My car's been neglected for a while. First, the new job and the horrendous commute before I moved made getting it to a shop on a weekday pretty much impossible. Then, once I moved, it's been fairly non-stop with other commitments that mean I can't be without a car for a day.
Finally, after getting back from Montana, I dropped it off at the shop last night and got a ride from my best friend into work today.
Status report:
Two bad catalytic converters. Yes, my car has two, and they both need replacing. I figured I'd gotten bad gas at some point in the past since a few things went odd, but that cleared up. Or seemed to, anyway. Plus, I'm at 100k miles (just shy), so it's about time anyway.
A bigger concern is that they said the engine had almost no oil in it. Now, yes, it's been a while since I had an oil change (probably too long), but I swear I checked the oil levels either just before my vacation or just after, so it's been max 8 weeks and more likely 6 weeks since I looked, and it was fine. So, that's a little concerning. They're going to flush it, load it with HQ synthetic, and have me flush it again (at no cost) in 2k miles or so.
Lastly, front brakes, but that's not a big deal: pads are under warranty, so it's just labor.
Total cost: about $2500, most of that the converters (which are about 900 each). Luckily, I don't need new tires yet, which would be another $1k. But that'll probably come up in the next couple of months (especially as the weather gets rainy towards the end of October).
It's also a really good feeling to know that spending $2500 to get my car fixed isn't a big deal: I'd actually budgeted for about $3k, not including tires. So, while I'm not happy about the oil thing (hopefully it's just a "wtf" freak occurance and not indicative of some larger problem), I'm actually not upset over the cost.
And my toy will be all spiffy again. Well, as soon as I get it washed, anyway...
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2 comments:
Over the years I've learned to be very skeptical of car mechanics, even the ones who seem very honest. Sometimes I think it's deliberate trickery, other times they're going by manufacturer's recommendations and those always err on the side of being VERY preemptive.
A number of years ago I bought a car private party. The owner lived 30 miles away so I took the car to a garage near him to be inspected. They said the car needed $2500 worth of work. Because of the estimate I was able to negotiate nearly $2000 off the price of the car. A day or two later, I took the car to my local mechanic. Guess what? There was nothing wrong with it. Not one thing! I felt really guilty about paying too little but it was an eye-opening experience. Since then, whenever a car has needed repair work, I take it to a shop, get an estimate, then do my own research. Each time I've saved hundreds of dollars. Most recently, one car needed new rear brakes. Midas was running a special - a complete inspection plus an oil change. They quoted the brakes at around $350. I checked the Internet, saw that price was high, and did some research. I found an ASE mechanic who worked from his house on Craigslist. He wanted $50 (I paid him $75) and I bought the parts. Yes, it was somewhat risky, but I got a good vibe from the guy so I took a chance and let him replace the brakes. He did the work in an hour and I saved more than $200 compared to the Midas 'deal'.
You've probably ok'd the work and you're happy enough with the estimate so my skepticism is likely of little interest to you at the moment. But in the future, whenever you get a big estimate like that, I suggest that you do some research. Educating yourself could allow you to save enough for an extra vacation.
Oh, I did research it. I've got more than a few friends who do their own car repairs and have often volunteered to work on mine.
That's why I had a rough idea of costs going in. The brakes I knew about, and as I said those are under lifetime warranty. The converters I didn't know about, but running past a couple of car geeks also sounded reasonable: again, I know I got bad gas at one point, and it's also about time to get it changed anyway.
I also talked with the guy about other things - like my tires, the timing belt, etc. - and he actively said those weren't a problem (tires I could wait a few months, and the timing belt was actually replaced at 75k miles at my last shop). So, he's not trying to milk me for money or extra labor costs.
Catalytic converters are expensive, especially for my car (high-end model of what is technically a sports car) and especially in California. That's the vast majority of the price (best deals I've seen for after-market type are in the $700 range, and that's from sketchy sources; 900 isn't unreasonable).
But, yeah, I appreciate the advice. I usually do this kind of research before I walk in the door so I at least have some idea of what's going on. This time, it's just legitimately expensive. It's one of the downsides of owning a sports car.
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