okay we're talking about uh car repair the last car repair i had done on mine was last February
it was uh uh my car was inspected and then they said that the brakes weren't adjusted properly and i had to go have it uh adjusted and it turned out that they needed repair and it cost like three hundred dollars
the brakes
to have that yeah for the brakes
what uh what did you have to have done to the with the brakes
oh i don't know they had they had a whole list of things you know you need to have this turned and that
you know refinished i don't know i don't understand the whole process my personally which is one reason why i don't trust the auto repairmen i guess uh these car repair places but uh
i hate to take it anytime because i know they're going you know say oh you need this you need that and everything else in the book uh
so i don't know i haven't had a terribly good experience a lot of times with car repair places uh years ago when i was living in California i went to my my my clutch cable had popped on my car
the clutch had broken or something i don't know what was wrong so i took it to uh a transmission shop uh nationally recognized name and uh
they had said uh
well they he called me back that afternoon and they said oh yeah you need this you need that your transmission's faulty and all this and it was like you know six hundred dollars
jeez
and i said wait the car's not worth that much it's it's uh an eight year old car and it's not worth that much uh i'll just have to do later i said i don't don't do anything with it because i'm i'm not worth that much money on it
and i went there after work my wife and i went there after work and uh they had the whole thing down and taken apart
um-hum
so i told the guy i said you know i didn't authorize this i said you put it back together i'm taking it home and the guy said well it will have to be another day before we get it put back together i started to go get a lawyer
um-hum
you know because i didn't authorize anything and so he went and got his manager and the manager came out and says i'll give you the parts at cost i'll give you the labor for a hundred dollars and so for two hundred fifty dollars we'll do it all for you
oh really
yeah so i thought well he'll meet me halfway i'll meet him halfway so it all this work done for like two hundred and fifty dollars but still you know the the element of trust was gone at that point
yeah that's their way of capturing your
pocketbook i guess for those who are least suspecting
in a lot of regards i mean uh
actually
you probably had a better deal that way
yeah it was i'm sure it was
so i got my
uh transmission fixed with all my clutch
um
just the other day my clutch cable had had popped again and uh last year i i took it my car to a friend of mine to have the oil changed he worked at a at a car lube place
and uh i asked him if he could adjust the clutch any because it was kind of loose and he looked at it and said sure he pulled the clutch cable out from inside the engine area and
pulled the clip out that was attached attached to it and put it back further on on the cable well it was fine
so i watched real carefully and and then my clutch cable broke uh i went and uh i got a new uh
clip that i had with me i bought an extra one and i just went there and and replaced it and was back moving again within three minutes and
um-hum
there i was stuck on the road right in the middle of traffic but i managed to get it going again relatively quickly because i knew i watched what he did and was able to do it really fast
and you know i just figured that if i'd taken it someplace they would have said oh you need a new clutch cable and this and that and you know two hundred fifty dollars later there it is you know
gee
i don't know i don't have much trust in those people but how about your experiences
well i generally try to find my own personal car mechanics
yeah
uh rather than taking it to a shop i'm kind of like you it's
uh
i kind of equate them with some bad dentists
yeah
who try to find problems in your teeth which i have had that experience
yeah
and that's a different subject so i better stay on cars
but the last problem i had with my vehicle was a uh fuel pump that needed replacing
and that's all the major problems i've had for a vehicle that's got eighty nine thousand miles
what kind of car you got
it's a Nissan
okay that that explains it yeah i've got an American made car
yeah
yeah it's it's been very good to me i
i'm going to uh
i i would
eventually like to get into an American car but
right now this one's doing fine for me
yeah
but then the other problem too is just a fuel filter and the fuel pump and i've had to replace a set of tires a couple times
but that was due to quirks
uh if you ever have a flat tire
uh-huh
don't ever have it plugged have a patch put on it
okay
because those plugs wear eventually will wear out all four of your tires
oh is that right
yeah because it causes an unevenness in the rubber
and uh that happened to me twice before i caught on well enough to what what happened
hum
i had uh one tire uh plugged after a flat
and somehow the unevenness of the plug just caused all all the other three tires to wear out
huh that's odd
so always have a patch put on
that's good to know though
it's
it's happened to me twice and
that's enough
yeah it is that's more than enough
well
other than that that's the major problems i've had i used to change my own oil and filter but i got tired of that so i let somebody else do it
yeah i do that myself i mean i i take it for places so because i figure for for eighteen dollars they'll mess with the oil and they'll mess with getting the things off and all that you know and
it's just it probably costs me at least six seven eight dollars to do it myself i figure for an extra ten dollars let them take care of it
yeah you're you're saving about uh ten bucks by doing it yourself but
what the heck if you can afford it
yeah
um i'd rather change it myself myself but
i don't have the facilities well enough all the time
yeah that's right
uh
so that's the only major problems you've had then
who me
yeah
oh my clutch has gotten out a couple times and uh
what kind of vehicle
a Chevette
Chevette yeah
yeah
let's see what else have i had done uh one day i was driving with my dad and the uh he was driving in fact and the uh uh stick shift came out in his hand he driving down the road
um
gee whiz
it just totally disengaged itself and you know of course then we had no way of of doing anything at that point
we had to tow it home and uh and all that and it was like good grief and the car was new at that point it was only like a year or so old
um-hum
uh
and uh other things were going out on it you know and these repair people say oh you need need your your your your this and your that's gone out and it's like good grief i don't even know what they do
um-hum
so how am i supposed to trust them i don't know
yeah the only thing you can do is
somehow through your own network and the friends find a mechanic through them
yeah that's all you can do
that they trust and
and then i'm sure that that mechanic's not going to do you in
through their recommendation
yeah i was uh i had my car taken in uh
to have the oil changed at the the place across from the the TI plant in Lewisville
and uh they told me he says oh your your belts are all worn out and they need to be redone uh
it'd be like sixty dollars
so i thought is that right i don't remember that having seen that they're that bad so i took it to a friend of mine's house and he looked at them he took the belts off and looked at them and he says no they're not cracked or anything they're they're they're in pretty good condition all i had to do is tighten them a little bit they need little bit of tightening
now what was it
there's was some belts that needed to be tightened
the belts um-hum
they you know they were kind of loose and so but these people were telling me that they needed to be replaced
um-hum
so
yeah i i know this guy that's a car mechanic and he told me i told him my belts are slipping a little bit and he said they'll last forever all you got to do is just tighten them
yeah yeah
uh every time my dad had taken his car in to be worked on and they did something with the belts and they when they took the old belt off they cut it
um-hum
and looks like it's a standard deal easiest way to get it off and uh
they just let it hang where it was basically instead of just taking it off and throwing it away and when he got home he noticed some strange sounds so he opened it up and looked in there and there was the old belt wrapped around one of the uh axle things in there
um-hum
um-hum
totally took him a half-hour to cut it off and it totally engaged itself around the thing and boy was he he boy was he irate
hum
which i don't blame him you know he'll i think he went back and showed it to them and really chewed them out for it there's no excuse for that you know if your going to cut it off just grab it take it throw it away it's simple
um-hum
um-hum
oh well that's all i got to say
yeah i don't have that much problems so with my vehicle knock on wood
yeah
excuse me
i just remember a seventy nine Chevy Nova that i once had never again
yeah
that was a definite lemon
yeah
that's what year mine is so that's the problems problem i guess
well i got rid of that one after it cost me megabucks
mine mine's still running it's twelve years old and it's got uh seventy two thousand miles on it now so
that's not bad
no not that much
