Frontiers Georgia Frontiers is a horse stable offering western-style trail rides from 1-2 hours. First-time or experienced horseback riders will encounter a change in scenery as they follow the guides across 150 acres of wooded trails on the property. Visit www.georgiahorsebackriding.org for more information or to call and make a reservation.

Allscans are Important to Maintenance

BY DEIDRE PARKER

Everyone knows you need to change your vehicle’s a failure. Reading this type of code is one of the oil at regular intervals, but many people don’t know best ways to find a serious failure before it occurs. their vehicle’s computer has a built-in diagnostic Present codes currently show up in the system; they " test that can alert them of future problems. These diagnostics are accessed through an Allscan. When performing an Allscan, trigger the check engine light on a vehicle and show that it is experiencing a failure that requires attention. Pending codes still are being tested by the vehicle’s Having your automotive technicians connect to a vehicle’s computer with a vehicle regularly computer. In this case, something is amiss, but the computer has not special scan tool. This tool allows them to look at the general health serviced is the finished running diagnostics yet. The most expensive thing that of systems in vehicles that have sensors. Allscan data is invaluable best way to reduce you can do, regarding auto repair, is waiting until a small issue becomes in determining what type of diagnostics are needed to locate the your overall cost large enough to cause damage to other parts or related systems. problem. This information tells the technician what internal systems are experiencing issues. After interpreting the data, a technician can do proper Having your vehicle regularly serviced is the best way to reduce your overall cost of ownership. Now that you know how the technology works, of ownership. " testing of a system to isolate the failed part(s) on a do yourself a favor and ask your repair shop if they vehicle. perform an Allscan each time they service your

An Allscan should not be confused with vehicle. Not all shops offer this service free of performing actual testing or diagnostics; it will charge, but many do. provide data on the system, starting point, or inform the technician what type of testing needs to be done, if any. Allscans report three different types of codes: history codes, present codes and pending codes.

History codes are stored in the system from Deidre Parker, owner-operator of Chloe's Auto previous events; they are critical in determining the source of a failure, or the conditions that led to Repair, holds an ASE certification and has extensive experience in the area of automotive repair.