Meeting people as a mechanic.

[CexMashean]

Nissan 4 runner (whatever that is)

Wait, you've really never heard of a Nissan 4runner?

[Forever_frost]

Wait, you've really never heard of a Nissan 4runner?

I wasn't sure what the Nissan SUV was. I tend to stick to Fords

[4king]

Never tap a starter, the solenoid contains magnets that will crack off if hit correctly. Well I mean you can try to tap it but it will just confirm you have a broken starter now.

Most cars newer than 2010 should only require a new battery if the vehicle has been properly maintained.

[Tremor14]

wasn't my car, it was 107 yesterday, and i was following her orders.

[mstng86]

Huh? LMFAO!

You know, I kind of expect my 5 year old car or newer to not have issues with a starter.

[LaserSVT]

You know, I kind of expect my 5 year old car or newer to not have issues with a starter.

You must drive an Accord or Camry.

[4king]

Huh? LMFAO!

In response to an earlier comment about new cars. There have been a few ac compressor jobs we send out but a vehicle in its first 2-4 years of production cycle has very few parts available at parts stores. Shit I remember special ordering an alternator for a 2012 challenger for $465 when we first started getting units from junk yards to re manufacture .


Shit all I do here at autozone is check engine lights on rangers, mustangs, f150's etc.

The 4.0 V6 is just annoying to help people with. Ford just loves everything to be vacuum controlled.

Example guy came in today from an hour away apparently with a 4.0 ranger edge. He started the car to do the check engine light and it was a misfire on every cylinder with a code for ignition coil c malfunction. He knew nothing about cars and asked if that's why his ac stopped working. I try to explain to him how a coil, wires, plugs work, and he has dead eyes and ask if wE can do that for him.

He comes back in later and he went to the three shop we recommended and all of them turned him away for business, I'm assuming he was a rude customer because all the shops we feed are hungry for jobs like this

The prognosis was you cant fix stupid. He was driving around with his windows up too.

THEN f150's owners do you have the 5.4 or 4.6? No my truck had a v8
Gto lol

[mstng86]

You must drive an Accord or Camry.

no, a 2001 taco.

[AdRock]

So this afternoon I'm at work moving the truck I drive back to the front of the store and this guy walks up and asks if I can give his car a jump start. He has the cables so I say "sure". I pull the truck over to this beat to shit Mercedes with 3 different rims and 4 different tires on it. All the suspension is bottomed out and not because it was meant to be.

He says his car just died. So I hook up the cables and he immediately starts cranking the shit out of it. It spins slow but won't start. He then gets out and tells me it's probably the oil. I look at him funny and he then tells me that a few days ago he bottomed out the car and it put a hole in the oil pan. He put more oil in it and figured it would be ok for a few days. HOLY SHIT.....

Then I notice there's no water in the overflow tank and that I can hear a hissing noise from the radiator cap, but there are no water stains anywhere around the cap. He suddenly gets in and starts cranking it again and the hissing at the cap gets louder. I tell him the engine is most likely fucked and he doesn't believe me. He then proceeds to put about 2 gallons of cool water oout of a gas can into the reservoir and I start hearing clicking and light popping noises from the engine. Hot aluminum engine, cool water, I again tell him the engine is fucked. But after putting all the water in and sitting there about 10 minutes he manages to get it to fire up and he drives off. The engine was making the most horrible noises, it had absolutely no oil in it. As I was leaving work I saw the car sitting about a block away and as I drove by I had to avoid pieces of the bottom end of the engine laying in the road.

Some people just won't listen.

[DON SVO]

In response to an earlier comment about new cars. There have been a few ac compressor jobs we send out but a vehicle in its first 2-4 years of production cycle has very few parts available at parts stores. Shit I remember special ordering an alternator for a 2012 challenger for $465 when we first started getting units from junk yards to re manufacture .


Shit all I do here at autozone is check engine lights on rangers, mustangs, f150's etc.

The 4.0 V6 is just annoying to help people with. Ford just loves everything to be vacuum controlled.

Example guy came in today from an hour away apparently with a 4.0 ranger edge. He started the car to do the check engine light and it was a misfire on every cylinder with a code for ignition coil c malfunction. He knew nothing about cars and asked if that's why his ac stopped working. I try to explain to him how a coil, wires, plugs work, and he has dead eyes and ask if wE can do that for him.

He comes back in later and he went to the three shop we recommended and all of them turned him away for business, I'm assuming he was a rude customer because all the shops we feed are hungry for jobs like this

The prognosis was you cant fix stupid. He was driving around with his windows up too.

THEN f150's owners do you have the 5.4 or 4.6? No my truck had a v8
Gto lol

Misfire code will shut off the AC.

[Forever_frost]

So this afternoon I'm at work moving the truck I drive back to the front of the store and this guy walks up and asks if I can give his car a jump start. He has the cables so I say "sure". I pull the truck over to this beat to shit Mercedes with 3 different rims and 4 different tires on it. All the suspension is bottomed out and not because it was meant to be.

He says his car just died. So I hook up the cables and he immediately starts cranking the shit out of it. It spins slow but won't start. He then gets out and tells me it's probably the oil. I look at him funny and he then tells me that a few days ago he bottomed out the car and it put a hole in the oil pan. He put more oil in it and figured it would be ok for a few days. HOLY SHIT.....

Then I notice there's no water in the overflow tank and that I can hear a hissing noise from the radiator cap, but there are no water stains anywhere around the cap. He suddenly gets in and starts cranking it again and the hissing at the cap gets louder. I tell him the engine is most likely fucked and he doesn't believe me. He then proceeds to put about 2 gallons of cool water oout of a gas can into the reservoir and I start hearing clicking and light popping noises from the engine. Hot aluminum engine, cool water, I again tell him the engine is fucked. But after putting all the water in and sitting there about 10 minutes he manages to get it to fire up and he drives off. The engine was making the most horrible noises, it had absolutely no oil in it. As I was leaving work I saw the car sitting about a block away and as I drove by I had to avoid pieces of the bottom end of the engine laying in the road.

Some people just won't listen.

I remember having to dump a quart of oil into my 79 Suburban every 150 miles until one day that became a gallon in 20 miles and then it threw a rod through the hood. I have no idea what happened to it but I signed the title, put that on the seat, took my stuff, put it in my school bag and walked away from it.

[LaserSVT]

In response to an earlier comment about new cars. There have been a few ac compressor jobs we send out but a vehicle in its first 2-4 years of production cycle has very few parts available at parts stores. Shit I remember special ordering an alternator for a 2012 challenger for $465 when we first started getting units from junk yards to re manufacture .

Man you aint kidding on the new cars. Got a 2014 Challenger in that alredy had 77k miles on it and the alt died. Couldnt get it anywhere but Dodge and it was almost $500! Had a 2012 Hyundai come in with a bad AC comp and it was the newer HT16 with the funny ports so again was a dealer only item at $730!

Had a lady come in today with a 2013 Jeep somethinorother that had a failing throttle body. I saw she had a few k of warranty left so told her she can save herself $600 by going to the dealer. It would have been an $810 job at my shop but I figure she will need a weeks worth of car rental because the Dodge dealer is slow as fuck.

[4king]

Misfire code will shut off the AC.

You can not guarantee that to.a customer who knows nothing about cars. What will.happen is they come back asking for a refund because their ac doesn't work now and the spark plugs ruined the ac system so I need to give him a new ac system.

I never guarantee anything to a customer, we are not a mechanics shop and I am just letting them know what the computer says is going wrong.

Gotta remember this is autozone, the people that laser svt complains about usually come from autozone first expecting me to fix shit for free

[red89notch]

Most cars newer than 2010 should only require a new battery if the vehicle has been properly maintained.

Lol, I see roughly 100 cars a day that disagree with this statement.

[LaserSVT]

You can not guarantee that to.a customer who knows nothing about cars. What will.happen is they come back asking for a refund because their ac doesn't work now and the spark plugs ruined the ac system so I need to give him a new ac system.

I never guarantee anything to a customer, we are not a mechanics shop and I am just letting them know what the computer says is going wrong.

Gotta remember this is autozone, the people that laser svt complains about usually come from autozone first expecting me to fix shit for free

There are no guarantees in this work. I tell people that all the time.
"Well its $650 for you to replace my ac compressor, drier, orifice tube and you guarantee thats all thats wrong and it will work perfect?"
Well no. I warranty everything I install but your car is 15 years old and I cant say if one of those old rubber lines might not crack or that your evap wont start to leak. I can only fix the problems I see in front of me.
Or the ones that have multiple problems like two coils are bad, the TPS reads funky, the IAC is slow to react and the O2 sensors have 180k miles on them and they ask me whats the most important ones because they onlyhave a couple hundred so i say the coils and their response is always "And it will run perfet after you replace those?" No. It will be better but you still have all this other stuff that needs fixing.

People still dont understand that O2s, fuel filters, flushing of cooling systems, gear oil changes, transmission service is all standard things you do to keep a car working properly. Not things you do once that part has failed because you never maintained it.


Its like the Jag I have in my shop now. Started off as a $300 estimate and now hes at $2200. We started to replace his spark plugs and every single one you could JUST see the tip. The rest of the plug body was in a pool of oil. I explain that hes lucky it hasnt blown out the $100 ignition coils and that doing a tune up is useless without replacing the valve cover gaskets because it will just kill the new plugs. He wasnt believing me so I had him come over and opened up the passenger side for the first time, pulled a coil and shined the light in there so he could see for himself.
I could see why he was leery. He had the car towed from the most expensive place in town to us because the car ran like shit. They said $1600 for a new throttle body and water pump. I was $280 total to replace the pump and the reason the car ran so bad was one of the Norma fittings on a vac line broke. I fixed the fitting and it ran like silk. When he saw that and I said no charge thats when he warmed up and got to such a big bill. He then wanted new rear shocks (fucking nighmare on an XJ8), front and rear pads plus new front rotors (rears were good enough to turn), new O2s, new serpentine belt and fix the door handle.
I called my buddy at the other shop it was at and said i had the car. he says "Guy is a broke dick and dont have the $1600 to fix it." I tell him thats funny because he had no issue coughing up just over $2200 for me. LOL He said I must get good deals on the throttle bodies. He felt bad when I said the TB was fine and it was just a broken vac line. LOL