Today's Example of Why I Prefer to Do All My Own Work on My Rig

[Anak]

A couple of years ago I had a shop tear into my front axle in pursuit of a noise that I couldn't track down myself. They did indeed find it, all the way in the center of my ARB carrier. And the only way to find it was to tear the carrier down. It didn't show at all on the axle.

This is what was happening inside the carrier:

View attachment 132051

And this was what the end of the axle looked like:

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I wasn't going to have found that on my own. The shop did find it. And this is not the only job for which I have used that particular shop, and I would use them again if I needed to. Even after finding this today, on that very carrier they disassembled:

View attachment 132053

Evidently they didn't get those bolts properly reinstalled. My guess is that they damaged two of the retainers (you can just barely make out one of the retainers at the top of the carrier) and didn't want to hold up the job in order to wait for special order parts to come in. Those retainers might even be a single use item.

Point is, a shop isn't going to stop and present a customer with the choice to wait for parts or not. Among other things, the shop wants that lift cleared out so they can get to the next vehicle in line. They have other customers and a profit motive which are not necessarily driving the same priorities that matter to me. Now, two years later, I get to wait for special order parts. And hope that my bearings are not going to suffer from all the glitter that has been circulating in them.

On the bright side, I found this problem at home, doing my own routine maintenance, and not on the trail with a disaster on my hands. The outcome of the shop's decision could have been much worse.

I will take my own workmanship over anyone else's.

 

[64Trvlr]

View attachment 132053

Point is, a shop isn't going to stop and present a customer with the choice to wait for parts or not. Among other things, the shop wants that lift cleared out so they can get to the next vehicle in line. They have other customers and a profit motive which are not necessarily driving the same priorities that matter to me. Now, two years later, I get to wait for special order parts. And hope that my bearings are not going to suffer from all the glitter that has been circulating in them.

On the bright side, I found this problem at home, doing my own routine maintenance, and not on the trail with a disaster on my hands. The outcome of the shop's decision could have been much worse.

I will take my own workmanship over anyone else's.

I agree that there are some shops that would do a half ass job just to get a vehicle out and get paid, I used to hate shops like that. I made a lot of money fixing the stuff they screwed up, sad thing is there really isn't a reason for it other than just being lazy, not knowing what the hell you're doing or just not caring.

I had a shop for almost 10 years and I would have never turned something like that out. By the time the customer would have been notified the parts would already be on the way.

I agree your own workmanship is head and shoulders over most shops best efforts, other than mounting and balancing tires I do everything on my vehicles.

 

[M Rose]

I agree that there are some shops that would do a half ass job just to get a vehicle out and get paid, I used to hate shops like that. I made a lot of money fixing the stuff they screwed up, sad thing is there really isn't a reason for it other than just being lazy, not knowing what the hell you're doing or just not caring.

I had a shop for almost 10 years and I would have never turned something like that out. By the time the customer would have been notified the parts would already be on the way.

I agree your own workmanship is head and shoulders over most shops best efforts, other than mounting and balancing tires I do everything on my vehicles.

I too made a lot of money from “Those Shops”. My lift was known to house rigs for months at a time, one bay had a customer’s 1930’s REO for nearly 2 years as we waited for the engine to turn one full revolution so we could make it a runner.
And, no we would give the customer the choice to get parts and wait or try to come up with another solution.

 

[64Trvlr]

I too made a lot of money from “Those Shops”. My lift was known to house rigs for months at a time, one bay had a customer’s 1930’s REO for nearly 2 years as we waited for the engine to turn one full revolution so we could make it a runner.
And, no we would give the customer the choice to get parts and wait or try to come up with another solution.

Looks like you're gonna have to straighten that spare wheel out a little...

 

[Boostpowered]

I completely stopped going to shops one winter in early 2000s when i lived in indianapolis, i had a strut replaced and didnt feel like messin with it in the cold in front of my apartment at the time. They fixed it but ended up leaving tools under my hood which scratched my paint up before i realized they were there. I still use the breaker bar and the stanley rachet set they left under there to this day. I decided on getting my ase cert soon after this happened and started working at a race shop in speedway.

 

[M Rose]

Looks like you're gonna have to straighten that spare wheel out a little...

The owner of the car had found a spare wheel, along with a hole lot of other parts...

Sad story to this car: the owner was a long time friend to my dad, and installed garage doors. He literally found the car in a barn he was installing doors on back in the 80’s. Every time he had to go to the area he would stop in and try to by the car. Nearly 30 years later he was finally able to buy it. We had the car 2 years trying to get the seized engine to turn over. Finally one day the engine budged and about 2 weeks after that we were able to get the engine running. The owner then took the car back to his house to finish the restore. 6 months later his wife died. Then he got very sick and put into a nursing home. His daughter sold the car to a guy who chopped it up for one of those rat rods.

 

[64Trvlr]

The owner of the car had found a spare wheel, along with a hole lot of other parts...

Sad story to this car: the owner was a long time friend to my dad, and installed garage doors. He literally found the car in a barn he was installing doors on back in the 80’s. Every time he had to go to the area he would stop in and try to by the car. Nearly 30 years later he was finally able to buy it. We had the car 2 years trying to get the seized engine to turn over. Finally one day the engine budged and about 2 weeks after that we were able to get the engine running. The owner then took the car back to his house to finish the restore. 6 months later his wife died. Then he got very sick and put into a nursing home. His daughter sold the car to a guy who chopped it up for one of those rat rods.

That sucks...

 

[M Rose]

Ya it does...

 

[Mike331]

As a dealership technician that typically works on the older vehicles that we see (5-15 years old) I will always put the decision to replace a "questionable" part in the customers hands, with as much information as they desire to make the best decision they can. My manager, team leader and service advisers all dislike it because it can tie up a rack (in a small shop) for a few extra days, or I make the vehicle mobile and push it outside, but what gets replaced on the vehicle is not my decision to make. I just let the customer know what I see wrong with their vehicle. Sounds like the shop that you took your vehicle to (or even sometimes what technician received your repair order) doesn't share the same opinion in regards to notifying you about potentially questionable parts.

 

[joshjunior]

i've always installed all my mods...settings gears has never been something i've learned to do sadly. I've seen many bad installs on jeeps back in my rock crawlin days though

@RichieFromBoston the jailbreak channel?

 

[joshjunior]

I never even saw anyone do gears, and I managed to get my front high pinion and rear 9.5 installed and dialed in. yes Jailbreak

nice! really dig your channel bro

 

[JimBill]

Found this when doing wheel bearing on the rear of my used WJ. And a stripped transfer case drain plug. And frozen caliper pins even though the lot I bought it from had the front brakes done. And a cross threaded lug nut.....

View attachment 132203

 

[Anak]

Cross threaded lugs are one of my biggest gripes with shops. I know exactly what happens with them. Some monkey with an impact doesn't bother to take the time to start them by hand and make sure they are threading on correctly. Oh no. He just starts them with his impact and doesn't GARA what it takes to run them all the way down. He knows the customer is going to drive off without a clue.

Consequently I don't let tire shops touch my vehicles. I put the vehicle up on jackstands at home and just take the wheels to the shop for mounting and balancing. My quality of life is much better this way.

 

[smritte]

I'm glad I can do my own work. Whats funny is I will let one of my students work on my rig before a "professional". When asked why, my response is "they have no bad habits yet and their not on a time crunch". Obviously I watch them though and the repairs don't get too detailed.

 

[64Trvlr]

Cross threaded lugs are one of my biggest gripes with shops. I know exactly what happens with them. Some monkey with an impact doesn't bother to take the time to start them by hand and make sure they are threading on correctly. Oh no. He just starts them with his impact and doesn't GARA what it takes to run them all the way down. He knows the customer is going to drive off without a clue.

Consequently I don't let tire shops touch my vehicles. I put the vehicle up on jackstands at home and just take the wheels to the shop for mounting and balancing. My quality of life is much better this way.

Is this what you're referring to?

View attachment 132245

 

[Anak]

Is this what you're referring to?

View attachment 132245

LOL.

They mess up before they even get to that point.

And then it takes better than fifty "ugga duggas" to get it to the point where they can pretend they tightened it down properly.