Technical WORST MECHANIC EVER............

Because electrical is voodoo to most of us! Mechanical stuff we can see and analyze, but we can't see electrons.

 

1200.00 is cheap for a condensor.......in the year 3021 that is.....ha ha ha

 

I'm just checking to make sure I'm not listed on this thread.

 

AMEN!!!!!

 

After my first carburetor rebuild, I surely thought it was me…
Early 80’s and an OT V8 Chevy with a 2bbl Rochester.
Rebuild the carb, install it, idles fine, revs fine. Close the hood and anything above 1/4 throttle bogs out and damned near dies.
Take carb apart, go through it again, rinse and repeat. Surely I screwed up.
Head the the wrecking yard, find carb and rebuild it. Rinse and repeat.
Take the first carb into a shop and have them rebuild it.
Same scenario.
Did I mention that the hood had that fiberglass stuff under it and I was doing my “test runs” without the air cleaner on?

Ya, it was sucking the insulation down and choking it out.

So a month later, two carburetors and 5 rebuilds my GF (who couldn’t put gas in her own car) clued me in.

I qualify!

 

A complete core for rebuild is $400 around here, bare blocks that need everything are $200. Those look like 1.94 intake valves, better than what i usually find. I think you did good.

 

The ASE ought to supply "Unwanted Posters" to hang up in all auto parts stores the same way the Post Office used to display Wanted Posters.

 

I had just finished putting in the filter and lowering the bosses truck down, getting the hoist legs out of the way, when he walked up and said something like "getting something from the truck". The compressor was going and I guess I misheard next thing I know he's firing it up and dropping it into gear! only.... I hadn't added the oil yet! Baha ha no damage but mighty embarrassing
That's ok we had a crushed tool box in the shop kept as a reminder of the time he started a car that was up on the old ramp type hoist and it was in gear.....flew off and crushed that box and narrowly missed a guy

 

My Dad had one of the gas crisis vw diesels that he bought for business use. He kept it imaculate both inside and out
including under the hood. It developed a diesel leak which dripped down onto the lower radiator hose. The dealership
fixed the leak under warrantee but refused to replace the hose. Fortunately Dad made sure it was documented. I t burst 2 days later in rush hour traffic on the Long Island Expressway. Dealership ended up eating a very expensive tow back to Connecticut as well as rebuilding the engine.

 

Maybe not a mechanic per se, but a buddy has spun a rod bearing in his Cleveland engine. He had taken it to a 'popular' engine shop and the special person at the desk said that it was completely ruined, unsalvageable!

The fella was looking at the wrong main journal and stated that the thrust surface was completely missing...

I think we may have insulted him when we asked to speak to someone who knew what a Ford crank is supposed to look like!

 

Back in the 80's during GM's "Mr Goodwrench" ad campaigns my Dad worked with a guy that he called "Mr Bentwrench" Told me a story about how the dude was underneath a car removing the main caps on the engine - one of the bolts fell out and knocked his two front teeth out. There were other funny stories too . . .

 

Years ago, when I was working on Cat diesel engines at a dealership they hired a guy who seemingly liked to disassemble everything with a HAMMER. He did not last long in the shop.

 

Yes! You're right!
He's the one that still wears his baseball cap backward and has the T-shirt that says, "Mustache Rides", right?

 

What you are referring to is called "flat rate" and is responsible in my opinion for much of the throw parts at it type of repairs we see today. The technician (used to be a mechanic) is paid for hanging a part but very little if anything for diagnostics. If the flat rate pay for installing a water pump is two hours and the tech can do it in one hour he still gets paid for two hours. The reverse is also true, if it takes longer he loses out. I have argued for three decades that this system needs to change if you want to keep quality knowledgeable people that really want to fix peoples cars correctly but instead the flat rate keeps getting cut and every shop out there is looking to find ANYBODY to work even if they are terrible at what they do. When you take your car, engine, transmission, etc in it is a crap shoot if you get a good or bad tech. Ask how I know? I ran a training center for a major car company for years!

 

Saw a beaut on Youtube. Apprentice mechanic was sent to change the battery on an expensive English car (Aston Martin? Jaguar?). The battery was behind the left front wheel, inside the fender. The bolt holding the battery down was seized so the boss said "cut it off then". Numbskull mechanic took a cutoff wheel and cut off the bottom foot of the fender. Wish I could find the video but don't remember what it was called.

 

That is all new car stealerships nowadays. Not able to diagnose a problem (even though the "smarts" on new cars TELLS you what is the probable cause), keep replacing parts until it works. Bad headlight? Start at the rear bumper, replace all the parts until the light works.


"Roothawg, post: 14216498, member: 160"]I guess that's why I always end up taking apart the cars I buy from other people. I try not to, but it snowballs. Some folks just have no real ethics.
-At least they could have used CLEAN rags !!
I was with a gal years ago that had a (sorry) FIAT in her drive, all manner of "experts" (local garage, etc) couldn't get it going. It had been sitting for a couple of years. Funny how if you put the battery in with the correct polarity, the car starts!

 

Sadly, in my career, I’ve run across several people like this.

Don’t forget wire nuts.

 

This may be the last time I have a reason to tell this story, but when It comes to a less then steller automotive mechanic experience, Windsor Car Care Clinic in Edmonton took the cake and screwed me over big time.

I had had a couple small repairs done, flat tire, some front end work, when I mentioned my 84 GM van was smoking and could use an engine replacement. Original motor with high miles, used only for holiday travel, it was smoking blue at a rate of a liter or two a tank full.
They said yea, we have a contact who can provide a good used engine, supply and install $1800.

Paid by Visa I picked the van up after hours. Plan was to drive it out to a friends acerage for winter storage. It made it out there but barely. Lacking power, miss firing, I should have turned around with it but didn't.
Mistake one and two, I was trusting and second guessed myself into believing that something wasn't seriously wrong. After all, they were the professionals. With insurance for the day, a return ride in place, plans were in motion to store it for the winter.

When I called the next day to express my concerns, it was bring it back in the spring and we'll take care of it/you, no problem.
They said as much again when I stopped to pick up my old engine.

With my van stored for the winter I tore into the old engine to discover seized rings all carboned up explaining the oil consumption. Well 6 months of winter is along time to wait but I did, come spring however, I couldn't get the van to run so I had the van towed back to the shylocks at Windsor Car Care Clinic expecting if not good news, satisfaction.

It wasn't. They said, and I quote, " that engine is worn out".

Now I won't speak of the words that were exchanged, or how I discovered my if I had a gun moment... what I will say is I did what I should have done in the first place, and that was find the resolve to do it myself.
Breaking down I went to GM ordered a crate motor ( in for a nickle now in for a dime kind of way), and plotted my revenge.

I've attached a few pictures of what the sbc tear down revealed of "a good used engine".

How a mechanic couldn't have know this by looking at it caked in years of old crusty oil leaks is beyond me but when I think I even got charged for an oil change and in less then 50 miles (cause it was towed twice), on tear down it poured out molasses black.

It got worse from there. A dip stick that was too short to read the oil level, a stretched chain, worn timing gears, worn cam lobes and lifters that can only be described as worn to razor were just part of it.

So...with no acknowledgement of their failings, no warrenty, all I had left was plotting my revenge. I was seriously angry. $1800 angry. Trrusting and with no apparent recourse I didn't think I could be that angry, but I was.

Well I didn't count all the pieces, but if you take a sbc apart, nut's bolts, valve springs, keepers, pistons, rods...it's a lot. And I loaded them up on my truck and headed to Windsor Car Care Clinic when the last part was on the truck, where I unloaded them all, scattering it across the parking lot and the block dumped in the center of the entrance.

They knew where it came from because I got a call the next day threatening me with legal action, I laughed and said prove it.

I know there's some good honest mechanics out there, but my opinion is they are few and far between.

 

Sure we can see electrons, at least sometimes - on spark plugs for example. We can feel them too at the same place.
We can easily measure the voltage, which in effect is the pressure trying to move the electrons, and we can measure amps which would be the flow of electrons. We can measure resistance that limit that flow. All that with a cheap multimeter for a few dollars.
For a bit more money we can measure voltage changes over time and see it on a nice clear graph, this is the voltage over a regular 12V relay coil measured when it is turned off - there's a -270V spike first, after about half a millisecond (half a box) there's a hump in the curve showing that's when the parts in the relay moves, i.e. it takes some time for the relay to turn off after power to the coil has been turned off, and after about one millisecond the voltage has reached zero.



But I get exactly what you mean, it can be hard to get a grip on how electricity works and for someone who may have little interest in it and no good teacher available it can prove nearly impossible. Some people will get it easily, while others will struggle, just like with anything else. Mechanical things are easier to look at and figure out what they're supposed to do - and why they don't.

What pisses me of are the professional mechanics that just fire the parts cannon, changing one thing after another hoping for one of them to be the right one. Sure, sometimes changing a cheap part costs less than actually spending the time testing it so there are times when changing a part just to see if it helps makes perfect sense, but once you've gone through the common, cheap stuff it's time to actually diagnose it. If the fellow Boneyard51 mentioned would have hooked up an ignition oscilloscope (and now I'm talking about equipment that was fairly common >50 years ago) to that engine it should have been obvious that there still was a problem in the ignition system, and no reason to dig any deeper into the engine just yet. $1200 down the drain just because a cheap part wasn't changed and a simple diagnose wasn't made.

It's just fine that not everyone is great at finding electrical problems. But that means some people (who get paid for the work) need to know when to step back and send the job to someone else who actually knows how to do it. Swapping part after part may be fine for the DIYer working on his own stuff, but when we turn to the professionals they should have the equipment and knowledge to use it to diagnose most electrical problems. It isn't even that expensive these days, I'm guessing an ignition scope was really pricey 50 years ago. And a modern scope with the right additions will diagnose so much more.

Oh. This seems to have turned into a rant. Sorry.

 

Vandenplas, if I could give you a hundred likes for this post, I would. You stated exactly what I’ve been thinking while reading this thread. Thank you.

 

This is EXACTLY the reason I got out of automotive.
Warranty and flat rate hours kept getting cut lower and lower. Diagnostic went from 1.0 hour guaranteed if you needed to hook up the scanner or any other kind of “ testing device “ down to 0.2 ( 15 minutes). And yes one newer cars the scanner will point you in a direction but most times it’s vague ( lean bank 1 , lean bank two , air fuel ratio out of range , timing correlation issue … etc.)

It’s not always “ misfire cylinder one bank one” type codes.

anyways it drove and drives good techs out of the industry and promotes hacks and wannabes.

Quebec has outlawed flat rate years ago , but most shops do a bonus plan type thing . You are guaranteed your 8 hours , but if you generate more then 8 hours of labour in a day you get “ bonuses” on productivity. I think that’s a good system as it keeps mechanics hustling , but if you get a tricky diagnostic job you don’t feel like your loosing cause your still getting your 8.

I worked at a Ford dealership for the blink of an eye
Shittiest bunch of shit sacks I worked with
The “ general mechanics “ where parts changers and you had one guy who did front end diagnostic one guy who did tune up electrical one guy who did transmissions etc.
So in a shop of 30 techs maybe 5 that where professionals in certain fields and good over all and 25 parts changers. I was a tune up electrical guy , after 3 weeks or so I left could not stand the stupidity.

we had GH RYDER forklift up here , really top notch place , got bought out by CROWN forklifts went corporate and within 4 years lost pretty much any senior tech with any knowledge due to b.S and scams and mistreatment of customers.

All hail the mighty dollar !!

 

What happened?

 

Had a freeze plug leak in our 1980 Monte Carlo, inboard of the motor mount making it impossible to remove with the engine in place. An old school mechanic had me go purchase at the pharmacy a container of "water glass" sodium of silicate. Something some pharmacies carry, this one did and to my surprise the veteran pharmacist ask me if I had a radiator leak. Well it was poured into my radiator while engine running then shut off and within one hour the freeze plug area was crystallized looking like little pieces of quartz. No more leak, but in time havoc thru out the cooling system including radiator cap and thermostat. Gee, thanks for nothing!

 

Yes, I'm happy with what I got from both sellers. I didn't even know the kid had attempted a rebuild until I was giving him the money. When I looked at what he had done, I was kinda amused that someone could actually think that the work he had done was going to work. Gave $200 for it and figure I can sell the old heads to someone for $50. If I sell the Weiand intake, probably worth $100. So I end up with a good (?) block and some peripheral parts for $50. The crank may actually be turnable too, but I won't use any of the rotating parts. So, Yes I got what I asked for and I'm very happy with it.

 

G-son, any mechanic worth his salt would have done what my friend , Charlie did, pull a spark plug wire and check for spark! He didn’t need a scope for that. Lol Later that’s what he told me, checked for spark, no spark, check for shorted condenser, replaced condenser! Truck ran great! Ten minutes vs one week!








Bones

 

It's easier to teach a welder how to scuba dive than it is to teach a scuba diver how to weld.

You friend Charlie is the better training candidate for the high tech brave new world troubleshooter mechanic. He will take to it like a fish to water. He already knows the important stuff, and knows when the diagnostics is confused, because he ain't.

Except, there aren't too many guys like Charlie around anymore. So they work with what they have. But if the WiFi is down, or it needs a software update, well your shit ain't gonna get fixed for a few more days. Sorry!

 

Yes Charlie is a great mechanic, he is still working today! I still call him occasionally when I get stumped on OT cars, which is quite often!






Bones

 

I delivered for parts stores for a few years after retiring from my factory job. Not hard to see where the "hacks" work.
A lot of returned parts, many claimed to be defective.

Gary

 

Oh yeah, checking for spark is as basic as it gets when it comes to figuring out why an engine doesn't start, usually the starting point. But sometimes a bad condenser can be tricky, still good enough to deliver a spark that looks good on a spark plug but it isn't strong enough under compression in the engine. Testing how far the spark can jump in free air usually tells you if that's going on so no need to go high tech... but scopes are fun, and like many other things, the more you use them, the better you get at analyzing the results.

 

While at a Ford dealership in the 80's they hired a mechanic by the name of Zach. Big tall guy and he had this huge Snapon roller cabinet with the hutch in the middle. Heck you had to be that tall just to get to see in some of the drawers. Had his own coffee maker and snack box as well. We thought this dude was the "$hit". I think he lasted 3 months. Almost every job he worked on came back, hence we coined the term "zach back" for all the jobs that had to be redone.