Meeting people as a mechanic.

[LaserSVT]

Since we have a safety inspection station in our lot I will see many people pull in there and pull right out then pull into my shop looking for clear red or yellow tape.
2012 Patriot came in Thursday, couldnt pass due to front amber broken. Very nice little old lady on social security. I said the vehicle is so new that it will probbly be a dealer only item. She said the dealer wanted $496 to replace it. Yikes! I did some quick searching and found a new OEM one on ebay for $32 and it would be a half hour to install. Part arrived today and $73 latter she was out the door happy as can be. 3 hours latter she brought back the most delicious homemade cookies...... man they rocked with some milk.
Another dude cam in Friday with NO brakes. Nothing! Drove 25 miles using the parking brake. Said it was at three shops and TSTC and nobody could figure it out. Said he just put in a new master. Well after spending an hour trying to bleed it I noticed the fluid only came out on the last 1/4" of travel. I asked if he bought new or reman. He said "junk yard". WTF? Never never never never never never never ever do that! Never buy JY brake parts WTF were you thinking. "Well the dealer wanted $450 and no parts stores sell them." Argh, its a 94 Toyota truck! Took 2 minuets and I found a brand new one (we dont use remans at my shop) for $73 fuggin dollars! Ordered it and what do ya know? We have brake pressure! Hes spent like $400 chasing the problem. We charged $260 for all the extra time spent trying to make his bleed out. Would have been a $160 job otherwise.

We did have one I kinda felt bad about last week. Normally when we do brakes we first pop the res cap and test the brake fluid. Well a regular customer that we overhauld his rear brakes and new master a few months ago decided to do his own front brakes and he way overtightened the bearings and the calipers were binding. We explained the rotors are seriously warped and its glazed the pads and that the calipers are stuck. Couldnt spin the wheels at all. Pull it apart, replace the calipers and rotors and pads and bearings. Go to crack the system and nothing comes out. Thats when I noticed the fresh resivoir was black. Pop the lid and see the seal all bloated out due to contamination. Brake fluid looked like coffee. Someone put power steering fluid in it. That DESTROYS any and all rubber in the system. Wheel cylinder seals, all brake lines, master and the ABS system. All destroyed. Had I of checked the cap first I would have refused the job. The parts are more than a 99 Tahoe with 278k miles is worth. And he asked about the brakes the moment we just swaped out the spider injection system which is a $600 job by itself. Now he spent $1100 for a truck thats on borrowed time. Fortunatly the new master and calipers never saw the bad fluid but the lines and ABS pump and wheel cylinders did. Told him go to a dealer and trade it in.

Turns out his 16 year old son was cleaning out the garrage and since the two bottles look alike he topped off a Dot3 bottle with a PS bottle and the father poured it in the master.
Feel bad for the dude and wish I had noticed the brake resivoir before we started on anything but the truck was first there for the injection system adnd as soon as we completed that he asked use to see why the brakes always smell. Siezed calipers and knowing that we just did the master a couple months back gave me no thought that the master was at fault.

[Gasser64]

I'm not a mechanic and I'm about retarded about such things but I just had to give a lecture to my father about changing oil and air filters on a vehicle. He just tops up the oil. The last time his car had an oil change was about 2010 and air filter change around the same time.

That's just a testament to the durability of the vehicle, engines weren't meant to take that kind of sludge. Unless it leaks or burns it fast enough lol.

I prefer the maintenance route, but sometimes I wonder if the cost would be better used to just buy new parts and repair.

Surely you don't mean that.. reading this thread is a testament to your dad's point of view. I mean c'mon, what machine is maintenance free. What out there, just lasts forever and never dies? We don't build things that like yet. How long can metal on metal friction last? With some piece of sand or who knows what else floating around in there. I really hate it when people abuse a decent vehicle like you read about in this thread. 95% of this thread was preventable.

[petyweestraw]

Some cases are just stupid . guy at work has a 99 f150 4x4. 4.6. Over 300 k. Only changed oil while under warranty. He changes the filter every so often. When it's starts to tick he just adds oil till it stops ticking then takes off like a bat out of he'll from work. Beats the living shit out of that truck.

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[kingjason]

more the breaking up of sludge that ends up in places that were previously sludge free, causing valves to stick, clogging passages, clogging the filter! etc.

Usually though it is because when most people get their transmissions flushed they are already having a problem. Then it just finishes what it was already doing, IE going out, so they blame it on the flush.

[03mustangdude]

Some cases are just stupid . guy at work has a 99 f150 4x4. 4.6. Over 300 k. Only changed oil while under warranty. He changes the filter every so often. When it's starts to tick he just adds oil till it stops ticking then takes off like a bat out of he'll from work. Beats the living shit out of that truck.

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Its what works first time he trades it in and someone does a real oil change motor will be smoking or locking up. Since it works for now that's all that matters

[petyweestraw]

Naaa. He said he wouldn't trust anyone else owning his truck lol.

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[LaserSVT]

I did my very first ever complete decline of a job that would have paid well from this very annoying female prison guard.

She bought a 1994 LE Nissan truck with a four banger from someone else I know. Little beat up four banger. Well I guess someone else she let work on it because it was making a clatter noise. Sounded like a little diesel. So instead of checking the oil the "mechanic" used a large socket and wrench and tighten down the OHC caps as hard as he could. This of course ruins the bearings that cut into the cam and shaved it too. We drained the oil and it was filled with shavings. Motors done. Toast. She in her infinite wisdom declares I can rebuild the head and it will be fine. I explain why it wont work but its her money. So she drives it home and saves for the $1300 head job. Comes back last Wed saying she has the money. I repeat that I don't want to do it unless I can do the whole motor. Plus I am too small of a shop to pull the head and send it off to be redone and have her mess up my bay for over a week. I show her for a $1300 more I can put a completely rebuilt motor in it with a 3 year warranty and unlimited mileage. Nope, just the head. She eventually wears me down and leaves the truck. Now I know when we throw that fresh head on there shit still wont run right and will still smoke like crazy and she will be back to bitch about it all the time. Plus I said shes 7 cars back so it will be a few days until I can give a more precise estimate as I can see the EGR is fucked and the manifold bolts are rusted to shit and the motor is bathed in oil. She still calls me 3 times every day this week when I said it would be Friday before I can put hands on it. She also insists that the truck stays inside overnight. Why? its a beat POS that don't run for shit. No stereo or anything, who's gonna fuck with it? But sure, I will push it in and out every day and just leave the BMW, Volvo, Lexus, QX56 or one of the cars with value outside so your POS is safe.
So its close to closing time and I am staring at the truck about to remove the hood to start the job and she calls up right then. "Yo! You got my head out yet?" No, its Thursday and I said Friday. BTW your water pump is leaking as is your master cylinder and it looks like it poped a rear freeze plug, probably due to the solid brown mud water in your cooling system. This is at 4:30 mind you and we close at 5. She says "Well just pull the head tonight so I can get it in the morning.


I stopped her right there and said if she does not replace the whole motor and continues to tell me one more time how to do my job I will kick the truck to the curb. Every minute I am talking to you is a minute I am not fixing the truck. Are you going to man up (I said that, shes hard core lesbo) and let me properly repair this with a fresh motor or insist on only the head. She of course starts telling me what a friend of her step brothers cousins aunt used to cheat with a mechanic and he said......... I stopped her and said i will pay the tow fee where the truck needs to go but I will not be working on it. First time I ever heard her shut the hell up.
Way too much drama for a $400 total profit that would actually cost money due to time and shit that WILL break along the way. Plus I know she would be constantly claiming something we did was wrong. So thats the first customer I had to tell to split.

My business partner was sooooo happy. LOL. After she left he reminded me that shes the woman that we replaced a headlight bulb 4 years ago and she came back about a year latter asking what we did wrong because the power windows just stopped working today.

Seriously? I remembered it happen but I forgot it was her.
So glad I kicked that truck out of my shop.

[Cooter]

nothing better than firing a shitty customer!!! well done, sir

[jammeejamm]

one of the best things about where i work now. i tell people to pound sand all the time.

[prostock1]

I did my very first ever complete decline of a job that would have paid well from this very annoying female prison guard.

She bought a 1994 LE Nissan truck with a four banger from someone else I know. Little beat up four banger. Well I guess someone else she let work on it because it was making a clatter noise. Sounded like a little diesel. So instead of checking the oil the "mechanic" used a large socket and wrench and tighten down the OHC caps as hard as he could. This of course ruins the bearings that cut into the cam and shaved it too. We drained the oil and it was filled with shavings. Motors done. Toast. She in her infinite wisdom declares I can rebuild the head and it will be fine. I explain why it wont work but its her money. So she drives it home and saves for the $1300 head job. Comes back last Wed saying she has the money. I repeat that I don't want to do it unless I can do the whole motor. Plus I am too small of a shop to pull the head and send it off to be redone and have her mess up my bay for over a week. I show her for a $1300 more I can put a completely rebuilt motor in it with a 3 year warranty and unlimited mileage. Nope, just the head. She eventually wears me down and leaves the truck. Now I know when we throw that fresh head on there shit still wont run right and will still smoke like crazy and she will be back to bitch about it all the time. Plus I said shes 7 cars back so it will be a few days until I can give a more precise estimate as I can see the EGR is fucked and the manifold bolts are rusted to shit and the motor is bathed in oil. She still calls me 3 times every day this week when I said it would be Friday before I can put hands on it. She also insists that the truck stays inside overnight. Why? its a beat POS that don't run for shit. No stereo or anything, who's gonna fuck with it? But sure, I will push it in and out every day and just leave the BMW, Volvo, Lexus, QX56 or one of the cars with value outside so your POS is safe.
So its close to closing time and I am staring at the truck about to remove the hood to start the job and she calls up right then. "Yo! You got my head out yet?" No, its Thursday and I said Friday. BTW your water pump is leaking as is your master cylinder and it looks like it poped a rear freeze plug, probably due to the solid brown mud water in your cooling system. This is at 4:30 mind you and we close at 5. She says "Well just pull the head tonight so I can get it in the morning.


I stopped her right there and said if she does not replace the whole motor and continues to tell me one more time how to do my job I will kick the truck to the curb. Every minute I am talking to you is a minute I am not fixing the truck. Are you going to man up (I said that, shes hard core lesbo) and let me properly repair this with a fresh motor or insist on only the head. She of course starts telling me what a friend of her step brothers cousins aunt used to cheat with a mechanic and he said......... I stopped her and said i will pay the tow fee where the truck needs to go but I will not be working on it. First time I ever heard her shut the hell up.
Way too much drama for a $400 total profit that would actually cost money due to time and shit that WILL break along the way. Plus I know she would be constantly claiming something we did was wrong. So thats the first customer I had to tell to split.

My business partner was sooooo happy. LOL. After she left he reminded me that shes the woman that we replaced a headlight bulb 4 years ago and she came back about a year latter asking what we did wrong because the power windows just stopped working today.

Seriously? I remembered it happen but I forgot it was her.
So glad I kicked that truck out of my shop.

People only walk on you if you let them !!!
I could careless about making money, if it means I have to listen some bitch tell me how to work on their shit IN MY SHOP !!!

[Torinoman]

Nothing better than putting those kind of people in their place.

[EW]

nothing better than firing a shitty customer!!! well done, sir

x2

[Nash B.]

I imagine I'm going to find something like that when I replace/rewire the brake controller. It gets hot when a trailer with brakes is connected and puts out 10 volts regardless of what it's set to.

As it turns out, it was wired up wrong. I found this out when I swapped the working Prodigy out of another truck, blew the brake light/hazard fuse, burned up the hazard flasher.

Red - a long wire that went nowhere
Black - ground
White - input from brake light switch
Blue - output to trailer

I tried wiring the red to a key-on hot, and that blew the fuse. This being the first controller I'd ever wired up, I found a wiring diagram for the controller on the Internet and switched the wires around. It works now (and I imagine the old controller, a Tekonsha Mark 12 with an 08-92 sticker, probably still works, too).

Red - input from brake switch
Black - key-on hot
White - ground
Blue - output to trailer

Oops.

[dsrtuckteezy]

thank god, i was losing sleep...

[4bangen]

A problem I run into is dumbass know nothings that spit bull shit are more than happy to tell anyone everything they know about cars. This is a problem because most of the people they talk to don't know enough to tell that they are lying. So the BS spreads like wild fire. "I heard from a friend who knows about cars that..."
So I'm faced with the moral dilemma of arguing with numbnuts or letting them spread their retardation to nice people.
Just the other day I was told by a 60yo man that "motors in the sixties where the best hotrod motors ever made, the had one hp per cubic inch." he then added, "a 454 had 454hp and a 289 had 289hp." He gave me a stern look and said, "A 65 mustang with a 289 would give your (2015 GT) a run for it's money!" I called him out on his BS but until that the other guy in the room had bought it hook line and sinker.