Guest bastaad525 Posted December 30, 2003 Share Posted December 30, 2003 I have hit a crossroads here and, though I can kinda guess already what you guys will say, I wanted to ask for your oppinions on how to deal with a certain situation that does not seem to have a 'good' solution. Basically it's like this... my car... though I love it greatly, can be a problem case sometimes (most of the time). Especially since putting in the turbo motor it has had a LOT of things go wrong with it. MAJOR things. Now, though I'm pretty knowledgeable about L6 Z's (this is my 3rd one in 7 years), and have a haynes manual and a decent set of tools, and am fairly confident in myself about handling all but the largest of jobs. The problem is I live in an apartment. Now, I used to work on my car quite a lot here, but there came a point where the manager here made a big stink out of it and basically told me if I'm caught working on the car in our parking garage it could be grounds for eviction. I can still do little stuff... well just about anything that can be done from above the car, that can be completed relatively quickly... but nothing like pulling an engine or anything. Pretty much anything that requires me to lift the car up and work on it from underneath gets the red flag. Which is like... 80% of the stuff that has needed to be done. I dont really like the idea of working on it in the street... you can get a fat ticket for that and police do drive down our street relatively often (some bad seeds occupy one particular apt. bldg. down the block) so it's really not a safe option. Moving, for now, is out of the question (I know some of you wiesenheimers are gonna jump to that as your first solution ) Luckily, I made good friends with a guy right when I got my second Z, who has been working on Z's for half as long as I've been alive, used to have his own shop, but now just works from home. Since he has no overhead to speak of, his prices have always been awesome, usually 1/2 of what a regular shop would charge, if not then even less than that. This is the guy that's done all my serious work, including swapping the turbo motor into my current Z. Problem is, he's starting to get lazy. I'd say one out of every five times now, he will do a sloppy job of something... maybe he'll forget to tighten a bolt, or wont put something back the way it was, or if I maybe ask him to check some things while he's doing whatever he's doing (like, hey, if you're replacing an injector, can you check to be sure all the manifold bolts are tight? checking stuff usually doesn't incur any extra cost) he may or may not 'forget' to do so. On top of that, he is starting to run into the same problems with HIS landlord (he rents a house) that I have run into with our apartment manager... getting hard for him to do big jobs at his house w/o someone making a fuss. I didn't mind the lazyness part TOO much... usually I could go back over what he did and catch whatever little things he missed... tightening a bolt or whatever, which doesn't bother me because I do like working on my car... but still... I mean... if I'm paying for it... you know? I shouldn't HAVE to do that... but anyways... that's not even the real issue. This is where it gets worse... a year or two ago he got this other guy to start helping him out with big jobs. This guy is a prick, #1. #2, he has NO respect for the car (MY car) he's working on. While he does good work, mechanically, and hasn't had any slip ups or missed anything like tightening some bolt or anything like that... the guy just doesn't respect the car. Many times I've picked my car up from friend #1's house and I just KNEW that his 'employee' had worked on it w/o even having to ask, there would always be some 'sign' such as, the car was COVERED in greasy handprints or there were nice muddy shoe prints on my new carpet! Stuff like that. Problem is, I never know when my friend is going to have this guy helping with the work, or will do the work himself... and I DO ask beforehand, but usually he doens't know either until it comes down to it and he finds he's gonna need help or whatever. I've TOLD him I dont like this guy working on my car, and to TELL him he needs to be more careful. He just seems to shrug it off. Anyways... it was never a huge issue before... I mean... the car was in primer, and not even very well applied primer... so it already looked like crap, and I had stained it enough myself that more stains or little dings just didn't really matter any more... but there was still the principal of the thing. But now things are different. I have finally, in 7 years of owning primered Z's, decided it was time to have my car painted. So now the car actually looks kinda nice (I say kinda because it is just a cheap, $200 paint job)... enough that I actually care about dings, scratches and of course greasy hand prints! But... happiness with this car never seems to last. Last week I found out that my motor had spontaneously decided to start puking oil from both main seals and from the oil pan gasket... so, reluctantly, I arranged to have my friend take care of it. Now it was my understanding that he wasn't working with this other guy anymore, so I wasn't worried. But of course... where does my car end up? This other guys house. Now... as soon as I found this out I made no bones about letting the guy know I was NOT happy about that, and exactly how I felt about his friends lack of respect for the car he's working on. I basically told him that you know... it's got new paint and he better TREAT it as such, and pretty much threatened that if this guy screws it up that I will hold both of them responsible and that it WILL be payed for. I told him he really needs to tell this guy to have some respect for the car and treat it as if he were a paid mechanic working at a shop... you know... that I should expect my car to be exactly the same way it was when I left it, excepting of course that whatever problem will have been fixed He kinda just chuckled when I told him this... I became even more annoyed and made sure that showed thru in my tone... to which he said something to the effect of "hey dont worry about it he knows what's up and knows what he needs to do". I haven't picked the car up yet, and really I'm at a crossroads here. This is the first time they've worked on it since being painted, and I fully expect to see something... some damage to the paint, some indication that tools were laid bare on the fenders, or greasy hands placed on the body, that were not there before.... Basically I expect to have a reason to be pissed off when I pick the car up. If not... well... awesome... then this post is for nothing But if so... what do I do? I mean... part of me really wants to say... hey... you know, I'm not paying for this work. I just paid to get new paint on my car and if you can't respect that then you're paying for it. I mean... this could get really ugly, you know? Either way it would end up that I would not have this friend of mine, or his 'employee', to work on my car any more. Which means, that any time something goes wrong with the car that I can't fix myself, I can look forward to paying out the butt to get it fixed at a real shop. I'm not rich, and really I think, had it not been for this guy to fix stuff on my car, major stuff, for as cheap as he has been doing, this car would either have been parked for a very long time or I would have most likely gotten rid of it already. I just can't afford to take this car to a real shop as often as it decides to have problems. So what should I do? It was always easy to shrug this stuff off in the past... but now, even thinking about it just pisses me off. Enough to where I think I'm not gonna be able to keep my anger to myself this time if I see that this jackass screwed something up. As long as I've been into Z's and hung out with other guys like me... I've never really found anyone else who would do this kind of work, and for this cheap. Hell... even to have a good friend with all the tools I dont have (like an engine hoist) and a place where I could work freely on it myself and not worry about it... I've just not been that lucky. So if I go off on this guy I'll really be shooting myself in the foot, unless I get really lucky and nothing else big goes wrong with my car, like, EVER! Heh... which I feel in my bones will not be the case. And anyways, being as he's not a business, I can't exactly report him or anything... all I can do is refuse to pay him and that would be it. Well... what would you guys do? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ON3GO Posted December 30, 2003 Share Posted December 30, 2003 do you have your own garage or could u get one? i live in a apartment building and i got my own garage for 50 bucks a month extra.. so working on the car is ok now, if i didnt have the garage i would be thrown out. theres nobody thats on here or a friend that you can bring ur car to there house to do small jobs? when i lived in florida either my house or my friend brendans house was were we did all the work to friends cars. mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bastaad525 Posted December 30, 2003 Share Posted December 30, 2003 if you mean renting a private, seperate garage from our apt. building, then no. Where could I rent a garage? I'm not sure I know exactly what you mean. The other problem is I would then have to get the serious tools that I dont have (engine hoist etc.). About bringing the car to someones house to do small jobs... for one... it seems that pretty much all my friends also live in apartments... no joke... and for two... that's the problem, most of the stuff I've needed to do on this car recently haven't been 'small jobs'. For instance... what I'm having done right now (replacing the front and rear main oil seals as well as a new oil pan gasket) necessitates, at the least, dropping the tranny, and lifting the engine at least a couple inches out of the engine bay to get the oil pan out. My friend decided to just completely remove the engine from the car to get at all three easily. I definately dont have any friends who'm I could go to to do something like this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest 240hybrid Posted December 30, 2003 Share Posted December 30, 2003 What about working with your friend (the mechanic), instead of just leaving the car and hoping the prick doesn't work on it. You'll learn more about the car, make sure that the prick doesn't do anything you don't like (or even touch the car), and your friend may knock even more $ off the price if you're there helping him out and working along side of him. Sounds like you hava a good bit of knowledge, so working along side your friend shouldn't be too hard and you 2 should be on the same page as far as repairs go. I agree though, someone disrespecting your car will make you hotter than a firecracker. Majority of people just don't care nowadays, and it shows too. Good luck with this problem. Chase. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevin Shasteen Posted December 30, 2003 Share Posted December 30, 2003 Back when I had my first Z, a 73 240z, everytime I left it w/a shop I could always tell someone had hot rodded it...or as you say, simply did not respect the paint or body-or they forgot to tighten a bolt, ect. This was the reason I learned to work on my own cars: both small jobs and large jobs. Have you checked into prices for a storage facility? You could split rent for a storage facility large enough to work on your car or your friend's car of whom you were splitting the monthly rent with....if you trust your friends that is. If you go this route make sure you know your friend your are splitting the rent with and you should check into getting coverage for theft-from the rental people: and dont skimp on you pad lock! Make sure you buy one of those $100 pad locks...not a simple $5 lock: the cheaper locks are extemely easy to cut and even easier to pick if you know how. Kevin, (Yea,Still an Inliner) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
baddriver Posted December 30, 2003 Share Posted December 30, 2003 I think as long as you keep asking this guy to do work for you, and he is giving you a good price, then you owe it to him to pay him for the work he does, even if he leaves a mess. You know what kind of work he does, and you took it back to him anyway. I know you said that the other guy wasn't supposed to work on the car, but really, did you believe this wouldn't happen? people are people, and they don't change. I think the idea of working on the car along side your friend is a great one, if you can do it. Otherwise, you have to decide if the money you are saving by having an amature do your work is worth it. People complain about the prices of mechanical work, but you have to pay professional wages to get professional work. What you really need to do is fix your managers brakes for him cheap some time, so he'll leave you alone about working in the garage. Otherwise, finding a storage garage or meeting some new friends might be your best choice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bastaad525 Posted January 1, 2004 Share Posted January 1, 2004 Picked up the car today and it was as I feared... this guy really took no care with the paint and put several pretty bad scratches all along the front fenders and hood. On top of that, when he reinstalled the hood he didn't even take the 5 minutes to line it up right, so that the lip of the hood was striking the vent cowl when you close it... and apparently he didn't seem to think that was a problem as now there are several chipped spots where he forced the hood closed... and I do mean forced, when I popped the hood I could not get it closed again with any reasonable amount of pressure. On top of that he took my car for a 200mile joy ride apparently, though I know this guy well enough to think he probably was taking it easy, I dont see why the need to drive that many miles with a customers car at all. He also threw something into the back of the car... maybe a toolbox or something I dunno but the rear hatch carpet was filthy.... There were also greasy hand prints all over the place.... the thing that pisses me off is that this could all easily have been avoided by simply using some good sense and some sort of covers to protect the areas he was working around, and a cover thrown over the rear carpet... but apparently this guy was just too busy for that I'm really pissed. Again, the guy who did the work, and who is responsible for the problems I just mentioned, works for my friend. My friend himself has always done good work and taken very good care of my car... I've NEVER had an issue with stuff like this when he's done the work himself, and any problems I have had with his work he has been quick to address and resolve, so I'm kinda split here. I called him today and told him straight out that he was about to lose a customer... I mean I have easily paid this guy over $10,000 THIS YEAR ALONE for work done on my car... engine swaps and such... and you know... I expect a little bit more attention to stuff like this for what I"m paying. I told him that his 'buddy' will NOT ever lay a finger on my car again, and if he can't get someone else to help him out when he needs help then I wont be doing business with him anymore. Surprisingly, he was pretty miffed himself, not at me but about the whole situation, and was being very sympathetic and accepted what I had to say... I expected to get into with this guy but he had a great "the customer is always right" attitude, which is good, and makes me feel like I can continue to do business with him as long as his friend/employee is not at all involved. Hopefully he'll figure out that working with this guy in general is not benefitting him. Well... I officially have lost all hope in keeping my new paint looking nice and will resume treating it the same way I used to when it was just primered.... there's no point in sweating over it any more. My g/f, who is also pissed and feels pretty bad about the whole thing too... seeing how happy I was with the new paint, has already said that as soon as we are able, maybe within the next couple months, I can have the car sanded down and painted again. Though... I'm not so sure that's a good idea!!! Think I like it better when I'm not worrying about it.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ON3GO Posted January 1, 2004 Share Posted January 1, 2004 dude the damage cant be all that bad.. get it detailed correctly and also alittle touch up paint cant hurt either. trust me on that.. sorry about all this, seems the bad stuff always happens to the nice guys. best of luck with everything. mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest freakypainter Posted January 1, 2004 Share Posted January 1, 2004 if your happy with the service dont bitch about getting your car back dirty, after all it is cheap labor. If you want your car washed every time you have it worked on take it to the dealer and pay more. There is always a trade off when your trying to save a buck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fl327 Posted January 1, 2004 Share Posted January 1, 2004 I think you definitely have a right to be pissed, really pissed. It seems like your friend that works on your car is ok, but his ASSistant sounds like a complete jerk. Part of how I was trained to work on cars is to leave them looking BETTER than they came in, and running BETTER than they look. The guy working on your car and treating it like crap is a reflection of what he thinks about you and how much he respects you and the hard earned money it took to pay for the work being done, part of being a good mechanic is being able to work on a car and leave the "scent" like you were never there, which he is eithe incapable of or just plain stupid, sounds like both to me. I was working for a guy whose business is all word of mouth (body, paint, basic and high performance mechanical+fabrication) , so we would go to lengths higher than a "normal" shop to ensure that customer satisfaction is met or exceeded. My old boss started out as a sidejob mechanic much like the guy you probably get work done from, but by keeping his standards high, he built a large network of clients who refer their friends and family, generation after generation. He isnt typical of the evolution of the sidejobber, he is the one true sucess story that I know of in a sea of wannabes, like dirtmeister who phucked up your car. Just my thoughts, Happy New Year (even though I dont celebrate official until Feb!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moridin Posted January 1, 2004 Share Posted January 1, 2004 Ask for your money back to cover all damages incurred to your Z. When the guy - your friend - chuckles again, tell him that its not a laughing matter. He is getting paid to do the work and no matter how little, no damages should be done to the vehicle. Also tell him that if the detail and cleaning are not paid for, you will take him to small claims court to cover the cost. That should let both of them know that you are serious. Don't take any s*** from anyone and you will be much happier with yourself. I'm finding that one out the hard way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Phil1934 Posted January 1, 2004 Share Posted January 1, 2004 It's just a car. My neighbor does car work at his house, so has a yard full and a couple in the street. Two nights ago someone hit and ran one, smashing the front. Backyard mechanics don't carry customer liability so that guy is screwed. You want to pay discount prices for full service? Something's got to give. In this case TLC. Scrub it, touch it up and don't sweat it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moridin Posted January 2, 2004 Share Posted January 2, 2004 Yeah, but there is a difference between taking care of a car when working on it and unforseen damages caused buy outside forces. That guy can simply show a little respect for the vehicle he's working on. When I work on other people's cars, I always take the time to make sure I don't run greasy hands all over a person's car, or misalign a hood and chip the crap out of the paint. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bastaad525 Posted January 2, 2004 Share Posted January 2, 2004 Yeah, but there is a difference between taking care of a car when working on it and unforseen damages caused buy outside forces. That guy can simply show a little respect for the vehicle he's working on. When I work on other people's cars, I always take the time to make sure I don't run greasy hands all over a person's car, or misalign a hood and chip the crap out of the paint. THANK YOU!!! That's all I'm saying! I'm not expecting miracles, I'm not asking him to go above and beyond some set standard or anything like that, just take FIVE EXTRA F'ING SECONDS of your time to put a cover over the fender, or line the hood up right, or put a cover under your filthy toolbox before throwing it on my brand new carpet. So because I pay less than a shop asks I should consider these as extra luxuries that I'm not paying enough to expect? You know, put it THIS way, yah I'm paying less, but the guy doing the work, in the end, is getting more $$$. Yeah if I go to a shop I'm paying $50 an hour, but how much of that is ending up in the hands of the guy actually doing the work on my car?? What, $10 an hour? How much do they get paid? Does that fact give that guy at the shop an excuse to not take care with my car? Obviously not. ah and now you guys are really gonna laugh (what I really mean to say is you're probably gonna cringe, or laugh if you are a sadist ) $400 to remove the engine, replace both main seals and the oil pan gasket (and of course, get scratches on my brand new paint, filth on my near new carpet, etc. etc.) And guess what? The damn thing is leaking WORSE than it was before, and I'm not even exaggerating here. Before I had the work done, I did a test a couple times. Drove the car, got it warmed up, parked it, and put newspaper underneath the car. Checked it a couple hours later. Before the work was done, there would be a few drops on there, around the front seal only. When I checked from under the car, there was only some minor oil buildup, that seemed to both be coming from the front seal, and the front of the oil pan gasket. The rear seal leak was evidenced by some oil on the bottom of the tranny housing. Now after the work, I noticed that the smell in the car when driving, the smell I was sure was burning oil and NOT exhaust, is much worse. So I take a look... well whereas before I had checked the exhaust for oil splatter and hadn't been able to find any to confirm if that's what I had been smelling, now it is COVERED in it. I open the hood and all this smoke comes wafting out, and I see the oil all over the DP, and all over the crossmember. I do the newspaper test again, and after only one hour the thing is soaked thru, except this time it's all coming from the middle... at first I thought maybe now the drain pipe from the turbo is leaking? That's about where I could see it was comign from. Got under the car and find that no, it's not the turbo, it's just the new gasket that I paid to have installed... WTF??? And it is leaking BAD... from the middle, driver side of the engine (again, before the work was done, I had pinpointed the front of the gasket to be the source of the leak) I lost about a half a quart of oil after driving 30 miles. MUCH more rapid then the amount I was losing before the work was done. So now I'm being told the pan might be warped or damaged.... and I'm thinking... yeah but was it before? Now I know it's hard to tell 100%, with oil all over the place, exactly where it's leaking from now, or where it was leaking from before, but I swear it is not leaking from the same place as it was, which to me, means something has changed (as in, this guy doing the work fugged something up). And I know for a FACT that it is definately leaking faster than before. So... I'm at a serious impass here. I took the car back to the guy and told him to check it out... he's of course now taking no responsibility and saying it's most likely a damaged/warped pan. And of course he'll replace it for like another $200... sorry but I dont think that's gonna happen. Problem is, I dont know what IS going to happen, I dont have the money to pay a shop to fix it, and again, really dont have the place or tools to do it myself. I seriously need to find another, BETTER, backyard mechanic... gotta be someone around here... anyways... again I am back to not being able to drive the car, if only for the now unbearable smell of burnt oil that comes into the cabin windows up or down. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Phil1934 Posted January 2, 2004 Share Posted January 2, 2004 Since both mains and the pan started leaking at once and the problem has gotten worse, I wonder if you don't have a blowby problem which a compression check will confirm. This is more serious than a little dirt and scratches. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bastaad525 Posted January 2, 2004 Share Posted January 2, 2004 I just replaced the rings not that long ago, and compression tested well, though I know you'd really need a leakdown test to prove anything. It was all even, at least, within about 2 psi of each other on all six cyls after the new rings had broken in. I too considered blowby as a problem... but there is other evidence that supports just plain mistake making. The front seal didn't even look like it had been installed properly. The rear seal had been leaking for a long time already, months, whereas the front had just started leaking. The oil pan gasket, I found out later, was 1) one of the cheaper ones, and 2) I had overtorqued it, causing it to bulge out. I did still give mind to pressure in the crankcase possibly causing the issue, and before dropping the car off to be fixed I spent a day and reworked the PCV system and made sure it was functioning properly. Originally I had just had the two breathers from the crank and valve cover open to atmosphere, though one of the filters I was using wasn't really a suitable filter and HAD clogged up somewhat... I figured that might have caused the problem initially and that's why i went to great lengths to reroute everything and have a better solution BEFORE getting the seals replaced. Anyways, I just got off the phone with my friend again, and now he's saying that his guy that he had do the work is now saying that the oil pan was 'out of whack' when he took it off, so he went at it with a hammer to try to straighten it out.... WTF????? Um... did you just fail to mention this earlier?? Like, BEFORE YOU PUT THE FRIGGIN PAN BACK ON THE CAR?!?!?! Both my friend and I have spare oil pans that could have replaced the one that was on there and could have been verified to be in good condition before installing them... instead this idiot just decided a few whacks with a hammer would be enough. So... I have enough evidence here to not suspect a blowby issue anymore, rather, just a stupidity issue. My friend is now offering to replace the pan and the gasket himself, NOT have his friend do it, and will only charge me for a replacement gasket, which is being debated right now as to the fairness of this. His grounds is that obviously there must have been an issue before as the pan was leaking when I brought it to him initially, and therefore we can't place the blame on his 'employee' with 100% certainty. So... I dunno... I REALLY am at a point where I think I'd just like to do it myself, but the few friends I have talked to so far aren't up for the idea of me doing such potentially messy work in their driveways. I do still have some measure of trust in my friends work... I just hope he has the sense not to deal with this other guy anymore... if he will definately do it himself it may still be my best option to just let him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.