Freakin nightmare getting my car fixed *UPDATE*

[sac2165]

Originally posted by shenanigans:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Dojo2000:
He's right, you got reamed real bad.

Never take your car to the dealership for anything other than warranty-covered work.

I disagree with that BIG time...

In my opinion, if its anything other then like a routine maintenance thing(alternator, AC, fluids, etc...) I say go to the dealership. Is it more expensive? Yeah but they do the job right, and you always get better service in my opinion.

Little franchise shops suck ***, I am only 23, and I have seen them ream me, and others not so much in the initial price but by doing total crap work.


If you took it to the dealer the first time for the starter bet you woudl have paid ~$500, and your problem woudl have been fixed. You would have had AC delco parts, not some remanufactered 30day warranty crap.

Maybe you had to pay so much because the guy messed it up, really made a ****ed up mess to fix from this mechanic.


price wasn't to bad for the ignition lock cylinder. I think I paid $370, like 4 years ago to get it done on my 94.

Where the hell else are you going to get it done, no mechanic will touch it and shops are not equiped.


You pay more for a dealer, but they fix the problem. </font>[/QUOTE]If you've got a problem you can't fix yourself, its not worth taking the gamble to go to a non-dealer shop. I know when I go to the dealership I'm paying a premium for the service, but I know I won't have to screw around getting it fixed again.

[shenanigans]

You guys didn't read my post...

Originally posted by shenanigans:
In my opinion, if its anything other then like a routine maintenance thing(alternator, AC, fluids, etc...) I say go to the dealership.

I wouldn't take a car to the dealer for plugs(I'd do them myself) but even if I didn't I woudl assume a local shop could be competant to do it.

A starter, I'd go to a dealer. Probably not related but our cars have a semi-sophisticated anit-theft system that I don't trust a guy that is a step above a jiffy lube tech to do.

Things I have a small shop do...

alternator, plugs/wires(if I had horrid misfires I'd consider a dealer if I suspected, coils/ICM or something else), fluids. "Maybe" I'd let them do some work in my 10-bolt, I'd be iffy and have to trust the shop, I think I'd rather go to a performance shop for that. And I'd trust a tranny shop with my tranny.

I alos trust shops with exhaust work over a dealership(assuming I kept it stock and never went aftermarket)

Now if I suspected my starter or possibly something else for starting problems(ignition lock cylinder) I'd take it to the dealership. I took my car there for power steering pump.

Or I had something I suspected the fuel system, maybe a problem with an injector, I'd go to the dealership too.


Dealerships are expensive but to tell you the truth, $210 for plugs and wires. If you had a shop do it, with same parts I'd see it costing the same money. Especially on a '97. Just seems like a ripoff because a guy you know in a 4 banger got his done for $75 probably. Well there is bit more labor involved doing yours over a guy with a 4 banger.

Now the having them wanting you to pay twice, now that sucks, but little shops are the same way about things, sometimes worse, because they stand to lose more money by fixing it for free.

[KBeezy]

It doesnt matter where a technician works, so long as they are ASE certified.. ASE cert is ASE cert.. Now that I said that. Be sure the guy who worked on your car is ASE certified in electrical, if he is ---- he's got to be the dumbest SOB I've ever heard of. If he isn't, ask them what they are doing letting an uncertified technician work on your car.


As for the people who say "NEVER GO TO A DEALERSHIP!!!!" ... I love it when I work on one of your cars for you, ESPECIALLY when its towed in from another shop! Why? Because you always seem to think we're ripping you off. We're not. Do a labor rate study in the area, up here the average per hour is between 74-81 dollars an hour at a shop. All dealerships are in that price range, so ripping you off on labor? No. Parts? Yes, you will pay more for a genuine *insert auto manufacturer here* part BUT they always come with a guarantee that includes a guarantee on the labor to replace it.

So, as I was saying, the most fun part about when a car gets towed in by someone who doesnt trust us "evil dealerships" is when we get to finding stuff wrong. Example, we had a guy tow his car in for a crank no fire, and we fixed it.. But we also found he was leaking oil from the oil pressure switch, his front axle boots were split and all the grease was gone so the nuts on the end of the axles were prematurely worn/damaged and the axles needed replaced, and he had a broken front left spring.


..... He didn't believe us, thought we were trying to rip him off ...... Until he came in and saw it for himself ...... *shakes head* Had us fix the axles and took the rest to Midas or some place like that because he didn't think we were right about his spring, even though it was completely busted. "Its not as bad as you guys think it is!", HA!


All I'm saying is dealerships dont rip you off on labor... You just pay more for quality parts... Trust me, call around and tell shops you're looking for a place to take your car and want to know what their effective labor rates are.

[Everglades W68]

I want everything to be taken care of and also not have to concern myself whether I can / want to afford the particular repair. Therefore, I typically have bought the GM protection plan extended warranty (absolutely NOT any of the independent extended warranties).

This causes me to go to GM dealers for all major repairs. The GM places have good, knowledgeable people handing the bigger warranty work. The guys at the service drive are absolute idiots. The mechanics who handle smaller repirs are usually, but not always awful.

We've found a very good local garage who handles maintenance and stuff for us like brakes, etc. We've built up a long term relation with the guy, so he knows not to push overpriced or unneeded stuff on us (although I would guess he might be tempted to do so on complete strangers). He has years and years of repeat business from us and is trustworthy.

Se also me separate thread on GM repair guys.

[57s98Camaro]

I mean, now there's not much I can do. If the dealership fixes the problem and the car doesn't break down less than a week later I will pay them the money happily. It just sucks because the only places around here are Procare, Midas, and Monroe. All of which suck.

My whole family likes this guy's Volkswagon place that only does imports as I said before. I guess I'm going to have to attempt to find a good mechanic that will do my Camaro at least as long as I have it. In the meantime I'll pimp my sister's purple RAV4 while she's recovering from her wisdom teeth getting cut out.

[57s98Camaro]

Some new info, reread the first post for the new stuff.