As I mentioned elsethread, I've just spent a stack of my hard earned on my truck in order to address a few issues that I inherited from the PO.
One of the issues was supposedly a duff EGR valve with a clogged passage into the intake that was the real cause of the CEL; within a day, the CEL came back on and getting the issue investigated at another shop (the dealer's shop is conveniently closed on Saturday mornings) points at the EGR valve. Hooray. However the truck was deemed to be safe to drive as is - not that I had a choice...
There were also a couple of other issues - for example, they were supposed to perform a compression test and called me with the results but when I put new plugs in yesterday, I noticed that the spark plugs that were in the engine were caked with deposits (presumably from the leaking intake gasket) to the extent that the one plug had most of the 'side' gap between the two electrodes was completely filled up... Why does someone put plugs like that back into an engine if the customer is already almost 2 grand in the hole?
Anyway, apart from the usual advice - if you want to berkeley up a job properly, do it yourself - I'm now wondering how do to approach the dealer and get them to finish the repair that I supposedly paid for? Obviously I'm not too keen on paying them for further work and if I have to, I'll take it somewhere else. I'll try not to go medieval on their backsides as I've had a good 48 hours to calm down by the time they open, but still.
Any advice?
No advice - 99% of dealer work is e36m3 wrenching performed by berkeleytards (sorry to those in the biz on here, present company excluded). Ive had exactly ONE dealer repair that I didnt want to punch myself in the face after seeing the quality compounded by cost (but to be honest, theres only about 5 examples to go off of, my frame of reference may be shallower than others).
There are ways to do a compression test without removing the spark plugs, all you need is an ammeter and an oscilloscope.
Sure, you won't get actual compression numbers, but what is the disclaimer everyone always mentions about compression testing?
I f the work order didn't say install new plugs, they didn't.
4cylndrfury wrote:
No advice - 99% of dealer work is e36m3 wrenching performed by berkeleytards (sorry to those in the biz on here, present company excluded). Ive had exactly ONE dealer repair that I didnt want to punch myself in the face after seeing the quality compounded by cost (but to be honest, theres only about 5 examples to go off of, my frame of reference may be shallower than others).
I worked at a dealership for a while. You're right.
The money was awesome, but the atmosphere got to me.
I took my Ranger to a Ford dealer for a "tune up" that included replacing the plugs and wires. When I got the truck back I thought it ran kind of "funky" but put it down to "bad gas". When it didn't get better I decided to check under the hood. They replaced the spark plugs but only hooked up 4 of the 8 wires (it was one of those 8 plug 4 cylinder Rangers). For some reason, they hooked up the difficult wires and left the easy ones un-hooked. At least I'm guessing that's what they did.
I would like to throw business to my dealer...but after trying 2 different Ford dealers, they never seemed to care for doing a repair correctly and completely. The dealer my father buys his cars from seems to do good work, probably because they are in a small town and really know their customers. Too bad they are too far from me.
Here is the biggest rub with dealership "work", if you only get paid say, a hour, to do something, you get 30 min worth of the fastest work humanly possible. If you are at about 45 min, it becomes "What can I get away with and have it still run?".
I never did the above scenario in my three yrs of dealership life, but I did see plenty of it though.
Yes, if the work order said to run a compression test, that is what you got. But I would have immediately written up a change order to include new plugs and anything else I could find. But then again, the tech assigned to your vehicle could have 5 other vehicles that need to get out of the shop and he/she can't realistically write themselves any more work as they already have the others waiting. BTDT and been bitched out because of it from the service manager. I had to deal with a service writer that could not figure out the word, RESCHEDULE. He was now or never on repairs. I never understood it because he cost himself money besides myself.
Brian
integraguy wrote:
I took my Ranger to a Ford dealer for a "tune up" that included replacing the plugs and wires. When I got the truck back I thought it ran kind of "funky" but put it down to "bad gas". When it didn't get better I decided to check under the hood. They replaced the spark plugs but only hooked up 4 of the 8 wires (it was one of those 8 plug 4 cylinder Rangers). For some reason, they hooked up the difficult wires and left the easy ones un-hooked. At least I'm guessing that's what they did.
I would like to throw business to my dealer...but after trying 2 different Ford dealers, they never seemed to care for doing a repair correctly and completely. The dealer my father buys his cars from seems to do good work, probably because they are in a small town and really know their customers. Too bad they are too far from me.
Ditto, I'd love to support a dealership, as they likely know the specific problem areas of their particular line. But both the Mazda dealerships in my immediate area (upstate NY) are terrible. So I go to an indie for jobs that I can't tackle myself.
I have a beef with a certain Mazda-VW dealership in the area, and they will never see another dime of my money. Literally 3 days after I moved here (from across the state), the dashboard e brake light on the car starts coming on when I'm using the brakes. I take it to the dealer as I'm new to the area and don't know any good independents and had my tools in temporary storage across the state. They diagnose a leaking rear caliper, also having contaminated the pads. I'm not suspicious, it's been a problem area on this car before. I authorize the repair (caliper and new pads and rotors in the rear) and I pay gobs of money (OEM part prices on a Protege are stupid expensive).
I come back a few days later (part needed to be ordered) to pick up the car. Driving off, the brake pedal is mushy as hell. I bring the car back and ask for it to be re-bled/inspected as I brought them a car with a very firm pedal (I'm nice but firm). I wait 30 minutes, they say I'm good to go. Driving off, the pedal is better, but still not acceptable. My fault here, but I say screw it and head home. Dealership was getting ready to close, and I figure I'll just bleed the brakes myself. A few weeks later, I'm doing just this and discover a stripped fitting from hose to caliper (on the opposite side of the replaced caliper). I contact the dealer, they are unhelpful and not willing to own up to anything, but offered me a few vouchers for a free oil change. I laugh and say bye. I thought about contacting Mazda, but the fact is that the car was 7 years old at that point, and I'm not the original owner (or a repeat Mazda owner). But I will never go to either of the Mazda dealers in this area again.
It's shame really, as I'm not a guy that starts foaming at the mouth at the mention of dealer service departments. My first car was a Pontiac, and the local GM dealer had one of the best service departments I've ever dealt with. They weren't the cheapest gig in town, but they were such a joy to do business with that I was happy to pay the higher price.
iceracer wrote:
I f the work order didn't say install new plugs, they didn't.
Didn't stop them from changing the oil that was contaminated with coolant from a leaking intake gasket without checking back with me...
Let's see what a polite conversation gets me tomorrow, but I'm getting the impression that I'll be taking the truck to a local independent instead where you can actually talk to the person doing the work on the vehicle.
BoxheadTim wrote:
iceracer wrote:
I f the work order didn't say install new plugs, they didn't.
Didn't stop them from changing the oil that was contaminated with coolant from a leaking intake gasket without checking back with me...
Let's see what a polite conversation gets me tomorrow, but I'm getting the impression that I'll be taking the truck to a local independent instead where you can actually talk to the person doing the work on the vehicle.
Iceracer does have a point. I work as a bicycle mechanic and I don't perform any work over the original estimate without confirmation from the customer. That being said, I always call and apprise the owner of the situation when I'm in the middle of the job and discover an issue. But I've been burned for just replacing something that needed replacement without notification from the customer (and we're talking an additional $10 part on a $150+ bill).
So I do nothing unless I've received confirmation from the customer. That being said, they probably should have called you.
By the way, the main issue here isn't a set of $20 spark plugs that I had on the shelf, it's the fact that the EGR 'fix' hasn't fixed the issue.
Well, after some polite words yesterday they took the truck back in and found that the EGR passages were clogged up again with carbon deposits.
Just got the word they had to pull the intake again but supposedly it's now all cleaned out...
I thought that you should have given the shop a chance to fix it. There is usually some type of basic warranty on repairs, like 30 days or 30 miles, whichever comes first, etc. that should have covered you. I hope they fixed it.
Next up, if you're not going to work on your stuff yourself, you need to find a good basic auto repair shop, not a dealer (sorry dealer workers, I know who you are, I just can't afford you.) Ask around your work, neighbors, etc.
Dr. Hess wrote:
I thought that you should have given the shop a chance to fix it. There is usually some type of basic warranty on repairs, like 30 days or 30 miles, whichever comes first, etc. that should have covered you. I hope they fixed it.
So do I, and they seemed to be OK with covering their repair. I guess I'll see over the next couple of days if they managed to fix the issue.
Dr. Hess wrote:
Next up, if you're not going to work on your stuff yourself, you need to find a good basic auto repair shop, not a dealer (sorry dealer workers, I know who you are, I just can't afford you.) Ask around your work, neighbors, etc.
Trouble is that we're all looking for a good repair shop, even the people who've been here for a while, simply because the economy out here wreaked havoc amongst the smaller repair shops. I do try to do as much work on my vehicles as I can, looks like I need to ramp this up.
