One GM A Tech-Your probably an excellent mechanic, but degrees and or certifications don't mean a lot to me. Experience is what matters. I have a lot of degrees and certifications and am an avionic tech by trade repairing commercial jet avionics and have all kinds of certifications. I have FAA repairman license, FCC license, avionics degrees, BS and AAS degrees etc. They don't necessary mean your going to get a mechanic or tech with experience, knowledge and quality of work. All this does is give a mechanic the minimum requirements for employment. I remember a Corvette club member going into a Chevrolet dealership to get his new vette serviced, he asked to meet the tech that would be working on his vette. After seeing the mechanic (fresh out of school, ASE certificated) he opt not having that dealership repair his 50k Corvette. It's not just Chevrolet, a friend’s neighbor owns a Viper and had a Dodge dealership do some maintenance. They somehow damaged his engine and he waited for months for a new engine. A friend of mine took his Honda Accord into a Honda dealership complaining of losing power after 10 minute of driving at freeway speeds. They couldn’t find the problem, but they found other stuff wrong and charged him $300.00 for nothing. His problem with the loss of power continued and he wanted me to look into it. Since it was wintertime, I assumed the problem was directly to the weather and found that the air cleaner snout door wouldn’t close when it was suppose to. This was causing the choke blade to ice up screwing up his fuel/ air mixture. $35.00 later for a new sensor he was back on the road again. As far as Corvette go I believe independent shop, specializing in Corvette's.
Dan

 

Hey Dan Are you saying that your friend met an ASE certified MasterTech at GM and decided to have someone else do repairs on his car because he wasnt fifty years old and had Dirt under his finger nails ? And as far as Certification in the automotive industry goes ASE certification And the master tech program For GM puts these guys at the top of the food chain and makes them the most sought after techs in the industry. It is NOT the minimum standard please try not to misinform everyone on the forum. The problem in this industry is that these programs that I have just mentioned are not mandatory. they are voluntary if they were there would be less of these horror stories. The master tech program is textbook and hands on. so after you finished learning GM says " Now fix this and show us you know what your doing" The fact of the matter is that the only anwser is on going education and that flys in the face of all that these old timers think they know. You know the guys with all this experience that you are reffering too. There are a lot of repair shops going out of business these days because they refuse to learn and upgrade. The days of the backyard mechanic are swiftly drawing to a close. Along with all those guys that think they know what they are doing. At the dealer we call them parts slingers. Todays tech is the man that is well versed in the inner workings of the modern automobile and the only way to do that is with certification, P.S the certification Im talking about must be renewed every few years. :seeya

 

One GM A Tech- well this "backyard Mechanic" can fix anything you can with factory manual, a low-end scanner and a DVM. I've rebuilt and repaired modern computer engines from high tech Mitsubishi 24 valve v6 to 460 cu Big block Fords. I think you’re under estimating the modern motor head. We do evolve with the times and know how to read. I know I’m not the only one on this forum that has a bad taste for dealership techs. I've worked in the avionics’ industry for close to 20 years. You can’t teach troubleshooting skills. You either have the mind for it or you don’t. The master tech program your were talking about sounds very similar to my high school advanced auto mechanic course. Enough said, it's been a joy discussing this with you. BTW, I still get grease under my nails working on modern engine. Hee, Hee
Good day!
:cheers:
Dan

 

Heck if those are original ralley wheels with original trim they're worth more then most other custom wheels brand new.

I never even take my vehicles in for tires. I put them on stands and toss the wheels in the truck and take em up to be mounted. There are good quality people out there. There are also your fair share of duds. Personally I dont ever wanna take a chance on somethin I can do myself. :cheers:

 

I didnt even know sears had an auto center :lol: i sure as hell would never take my car to them...

luckly i found a damn good mechanic in my area. i take any work i cant do, or am too lazy to do, to him. he carges $60 an hour (compare that to the $90-$110 an hour for dealers) as he is just as picky as me. when i had my POS Trans am, he adjust timing, carb, and cleaned everything free of charge. he also knows a great deal about MY cars. he used to own and race TAs, he is extremely familiar with vettes, and he even knows my 94 blazer like its his.

PLUG
Dave at Alpine Auto in Thornton, CO. They're small enough to care about customers, but big enough to get the job done fast.
PLUG

and ASE is a joke. I am in an auto-tech class at our local community college, (dont laugh im going to WyoTech as soon as i get the cash...) and i am in a class of guys who are total gear heads and already know cars but suck at tests so they will fail, and the other morons will pass because they studied a book for a week.

And im not insulting the people on this board who are ASE mechanics (as i soon will be one...) im insulting standardized testing for mechanics. either you know cars or you dont. and if you dont know cars, you dont work on mine.

One moron came up to me a couple days ago as i was cleaning my new rear end and asked me if it was a TRANNY CASE!!! A :cuss: F@$KING TRANNY CASE!! i nearly kicked him in the *****, but i finally just said "no."
its scary to think this guy will be working on cars.

im done with my rant now :yesnod:

 

Dan Im sure that you are probably a capable guy and I am not calling you into question here. As far as u thinking you can repair anything with the tools you just mentioned you are sadly mistaken if it was that easy everyone would be doing it that thought he was capable enough and apparently this is the thinking of the many cause there are a lot of wanna bees out there that will never be. The guys that dont step up for education will be as the Dinasours history. Glad you are still reading and wrenching. Here is where we agree to disagree enough said :lol: :lol:

 

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Orlando - I guess I've been lucky so far repairing and rebuilding late model cars. We have kind of got away from the topic. None of the examples I mention above take a master mechanic to do the work the right way the first time. Do they teach you boy's quality! That what dealership mechanics seem to have a problem with. You mentioned yourself you know mechanic that shotgun parts and probably charge the customer for part they didn't need. This is also what I’m talking about. Do you expect customers to play Russian roulette with their car repaired? If you can't see my point this discussion is hopeless.
Dan

 

Hello Dan And good Sunday to you. Since you disreguard every certification of this industry that is held in high reguard how do you judge who is doing excellent work? Do you have some xray vision that we should know about That scans a persons brain and gives you the feed back on the extent of his knowledge in the automotive world. I ask no one to play russian roulette when it comes to autorepair or any other repair for that matter. What I say is "Be informed" who is working on my car today is there shop on the DMV hit list? Is he licensed? what qualification does he hold? (or She) Is the apprentist tech (C) working on my car or the Shop forman? Is the shop dirty and unkept? IF that sounds silly to you Then I dont know how else to explain it your set in the belief that nothing means anything to you. You mention in the previous posts that you would take your car to a vette specific repair facility. I get your vette specific repair guys in all the time looking for anwsers to problems they cannot solve As far as Im concerned half of these guys should even sit in a c5 or c4 let alone repair them. So Dan I ask you how do you do it how do you tell who,s who? Oh and Dan I really am trying to see what you are saying what Im saying is that it doesnt have to be a crap shoot if your informed of what to look for and what questions to ask a little research can save you headaches :cool:


[Modified by One GM A Tech, 7:18 PM 4/28/2002]


[Modified by One GM A Tech, 7:19 PM 4/28/2002]

 

Orlando - This isn't going anywhere! If all the mechanic were as you are, we wouldn't be having this conversation. No hard feeling, I hope to talk with you again on the forum. I may even have a question to ask you. Have a great week.
Dan :cheers: