DIY vs Getting a Shop Involved

[RANDY P]

If it takes me more than 2 days, I'll usually farm it out to a shop.

If it involves draining more than 2 fluids, to a shop it goes.

If it involves opening a transmission, to a shop it goes.

I never pay for electrical or suspension work unless it's an alignment.

If it's a V8 GM, it'll never see the inside of a shop.

As for relationships, best thing is one with positive reviews, I start on Yelp, and go by vibe.

rjp

[look 171]

I think the trick is to go back to the same guy. don't nickle and dime them. They remember you. They are in business to make money, so its taboo for me to even think of bringing my own parts. Just make sure they get dealer parts of you want the real deal. My wrenches understand that fully.

I Don't work on cars anymore. Did it in college out of necessity and that was it. I build thing for a living, so I know what it takes to do a good job and make sure customers have a understanding of what we do and the cost associated with it. I trust my wrench. Normally, I drop off the car and have them perform the repairs necessary. They all know, if things cost more then 1000 bucks more then what they quoted me, call. If not, just fix it because the relationship between shop owner and myself usually goes back a long way. They aint gonna to cheat me. They are usually specialty shops. My Honda guy build Honda race cars and have been monkeying with them since he was a kid in high school. I just dropped my S2000 for a clutch replacement today. I didn't even ask him how much and left to lunch when my wife showed up to bring me home. He know what ever it needs, it will get fixed.

There are still a lot of good and honest people out there once you get to know them and don't spin their wheels. They will be good to ya. I truly believe that.

[winders]

For my race car, I do all the work I think I can do without screwing something up. That includes just about everything except for engine work, transaxle work, welding, and sometimes alignment/corner balance (I don't own the tools to weld or align and corner balance).

Currently, my race car is up on jack stands because it broke a piston at laguna last month.

I pulled the engine and took it down to a long block before delivering it to the engine builder.

I need to flush the front-mounted oil tank (take it apart) and all the steel braided oil lines to make some piston or ring pieces are not in the oil system.

I had an incident in a race a few months where I bent the steering arm on one of the struts. Both struts are out of the car and are almost ready to send out to be straightened. One camber plate was bent slightly so a new one will be at my house tomorrow and probably installed hours after receiving it.

While the struts are apart I will inspect the wheel bearings and replace as necessary.

While the engine is out, I need to make some changes to the wiring harness to facilitate ease of engine removal. I do all the electrical work on the car including running new wires from the ECU to use previously unimplemented ECU functions.

I pull the transaxle and take it to a shop when it needs work. I replace the clutch disk, pressure plate, and ring gear as required.

I change the oil, oil filters, brake fluid, spark plugs, fuel filter, brake pads, and brake rotors as required. I bleed the brakes as required. I clean and re-oil the air filter regularly. I rebuild the CV joints every year. I remove the fuel injectors and send them out to be tested and cleaned every two years. I regularly check shifter bushings and replace as required.

I save a fortune by doing most of the work on my race car myself. I can't imagine how much it would cost if I took the car to a shop ever time it needed something done. A great benefit of doing all the work myself is that I know pretty everything about my car. I don't really love doing the work but it is satisfying nonetheless!

My modern street cars? They go to the shop for just about everything. Most are just too complicated to work on.

[greglepore]

Originally Posted by ckelly78z

We have a guy who runs a shop from his home (separate shop building) who is very reasonable on labor, and will only do what you ask to the degree that you want it fixed. He will afro-engineer if you tell him to to save some money., but will also do a fine job on most projects. He is getting up there about 65 years old, so I have to wonder how long he will continue.

I gained respect for him, and vice versa many years ago when we both raced Datsun Zs, and shared knowledge about the cars. He could tell that I wanted to learn, and wasn't just bleeding him for information on how to fix my car. If a stranger walks into his shop and starts asking a bunch of questions, he will show them the door, but if you truly have a give and take converstaion with the guy, you both will stand there for an hour and discuss everything from politics to local news, to cars.

Sounds like my Benz indy. Not 65 yet, but otherwise similar. And he's actually ok with customers bringing parts if we let him know in advance, he's all about the cars staying on the road affordably. His customer base is a bunch of Benz enthusiasts who couldn't afford the cars otherwise.

For me now it comes down to the lack of a lift and some physical limitations from a spinal injury a few years back. I'd like to diy everything but engine internals on my 911 but can't work for long lying on the floor anymore. The Benz's are pretty complicated for more than routine stuff like oil/trans fluid/brake work. The diagnostic computer clones are a $800 investment and while cool as all get out (they come with diagnostics and Mercedes WIS, which is more or less electronic shop manuals for all the cars from mid 90's on) not something I've been willing to buy yet.

[J P Stein]

It took me years to build a competitive TTOD AX race car. The only times it went to a shop was to put it on a dyno and an alignment machine.......there was some hard core DIY going on here.......no job too tough, given time.

The expense was manageable.....till I retired. We pretty much owned the local PCA & SCCA AX scenes.......did well at SCCA National Tour events also.(free tires is gud) The cost of having the car built by a shop was waaay beyond me. I knew of only one shop in the PNW that specialized in AX......they were pretty good.....but not good enough.

[sammyg2]

YPAF.

[J P Stein]

[QUOTE=sammyg2;9178265]YPAF.

I can't argue with that.
I did have to tow the ****box down to the bay area a few years ago to convince some local yucks of that. They still whine.

[sammyg2]

That'll teach em.

Doan wanna tell you your biddness or anything, but wouldn't it handle better iffn you got all 4 wheels on the ground at the same time insteada teeter-todderin like that?

[scottmandue]

Originally Posted by RANDY P

If it takes me more than 2 days, I'll usually farm it out to a shop.

If it involves draining more than 2 fluids, to a shop it goes.

If it involves opening a transmission, to a shop it goes.

If it's a V8 GM, it'll never see the inside of a shop.

As for relationships, best thing is one with positive reviews, I start on Yelp, and go by vibe.

rjp

(My edit)

Other wise the above sums it up for me.

Right now in my life I don't have a lot of time to wrench, we have two cars (2015 Nissan and 2013 Mazda) and we both have jobs and need those cars to get to those jobs. Not to mention modern cars just are not that much fun to wrench on.

I save my money working on the house, most minor plumbing/electrical/carpentry work I will do myself.

When I retire I would like to get a fun car to tinker with, and old Ford/Chevy... I had an old Rambler that was fun to work on... in the back of my mind a 356 reproduction would be nice (forget getting a real one $$$$$$).