Hola, folks. 🙂
About to crash, but gotta get the daily post up. Long work day today with some cars going sideways. First car was a 2013 Silverado that needed an oil pressure sensor (really common issue with Chevy trucks and SUVs). Second time in the last couple of days or so, though, that the customer got the wrong part.
I’ve gotta create a form text to send to customers who want to provide their own parts. It’s a pretty big issue when they get the wrong parts because it ends up taking longer, sometimes a lot longer, and that… is both awkward because I need to charge more for lost time if we need to go find the part, and it’s also not great because it puts me behind on the day.
So, gratefully, the parts store was less than a mile a way this time, and so it only took an extra… maybe 30-45 minutes.
Car #2 was… uh… oh yeah, jump start on a VW that had left his lights on. Easy peasy, and I gave a discount because it was so easy.
Car #3 was a sideways mess. 1999 Hyundai Elantra that was blowing ignition fuses every time the key was put to the on position. I spent over three hours trying to track down the issue, and after nearly 3 1/2 hours, when I was about to leave because I still had a bunch of other cars when he asked if I could get his driver’s window to go up.
He then proceeded to tell me that it stopped working the same time the other issue started. He also then said that the headlights stopped working at the same time as everything else.
Good gravy. Would have been nice to know that from the beginning. First of all, I never would have taken the job. But even if I had, it would have significantly changed the testing. Instead of a short to ground in the starting circuit, it would probably end up being a module or fuse box or something else.
Anyway, long long time that I didn’t feel I could charge much for, so I charged for less than half my time there.
Then it was a brake job that went slightly sideways. 2011 Mazda CX-9, but it wasn’t too bad.
Next car was putting a new latch on the rear hatch of a 1994 Nissan Pathfinder. It had been wrecked in the rear, so the latch was all mangled. I put the new one on, and it wouldn’t fit right, so I bent the new one , and that fixed it and made it work at least functionally.
Accidents aren’t so friendly for part installation tolerances.
Last job was a parasitic draw test, and it took a while. I didn’t get home until after 10. I’m tired.
G’night, all.
Lift the World
~ stephen
Lift the World 