RE: mechanics (Nightmares)

[Tim Ebling <tim@surreal.com>]

I have a couple similar nightmarish stories about mechanics who TWICE caused
potentially life-threatening situations.

Back when I had my black '86, I took it in to get new wheel bearings for one
of the front wheels.  After the job was done, the bearing noise was
certainly gone, but there was a new weird noise present, and the steering
was pretty bizarre (I hadn't had it realigned yet, but it shouldn't have
been THAT bad).  After I decided to investigate the problem myself, it
turned out that the idiot had only tightened the axle nut FINGER TIGHT.
This is the big nut that's supposed to be tightened to like 150 ft-lbs.
Fortunately the nut hadn't loosened all the way - probably wouldn't have
been pretty at highway speeds.

The second experience was even worse, imo.  This was on my red '88, and was
after having the alignment shop replace a tie rod end and a steering rack
boot.  A couple days after the job was finished I was driving around up in
the mountains on a pretty twisty road, having fun as usual.  On one of the
turns - holy crap!  My steering wheel doesn't work!  As I frantically tried
turning right, the car kept drifting left and into the opposite lane.
Totally panicked, I slowed the car down and managed to limp it back into the
right land and onto the side of the road.  If there had been someone in the
opposite lane, it would have been a head-on collision at 50 mph.  Suspicious
now of the job recently performed, I jacked up the car there on the side of
the road and had a look.  What I found was almost unbelievable.  This
absolute moron of a mechanic left the tie rod end sitting in the steering
knuckle without the crown nut to hold it in place!!! It was completely
loose, thus the steering was completely loose.  It was so ridiculous it was
almost funny - just about as funny as the temporary fix I used to get home.
Turns out - and you might want to remember this if the same thing happens to
you! - is that a lug nut from any of your wheels will thread onto the tie
rod end.  Muahahaha.

So my advice is - never go to mechanics if you can do the work yourself (I'm
certainly never going back to those places again), and if you must take it
somewhere, be sure to thoroughly check their work.  Especially if they've
been mucking around in dangerous places like suspension!

-tim

> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Ruby [mailto:dbruby@ainet.com]
> Sent: Thursday, December 03, 1998 10:57 PM
> To: scirocco list
> Subject: Re: mechanics
> 
> 
> Just like the rest of you guys, I try to brave the 
> mechanic-ing myself, too.
> The peace of mind you get knowing the actual status of your 
> repair job is
> well worth the greasy nails and time spent, plus one actually 
> learns a thing
> or two.  On the rare occasions that I have not done the 
> maintenance myself,
> I have gotten burnt (and even almost killed, once!): Once, I 
> took my 8v in
> to a local "specialist" for the installation of sport springs 
> and shocks.
> He took the liberty of stealing my steering rack, swapping it for the
> decrepit one from his '80 Rabbit.  He also broke the driver's 
> seat mechanism
> by lifting the car from beneath the seat (!!), and also broke 
> the driver's
> door lock mechanism.  Once I started ranting about these problems, he
> basically said "you can't prove anything," and locked himself 
> in his shop.
> The other time--the time I almost got killed--another shop, 
> after performing
> a CV boot job, forgot to put the bolt which keeps the A-arm 
> attached to the
> bottom of the strut.  I discovered this when the right front 
> suspension came
> adrift--seconds after I was traveling at about 60 mph over a railway
> crossing.  Fortunately, nobody got hurt.
> Nowadays, I save the $70/hour money normally spent on 
> incompetence towards
> nice tools for myself to get the job done right.
> 
> -Dave
> '86 8v, '79 Golf Diesel, '84 Nissan 4x4, '66 Corvair Corsa Turbo, etc

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