Those of you with professional shops....

[69MyWay]

If you build cars for a living...or do mods on cars for others for a living, how do you deal with "come backs"...and other issues that are sure to pop up on such old cars?

In other words, the older the car the more hidden and un-related problems it is going to have. As a result, you start to fix or modify one thing and run into three others.

Not everybody gives you a blank check book to cover every base...even those not discussed in the initial build.

Or, you fix it, but other problems creep up down the road with use and miles that are par for the course on an older car. Not to mention, sometimes the car gets shipped in from a long distance so you can't just call it back in, or run down the road to see what the problem is.

Just curious.....Do you ever feel like you married the car and the owner?

[Musclerodz]

When I was still doing aircraft maintenance full time, we would go ahead and take care of the small stuff, tell the owner and add it to the bill, 10 minute fixes type stuff. If it was going to be time consuming or high dollar parts, I would call the owner and discuss the issues. I do feel like i am married to the project a lot of the times. It really depends on the client as to how each job is dealt with.

Mike

[ProdigyCustoms]

Just curious.....Do you ever feel like you married the car and the owner?

Everything but a ring exchange and hot honeymoon sex! Of coarse, not many of my customers I could consider sex with, but there was this one girl, was smokin hot, so I did it. That was 21 years ago and she is still here.

[69MyWay]

Everything but a ring exchange and hot honeymoon sex! Of coarse, not many of my customers I could consider sex with, but there was this one girl, was smokin hot, so I did it. That was 21 years ago and she is still here.


I have met her...and you Sir...have excellent taste in women!

[1970cuda]

They are amazing. They help to make us what we are and if we piss them off they take away plus lots more

[Roger Poirier]

Everything but a ring exchange and hot honeymoon sex! Of coarse, not many of my customers I could consider sex with, but there was this one girl, was smokin hot, so I did it. That was 21 years ago and she is still here.


LMAO :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

R.P.

[ironworks]

if it was my fault I fix it if not i continue to charge and tell them why. if they are not understanding and rational I'm probabley not going to work on their junk. Either do it right or take it home.

I did a bunch of work on a 63 corvette and everytime I would get that part done something else major would go wrong. I hated that car an finally told him that we either fix everything or I won't work on it any more.

[69MyWay]

I did a 36 Ford LT1 for a guy years ago. A custom shop had already had it for almost two years doing the basic body work and frame mods. They brought it to me in primer and it was my job to make the LT1 run, gauges, interior wiring, drivetrain, and brakes.

The owner was VERY anxious to get his car as the shop initially told him it would be less than a year start to finish. I intended to turn it around (in my spare time) in less than two months....and did.

However, it had to go back to the body shop to paint the firewall...etc. before I could do the final wrap up. The body shop then had it for another six months for two days of work.

When it came back to me to wrap up...I was getting ready to have shoulder surgery and told him I would take care of it in the next two weeks. He blew up, and told me "YOU WILL WORK ON MY CAR" in no uncertain words. Basically he displaced the anger with the body shop on me.

It really frustrated me, but I wrapped up and delivered the morning of my surgery.

Anyway, the body shop left it outside and got the opti wet. It started running bad. I finally found the opti problem and replaced it, then re-delivered to the body shop to finish up some other loose ends. They continued to leave it outside and wet the whole motor down again. I had to take it back in, clean every engine electric contact and replace several connectors...and put another opti on it. I made it clear to keep it dry (the body shop is on the beach as well).

I figured after all the headaches, I made about $1.25 an hour to do that rod.

The shop finally finished it and he then drove it for about six months only to sell it.

That was the biggest cluster I had been involved in and the car/owner was about 75 miles from my house making it a royal pain to deal with when the opti issues came up.

[Blake Foster]

We handle the problems as they come up , every one is a little different, if the customer is a good one and has spent alot of coin then we will address issues and not charge them, when you build a complete car like the camaro where EVERY part is new and almost none of them actually fit out of the box it can be really tought to decide if the customer pays or we pay, when we are unsure.... we pay. but a complete build is neve finished, like i tell my customers. if you want a car that looks cooler, has more power, handles and drives like a new corvette with no issues............ start writtin cheques because GM spends MILLIONS and MILLIONS to build cars with no issues and still can't do it!! so how much should i charge you???
i herd that the 2 09 Camaros cost 9 MILLION to build and one of them does'nt even RUN!!!