Mechanics

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This article is about the crafting skill. For a general guide to vehicles, see Vehicles.

Mechanics is a crafting skill allowing the player to scrap, repair and modify various parts of vehicles.

Skill effects

Mechanics allows you to un- and re-install vehicle parts, with a success rate that improves as your skill level rises. It also allows you to salvage spare engine parts from Standard/Heavy-Duty/Sports vehicle engines beginning at skill level 4/5/6 respectively, so long as the donor engine is at or above 10% condition (note that the donor engine's condition will be set to 0% following part removal, regardless of how high it was beforehand).

Improving your Skill Level also grants more effective engine repairs when using the aforementioned parts on other vehicles' engines, adding to the recipient engine's current Condition statistic:

Mechanics Level	Standard	Heavy-Duty	Sport
4	1%	n/a	n/a
5	1%	1%	n/a
6	2%	1%	1%
7	2%	2%	1%
8	3%	2%	2%
9	3%	3%	2%
10	4%	3%	3%

The table above shows how much engine condition will increase upon successful repair based on skill level, showing it can be much more efficient to save a remarkable vehicle's repairs until you have a high Skill Level, and even at high Mechanics levels, it is much more time-efficient to keep the vehicle's hood in good repair to protect the engine.

Mechanics guide

Step 1: Character creation

During character creation, choosing an occupation and traits will provide the player with some skill levels, but it will also give an experience boost to that skill depending on the starting level. This bonus cannot be gained after the character is created, making this an important step in mastering any skill.
Starting Skill Level and Experience Boost

Level 0 — 25% (default for all skills)

Level 1 — +75% (100%)

Level 2 — +100% (125%)

Level 3+ — +125% (150%)

Occupations

Name	Starting points	Major skills	Description
Mechanic	-4	+3 Mechanics	Familiar with the maintenance and repair of all vehicle models on the roads of Kentucky.

Traits

Name	Cost	Description	Notes
Amateur Mechanic	-5	+1 Mechanics	Has a detailed knowledge of common and commercial vehicle models, and repairs.

Step 2: Collecting materials

Tools

Item	Description	Classname
Jack	Used to remove tires, allowing access to brakes and suspension.	Base.Jack
Lug Wrench	Used to remove tires, allowing access to brakes and suspension.	Base.LugWrench
Tire Pump	Used to inflate tires	Base.TirePump
Wrench	Used to remove large parts: hoods, trunk lids, doors.	Base.Spanner
Screwdriver	Used to remove small parts: batteries, windows, radios.	Base.Screwdriver

Other useful items

• Propane Torch
• Welder Mask
• Metal Sheet
• Small Metal Sheet
• Glue
• Duct Tape

Step 3: The mechanic window

Start scrapping to level up. Note that success or failure has little effect on XP gain; you can continually try and fail to remove or install delicate parts like brakes or suspension and still level effectively. In fact, that repeated failure is the best way to learn. Choose a sacrificial vehicle to practice upon; it won't be working when you're done with it, but you can level up for a long time by repeatedly installing and removing components until you're confident enough of your skills to try working on a vehicle you care about.

Step 4: Metalworking

Parts of vehicles can be repaired using the metalworking skill.

Car wrecks (burnt cars) can be dismantled, gathering metal materials depending on the player's metalworking skill.

Step 5: Hit & run

Build the ultimate machine and run over some zombies. Do note that hitting zombies will damage your hood and tires. Hitting any object or a zombie with a hood at 0% will start to damage your engine. Running over zombie corpses does not damage your car, but can cause the car to roll over if the car is going too fast.

Vehicle related interactions

Vehicle mechanics menu

The Vehicle Mechanics Menu displays information about various components of the vehicle. It displays the condition of all the parts within the vehicle, shown in a gradient from green (100%) to red (0%) – whereas a part that is missing will flash red. This information can be accessed by pressing E at the front of the vehicle, using the vehicle radial menu or by right-clicking the vehicle opening the context menu.

• The main display shows the durability/condition rather than the quality rating of the part. Batteries and gas tanks have an additional quality, which is the power or gasoline remaining and is displayed in the upper right details section.
• Certain parts are prone to wear and tear. Tires, suspension and mufflers can be damaged with normal use. A random chance of damage will occur when the vehicle is moving more than 10MPH. Other factors considered are: current speed, whether the vehicle is on or off road, the vehicles off road efficiency, steering angle or pitch, how long the vehicle has been running.

Taken from lua code in Vehicles.lua: vehicle:getCurrentSpeedKmHour(), vehicle:isDoingOffroad(), vehicle:getScript():getOffroadEfficiency().

• Engines have different horse power ratings, loudness and quality.
• Mufflers have a noise multiplier. An old muffler will give a higher rating than a performance muffler.

Installing/uninstalling vehicle parts

To install or uninstall a vehicle part, the part must be in the player's inventory or an accessible container. Unlike other occupations, a specific mechanics skill is not required to install or uninstall parts, instead the player must learn the recipe by reading the recipe magazine corresponding to the vehicle. A higher mechanic skill will increase the chances of installing/uninstalling the part without damaging it, the recommended skill is shown in the vehicle's info panel. Vehicle parts for a certain type will not be compatible with other vehicle types. For example, a heavy-duty wheel cannot be installed in a standard vehicle.

While in the Vehicle Mechanics Menu, right-click the part that needs to be installed/uninstalled and select "Install" or "Uninstall".

There are three major part subtypes in addition to the major vehicle type (Standard, Heavy-Duty, Sports).

Part	Subtypes	Vehicle Types
Tire	Valu-Tire Regular Tire Performance Tire	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Brake	Old Brake Regular Brake Performance Brake	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Suspension	Regular Suspension Performance Suspension	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Gas Tank	Small Gas Tank Standard Gas Tank Big Gas Tank	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Trunk	Small Trunk Standard Trunk Big Trunk	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Windshield	Windshield Rear Windshield	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Side Window	Front Window Rear Window	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Door	Front Door Rear Door Double Rear Door	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Hood	Hood	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Trunk Lid	Trunk Lid	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Seat	Standard Seat Big Seat Sports Seat	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport
Muffler	Old Muffler Average Muffler Performance Muffler	Standard Heavy-Duty Sport

Repairs/replacements

Author's note: In cases, where there are mutliple methods available, each one is written as method a), b), c) and so on.
Each item is required from each marking. (Everything beginning with "a)" is required for method "a)". )

Part	Tool	Recipe	Item	Skill
Seat	Screwdriver	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Repair: a) Glue b) Duct Tape Replace: Seat	Mechanics 2
Radio	Screwdriver	None required	Radio	None required
Gas Tank	Screwdriver Wrench Repair: Propane Torch	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Repair: a) Metal Sheet b) Small Metal Sheet x2 Replace: Gas Tank	Repair: a) Metalworking 3, Mechanics 2 b) Metalworking 3, Mechanics 2 Replace: Mechanics 5
Car Battery	Screwdriver	none required	Car Battery	None required
Muffler	Wrench	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Muffler	Mechanics 5
Tire	Jack Lug Wrench	none required	Tire	Mechanics 1
Brake	Jack Wrench	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Brake	Mechanics 6
Suspension	Jack Wrench	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Suspension	Mechanics 6
Trunk Lid	Repair: a) Propane Torch b) Propane Torch c) None Replace: Wrench	Repair: - Replace: Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Repair: a) Metal Sheet b) Small Metal Sheet x2 c) Metal Sheet, Screws x8 Replace: Trunk Lid	Repair: a) Metalworking 1, Mechanics 2 b) Metalworking 1, Mechanics 2 c) Mechanics 2 Replace: Mechanics 3
Trunk	Propane Torch	none required	a) Metal Sheet b) Small Metal Sheet x2	Metalworking 3 Mechanics 2
Hood	Repair: a) - b) Propane Torch c) Propane Torch Replace: Wrench	Repair: - Replace: Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Repair: a) Metal Sheet, Screws x8 b) Metal Sheet c) Small Metal Sheet x2 Replace: Hood	Repair: a) Mechanics 2 b) Metalworking 1, Mechanics 2 c) Metalworking 1, Mechanics 2 Replace: Mechanics 3
Windshield	Screwdriver	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Windshield	Mechanics 5
Rear Windshield	Screwdriver	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Rear Windshield	Mechanics 5
Side Window	Screwdriver	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Side Window	Mechanics 3
Door	Repair: Propane Torch Replace: Wrench	Laines Auto Manual - Standard Models	Repair: a) Metal Sheet b) Small Metal Sheet x2 Replace: Car Door	Repair: a) Metalworking 3, Mechanics 2 b) Metalworking 3, Mechanics 2 Replace: Mechanics 4
Headlights/Taillights	Screwdriver	none required	Light Bulb	-

Specialty repairs

• Engines require the player to have the car key, or to have hot-wired the vehicle, in order to repair or obtain spare engine parts .. Removing parts will reduce the engine durability to 0 even if no parts are received. An engine can be repaired to 100% but may require additional spare engine parts.
• Trunks cannot be swapped or fully repaired. They can be repaired with metal sheet or small metal sheet (requires metalworking skill) with the use of a propane torch.
• Heaters are not repairable or swappable.
• Radios can be swapped with a standard household radio found in game -- the condition of the radio does not seem to have an in-game effect.

Relevant info: engine quality

• Engine quality (do not confuse with its condition) is determined on vehicle creation and cannot be raised by any means; it mainly affects chance to start engine and its power. Maximum is 100.
• Emergency vehicles (ambulance, fire, police) usually have 90-100 engine quality.
• Chance to fail engine start on each try is 30 / (quality + 50) * 100% ;

for example, 65 quality engine has 30 / (65 + 50) * 100% = 26% chance to fail start.

• Engines with 100 quality skips aforemented check, but still has 1% to fail start due another one.
• Engines with quality 65 or less, if the weather is too cold, get an extra chance to fail.

See also

• Electrical
• Metalworking