A day at repair shop...or why auto repair is like sausage making

[nhdoc]

Hi All,

I really didn't want to succumb to bringing my '98 E300 DT to a mechanic as I had previously done most minor auto repair and all maintenance work myself in the past but my unfamiliarity with Diesel combined with the fact that I only bought the car last month made me reconsider finding an experienced shop to do my work, at least for now. So I called around and checked on the board and found a shop outside Boston who specialized in MB and agreed to let me stay and watch while the work was being done. In retrospect, this was a mistake I think, but mostly the shop's mistake because I got a unique opportunity to see "real world" auto repair and didn't really like what I saw.

I won't go into too much detail about what was done, but there were two experiences which made me really upset, and those I will relay;

1) When changing the spin-on fuel filter (i.e. the main filter) they use the old filter to fill the new one with fuel! I saw the guy take the new filter, place it over the old one and turn them over...I could not believe it! I asked about this practice which I thought was extremely bad and I was told "well, you have to understand the practical realities of running a shop, it is just impractical for us to keep fresh fuel on hand to fill these...this is the reason I don't like to let customers stay in the shop..." He assured me that if anything was loose on the "dirty side" of the old filter it transfer only to the "dirty side" of the new one but he felt that by doing it gently nothing would even come loose. I told him that I disagreed with doing it this way...it just seems to me that you don't want ANYTHING but NEW, fresh fuel in the new filter! Even if the crud stayed on the dirty side of the new filter why would you want to start out with a new filter that has some crud or water in it???

2) After replacing my fuel lines it came time to crank the car up and start it. After about 2+ minutes of cranking it was obvious to me that the battery was being drained and the lines were not filling. The tech decided to put the battery on the charger and while he was doing that I decided to double check to see that all of the lines were installed correctly. Fortunately I had brought a diagram with me that I had printed out on the Diesel Discussion board which showed the factory layout for the lines. It turns out that the tech switched two of the lines connected to the Injector Pump. I pointed this out to him and the shop owner and the tech's response was an emphatic "IMPOSSIBLE". Even though I had the factory diagram in front of me he insisted he only took one line off at a time and therefore he claimed he could only have replaced them exactly as they came off (WRONG because I saw him take two off at once).

Now, he was ready to keep on cranking without doing anything else but I insisted that he NOT crank any more until the lines were put the way the diagram showed them. I had to say "look, it's my car and I won't let you burn up my starter trying to pump fuel when I know it is incorrectly piped". I also said I was so sure it was their mistake being the reason the car would not start that I would gladly pay to have the lines put back if it turned out not to result in the car starting. They finally gave in and swapped the lines which fortunately could be done in about 10 minutes without removing the intake manifold again. Sure enough, as soon as they started cranking this time the lines began to fill with fuel and the car fired up about 30 seconds later.

I was the "bigger man" and said "everyone makes mistakes" but their pride was forever bruised. Instead of being thankful for my "saving his bacon" the owner then turned around and said "the reason the tech made that mistake was because he must have been distracted by having you watch him work, we just don't want customers in here for this reason". Well, for me that was the last straw. Blaming ME for their error. I paid my bill and left. A lot was done that day and I was happy to have accomplished all of the repairs I wanted to get done all at once, but I could not help but think that it was the ultimate in nerve to blame THEIR errors on MY presence.

So, now I'll replace the fuel filter AGAIN myself if, for no other reason, so I will be sure that I have a nice clean one to start out with this time around and I'll hope that no permanent damage was done to my starter and I won't go back to this "highly regarded MB shop" ever again.

Auto repair is like sausage making...you don't want to see how it is done, you just want to enjoy the end product. Now that I have seen how it's done I can't ever enjoy it again.

-Marty