How large of an issue would it take for you to switch what shop you take your car to for repairs?

I don't work in a dealer, but I grew up around dealer service departments, and this is what I'll guess is going on.

1. Replacing the engine probably gets your car back on the road sooner (and their tech working on another vehicle sooner) than pulling the head and everything that entails, and there's no guarantee that when they pulled the head, they wouldn't find other issues.

2. I'd also guess that replacing an entire engine helps their parts department and the service department budgets at the same time. Paying a tech several hours to tear your engine down for a couple hundred in gaskets and a valve or rings, etc has less benefit for them.

logdog wrote: In my previous career life I was a Honda tech in Columbus Ohio. There is only one place I worked I would actually recommend to people, its a Honda only independent I worked at while I was finishing my Bachelor's (the dealer went above and beyond to make taking night classes difficult before giving me an ultimatum). My toolbox is still in one of the website pictures. Honnaman

Per this recommendation. I've contacted them and scheduled to drop my car off as soon as I get back from vacation. Driving the van in the meantime.

They said they won't really know until they get in there, and if it's just valvetrain work would be quite doable. But if it's done damage to the cylinder, we're looking at a new engine for probably about $15k. Which has me thinking about swaps at that point.

Here's my issue- loss of compression isn't a very common problem on modern engines. Rare enough that it will never show up on a diagnostic list in most shops.

As for the rebuild- engines are so durable anymore, that few people have the skill to do rebuilds. On top of that, there are some very specialty fasteners that make it more complex than most old engines that were expected to be rebuilt.

So MY (me, myself, and I) conclude that the original shop did nothing wrong, but they don't have the skill to rebuild the engine. Even if it's something as simple as rings. (And that's why there's only one shop in all of Columbus that can do that job)

GameboyRMH wrote: Oh I assumed it had failed by flowing too low. If it was flowing too high a burnt valve is more likely. And yes they are absolutely being too lazy to see what the actual problem is, they just want to chuck a whole engine at it. Dealerships like to throw large and expensive parts/sub-assemblies at cars. Frankly, other problems aside, I don't think you have any business getting your car worked on at a dealership. Only two types of people should take their cars to the dealership for work, people with cars that are still under warranty, and yuppies with too much money and not enough automotive knowledge.

Um, I'm neither, yet I take my Cayenne Turbo S to the dealer for work. Why? Because they're no more expensive than a local indy shops, my friend is the service writer and other friend is the tech AND they send me home in a nice, new Porsche loaner.

So for no more money, I get a lot of convenience, factory parts and factory warranty on the work. Why wouldn't I use the dealer at that point?

Would you do a compression check for $15 per cylinder?

Beer Baron wrote: (If) we're looking at a new engine for probably about $15k.

You could rebuild a pretty awesome version of your existing motor for that money. There might be a Unicorn AMG wagon on here for inspiration....

A Honda dealer isn't going to rebuild an engine for you. Swapping in one that was rebuilt by someone else, yes, but doing the rebuild in-house requires a ton of specialized equipment and training that will rarely get used. Modern cars (especially Hondas) usually don't need rebuilding for 200K miles, by which point the vast majority of owners have long since stopped taking it to the dealer for service because they cost too much.

Rebuilding is something that it makes sense to outsource to a shop that specializes in it, which is where the fixed price for a rebuilt engine with a core charge thing comes in.

Beer Baron wrote: In reply to APEowner: I'm not looking to pay as little as possible for the work I'm having done. I want to get the best value for my money. That means, I'm willing to pay good money to a professional to do it right. But a few jobs that take a modest amount of time, no special equipment, and no great skill (e.g. brake pads and spark plugs) it just does not make sense for me to pay shop rate on. Especially when said dealer doesn't even have the plugs in stock and I would have to leave the car there an extra 2-3 days, or bring it back in, in order to have them installed.

Sorry, I didn't intend for that to be a criticism.

The dealer's target market is customers who drop off their car and say "this is what it's doing. fix it". When they get someone who want's them to diagnose it so that they can fix it they know that it's unlikely that they're going to both make any money and have a satisfied customer. The tech stopped troubleshooting as soon as he found something that could cause the problem. He doesn't know every plug that will run in those cars. He just knows that the OEM plugs do and some replacements don't. If he'd logged an hours labor (lets say $120.00) to check compression and do an injector leakdown test and all that was wrong was the incorrect spark plugs then they're likely to have a customer who's going around complaining that they got charged $120.00 to be told something that could have been found in five minuets.

Very few dealers do major engine repairs these days. It's just not cost effective for anyone.

Again, I'm not criticizing either you or the dealer. I just think that your expectations for each other are incompatible.

I agree, the dealer doesn't seem like they want to touch it. You took it in, they gave you a knee-jerk diagnosis. Well, less of a diagnosis and more of something to eliminate from the list of potential causes. $60 for that isn't unreasonable, that's probably 1/2 hour of labor.

I agree with taking it in to see someone who's capable of a more thorough diagnosis, which is what you're doing.

As many have mentioned, most dealers want to deal with their target demographic of people who drop the car off and blindly pay the bill when they pick it up. Those are the customers who make them the most money. Having a bay tied up for an extended amount of time while they're rebuilding an engine just doesn't make sense for them.

I won't take a car to a shop when I lose trust in that shop. Trust that they can perform the work competently, or trust that they're telling the truth. When either one is lost, I'm out.

In reply to APEowner:

I'm just saying I wasn't dropping it off planning to pay them to diagnose it and then go and do the repairs myself. I figured I had exhausted my skill or desire to diagnose/fix the issue, and they turned around with a knee jerk diagnosis. Had they done a compression test and said, "there's a leak, we need to pull the head off and replace a valve," I'd have told them to do it.

Now, obviously I'm not their demographic for that anyway. They'd rather devote just as many (or fewer) labor hours into replacing an engine with a higher product markup.

I'll go to an independent shop because I can tell them, "Here are the steps I did to diagnose it. Here's what I found. I think I have a berkeleyed valve but it could be worse. I'm going to let you pull the head and replace what's buggered." I probably could do it myself. But this strikes me as the kind of job I'll start to get frustrated with and cut corners or try to force things when I'm 2/3 of the way putting it back together.

Dealers don't rebuild things because then they are on the hook or warrantying the work. They push the easy button and replace with new, but 15k sounds high for an S2000 motor. I would ask the indy shop to do a leak down test. If there is a burned/cracked valve it will be very obvious.

Don49 wrote: They push the easy button and replace with new, but 15k sounds high for an S2000 motor.

It seemed really high to me too. That was the very off-the-cuff estimate from the indy shop.

At that price, I suspect I'd start hunting for LSx swap kits and find a couple local folks who would be up for putting a month of weekends into a swap in exchange for copious amounts of beer. But I'm hoping it's $1-$2k worth of a shop pulling the head and replacing a valve and seat.

The last time I went to a shop was a few months ago, before that it's been years (short of recall stuff). This last time because i couldn't figure out the issue and didn't have the gm $pecific $canner (note the dollar signs i used there because those scanners are proprietary and expensive, like as much as I paid for the car)... They told me $90 to diagnose the issue, which turned into $400 and they still didn't diagnose the issue. Next time Im buying the scanner

Before that was in 2004 when the shop put in a new low hp rated clutch completely without my consent.

Oh and right before the clutch issue had a ntb drill holes in the strut towers because they couldnt figure out how to adjust the camber. Only kept the car 4 days and charged $300 for that genius bit of work.

Even though I am sure I will be forced to eat my words with the advancements of tech...I'm done with shops from here on out

Beer Baron wrote:

logdog wrote: In my previous career life I was a Honda tech in Columbus Ohio. There is only one place I worked I would actually recommend to people, its a Honda only independent I worked at while I was finishing my Bachelor's (the dealer went above and beyond to make taking night classes difficult before giving me an ultimatum). My toolbox is still in one of the website pictures. Honnaman

Per this recommendation. I've contacted them and scheduled to drop my car off as soon as I get back from vacation. Driving the van in the meantime. They said they won't really know until they get in there, and if it's just valvetrain work would be quite doable. But if it's done damage to the cylinder, we're looking at a new engine for probably about $15k. Which has me thinking about swaps at that point.

Glad to hear it! Dan will take care of you with zero BS.

I wouldn't expect them to pay for the plugs. Maybe comp you on the diag towards another one as a courtesy...maybe. I'm not a mechanic by trade, but I have a lot of cars and work on them all, so I guess I play mechanic on nights and weekends. It's not all black and white and I personally wouldn't take a suggestion of installing oem plugs to fix a cel as a 100% this is going to fix it diagnosis. Sure it's not an bad idea, but come on.

Plus you have a bigger problem now anyway. I think the cost of taking care of that low compression issue is going to make you forget all about that diag fee and plugs.

I will also say....it is damn hard to find a shop, whether dealer or independent, these days for specialty cars. People ask me for recommendations all the time and usually I just don't have a good suggestion for them. This is one of the reasons I started doing my own work years ago....the other major reason is it saved me a lot of money so I could buy more cars.