- The first mechanic I went to I needed a clutch replaced. After that the car's alignment was so bad it would bounce all around and by the time I figured it out (I was new to owning a car) the tires were to the metal bands. He fixed the alignment for free, I ended up buying tires from somewhere else.
- When I bought tires from another shop I went with brand new tires. But when looking at the tires afterwards I found that they were two different brands, not at all the same tires all the way around. I complained but they refused to do anything about it.
- My break lights went out and changing the bulbs and brake switch did nothing. It turns out that the 1984 Toyota Corolla I had also had a brake light controller in the trunk. I took it to a Toyota dealer and they took several hours and never fixed it and charged me $200 (this was in the 90's). I ended up asking around and found I could just get the part at a junk yard for $10 and swap it out myself, which I did.
- Another alignement in another car and they changed out some bolts that hold the shocks onto the steering knucles to do the alignment, which was standard proceedure on a 1985 VW Golf. But they used cheap week bolts that a week later had stripped themselves and were coming out! I didn't go back and will no longer go back for anything.
It seems everytime I go to a mechanic I have a bad experience. I'm just not sure who to trust. How do you find a good mechanic and keep a good relationship with him or her? I'm to the point I'm aligning my own cars with strings and levels and chaging and balancing my own tires. But there are things I just can't do anymore. I can't fix the radio in my Avalon. I can't change the brake fluid properly. There are probably a lot of other things I can't do.
That and there are things I would want the mechanic to do, but they have their own policy. Like when I want to use an OEM dealer part but the shops around will only install parts they buy from NAPA or Autozone. Sometimes I ask for something and they're like "Why would you want to do that? We never do that. Maybe try somewhere else."
Where do I go for help? SMA, Shadetree Mechanics Anonomous?