Working on cars

and I bet you let it happen.

I don't let other people touch my car and I work in a real shop where we behave like professionals.

Depends on how much I spend on tools.
Poor people can't exactly afford what you need to work on your own car in a non ad-hoc fashion, ya dig?

>take car to shitty shop years ago for 4 wheel alignment
>not as experienced then as i am now with cars and repairs
>they had a good special running, $45 for all 4 wheels, went for it
>sitting in lobby waiting for them to finish
>mechanic comes out of work bay "hey man we finished your alignment but you needed ball joints on both sides and adjusting shims for your struts on the front"
>"we went ahead and did all that for you, comes to $387"
>immediately lose my shit, bitch at manager, tells me its store policy to replace "potentially life threatening" problems and he has to charge me
>completely in shock, broke college kid
>stepdad ends up coming down and yelling at them for a good hour
>manager walks back out and says "hey man, sorry about the misunderstanding, its only $52 with tax

Have never experienced a situation like that again (do my own work now). Turns out they never even touched the ball joints either.

Do you pay others to fuck your wife too, cuck?

2/10 apply yourself

There's s certain satisfaction to possessing the tools, skills and know how to fix, maintain or even restore a car. Kids nowadays are taught to buy something and throw it away when it breaks, not create or maintain it or repair it when broken

I do it because I like problem solving. Take, for example, my solution to a lost cilp for my key cylinder. Zips ties are amazing.

If your car needs 'working on' regularly, it's unreliable.

You know how moist you can make your girl when the car breaks down and you calmly get out pop the hood fix it and keep going about your day without batting an eye. You are truly beta if you can't take care of your problems.

>tfw perform meme maintenance on my cars just because i am bored and have the tools

Id love to see those niggers try that on me. My car doesn't have a cabin air filter.

>How poor can you get?

Poorer than you can afford, pal.

cool story bro

I worked on cars for a living for a number of years. Moved out and was making good money well before any of my peers.

It was hard work but paid off. Quit being a mechanic and I'm now an Automotive Crash Test Technician. Making even more money, no college debt, and I work directly with OEMs on preproduction cars, and NHTSA.

Keep drinking the higher education kool-aid

oh no, i'll have an entire $10k of student debt! How will I ever repay that after I get my engineering certification????

Because you pay me $60 an hour because you're a retard.

>"simply loosen the 12mm tension bolt until the belt is loose enough to take off"
>12mm socket doesn't fit for some reason, only have even numbered sockets, have to go to the store for a 13mm socket
>come back, loosen bolt
>nothing happens
>loosen more
>no
>completely remove tension bolt
>pump doesn't budge, belt is as tense as ever
sometimes i wonder why i bother.
I still don't know how I'm supposed to get this belt off

Loosen the pivot bolt, dumbass.

Wth is that homeless dude doing there?

>be service manager
>access to tools, lifts, supplies, parts, etc 24/7
>drive older cars with lots of problems
>don't want to work on my cars all the time
>everyone would know if i took them elsewhere
>have to do my own work to keep good reputation

>only have even numbered sockets
wat

part of the fun is overcoming the bullshit, my nigga

just the other day i encountered a honda accord wheel rotor that has spent at least the past 40,000 miles with only two of the three screws it requires. as such, the other two screws are actually fucking impossible to remove. and i really need to replace that rotor

An even number is a number that is evenly divisible by 2, for example, 4, 6, 8, and so on. 13, however, is not evenly divisible by 2, it's what's called an odd number.

Oh, of course, the step that immediately preceded the step I was stuck on. Why didn't I think of that...

how do you get anything done without a 13/17/19mm socket? did you buy your even socket collection from a man called Samuel Goldstein?

Can someone recommend some good books to learn more about engines, transmissions and cars in general? thanks

You can get a side job while you spend a few years as an intern praying you get offered a 60k/yr position

pretty poor once you start buying tool truck tools and went and paid money to go to school to wrench on shitboxes day in and out.

Those size bolts aren't used on my car, or at least haven't been on anything I've had to replace yet. It's all 8,10,12,14. I think there's a 21mm somewhere.

Never met a Stem graduate making less than 25 an hour out the door.

>have to go to the store for a 13mm socket
Just use a 1/2" next time

The percentage of people being directly hired after school in their chosen field for engineering is like 80%
Also, it's not really about money. I'd rather make 50k doing engineering related work than make 80k changing brake pads.

>we legally can't let you drive out of here without fixing this :^)

Is this actually even true?

Instead of going to the store for a 13mm, I could've gone to the store for a 1/2".
Yeah, I can see why that would've been a better idea.

What kind of stem grads going into a field relevant to their degree would be on hourly and not salary? Your experience seems dubious.

no

It's technically theft, right?

no

Entry level.

So you started working on your car with like 3 sockets, a roll of duct tape, 2 screwdrivers and a rusty hammer?

Go out and buy one of those craftsman assortments that come in the blow-molded briefcase. That way, you're closer to having what you needed and you can find them.

I have like 6 sockets, some small wrenches, pliers, and a screw driver.
Those are all I've needed so far, technically, it's all I needed for this job too, if the belt would've come off like it was supposed to.

>6 sockets
Jesus christ

It does happen. Have you actually ever read the release forms you sign when you drop your vehicle off? It's pretty much a golden ticket for them to do whatever the hell they want and hold the balance as a lien against the title of your car.

Funny enough, the best/most honest mechanics I have ever dealt with never even used release forms

What would I need more than that for, huh? Like I said, everything is either 10,12, or 14mm, with a couple exceptions. Anything smaller than 10, I've got box wrenches.
Why would I go spend like $80 on a socket set that has a ton of sizes I don't need and will never use, when I could spend $5 at the pawn shop on a handful of the ones I need? The only problem I've ever had involving my car and sockets was this 12mm that was like, 12.5mm for whatever reason.

I think I paid like $45 for a giant craftsman set of 1/4" and 3/8" sockets, from like 1/8" sockets to 1" I find needing all kinds of weird sizes, including metric. Usually weird sizes like 17mm or 31mm too.

>have FD3S
>all fixings are metric
>ordering aftermarket parts from the US
>it's all fucking imperial
>use AN fittings
>fucking imperial

I accept that American cars use the American standard, but why make aftermarket fucking parts for a metric car and not use the metric fucking standard...

I had a tire alignment place try to pull that shit on me, telling me it needed to be done ASAP and I should have them do it.

Except I had just replaced all the suspension bushings, ball joints and tie rod ends.

Apparently they were not paying attention when I arrived and said I needed the alignment because I had just done all that work.

>have 1uzfe
>proceed to tap into oil pressure sensor port for a turbo oil feed line
>its a 1/8 british standard pipe thread
>1/8 npt will fit in there but it will leak
>buy a block that has 1/8 bspt to 1/8 npt conversion

Which one?

While I actually like doing my own work, and have driven a car off the lot only to start stripping it apart and replacing stuff, having a well-qualified person working on shit is really nice. Just the lack of stress involved, especially if something goes wrong with what you were working on, is nice to have, plus you get to hold someone elses feet to the flames(which shouldn't be needed as long as you don't go to the bottom bin cheapest shop you can find.)

I still like to watch someone do the work, if they don't mind though. You can't trust some cocksuckers.

>heartbreaker has been hiding on Veeky Forums this whole time

That stats wrong you fucking retard. Good luck getting priced out of the market by foreigners on H1B visas, or relocating all the way across the country just to find an entry level position.

I've been an alignment tech for years

If someone brings in their car saying they've put in all new front end parts, i can GUARANTEE they missed at least one part that's falling-out loose.

>can't align it sir, your right outer tie rod end is dangerously loose
>"no way, asshole, i just put all new parts in it"
>he actually put in chinese ball joints and an inner tie rod

I'll bet $100 they were right and you missed something big time, or you put in a part you ordered online that was so cheap it's already loose

Extra wrenches make for good leverage. You never know what every bolt size is on your car. You may need them for other things. Deepwell sockets are nice to have. Etc.

Where do you guys even find these shitty mechanics? I work in the business, and I've never come across people who act like in your horror stories.

Youtube.

I personally like the 30's to 60's era black and white films explaining mechanical things.

>try to loosen bolt on airbox
>it breaks off