Mechanic recco in RTP NC area? (NO CROWN HONDA DEALERS, PLEASE)

Hello, all,

I have a horror story and a question.

I bought a 1991 Civic Station Wagon with 196,000 or so miles on it. I
love that little thing! It has terrific road feel and gets incredible
mileage for a 90's car, but it needed a lot of work from the get-go.
Problem is finding a reliable mechanic in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill
area.

After various adventures with Chapel Hill independent mechanics, one of
whom allowed as how I could have my brakes done (for $40 over the
dealership price, as I later found out) but had to have my car off his lot
that day by 5:00 pm sharp, another of whom swore to use OEM parts but had
a 19 year old install no-name brake pads that squealed from day one, I
started searching for dealers in the area.

Crown Honda of Southpoint was just two exits down the interstate. They
did two services on my car, with excellent results, but....I'd broken my
shoulder in a bicycle accident and was still in very painful recovery a
month later when my Honda's rear brakes needed servicing. I called Crown
Honda and made an appointment to have the brakes serviced. Of course
I specified the year, make and model of my little wagon. The tech writer
at Crown Honda insisted I be there at 7:00 am (I work swing shift, so this
was very early for me). It takes a lot longer to get ready with only one
arm, but I did make it there close to the time specified. After waiting
an hour and an half with no word of my car, while trying to find some way
to work with a broken arm and my laptop, I asked the service writer how it
was coming along. He barely looked up from his podium to tell me the
brake pads weren't there and, next time, make an appointment before I
brought my car in. When I told him I had made an appointment, he just
said the parts weren't there, they'd ordered them and come back when they
were. The service manager's name was printed on every service receipt.
I called him and described the problem. He said he'd look into it. Left a
message on my voicemail that Friday saying that since I'd had some good
experiences with some of the tech writers, I should make sure I made
appointments with those tech writers in future. Oh, and he told me to
think about this over the weekend and call Monday if I still wanted them
to work on my car. Needless to say, I'd didn't.

Fast forward to Christmas this year - out of town trip to visit family
means my little wagon has to get there. Chapel Hill mechanics again
asking a ridiculous amount for ordinary service and no guarantees as to
reliability. Crown Honda of Southpoint could fit me in and quoted a price
$100 less than CH independant shops. The tech writer I spoke to was OK,
but when I brought the little beast in, every one of the service area men
just happened to find something that faced away from me and my car. I
found someone in another area that would write up the work and finally got
it done, for quite a bit over what I'd been quoted.

Given all this, does anyone know of a good shop in the Research Triangle
area of North Carolina? There seems to be a really good one in Greensboro
(Triad) but they're an hour away and have 8-5 weekday only hours.

Thanks for listening -


MG

 

wrote:
<snip sob story>

you have a car that is not as well supported in the after-market as
standard civics. given that, if you're a busy shop, and some dude walks
in that needs a lot of hand-holding, what are you going to do - serve
another customer that will be quick, easy and profitable to deal with,
or waste a bunch of bandwidth on someone that could turn into a
potential whiner that's never satisfied? i think the answer is simple.

if you like this car and want to keep it running, sign up for evening
classes in basic auto maintenance in your local community college.
you'll save yourself boat-loads of cash on repairs, you'll have the
satisfaction of knowing that you can take of most things yourself, and
most important of all, you'll learn how to talk turkey with the shop if
you need something bigger done by the pros.

 

The point was they made the appointment and they failed to make sure they
had the parts and they failed to apologise or admit error in any way.
Those may be the kind of mechanics you like to keep busy - you're welcome
to them.

Thanks (and I mean it) for not recommending your favorites -

MG

 

The suggestion of learning how to work on your car is a good one but
some people don't have the inclination to do such things and just want
a good mechaic that will not rip them off. My suggestion is to get on
the web and log in to www.cartalk.com and go to their MechaniX files.
There Cartalk listeners have listed the names and locations of shops
that have done good work for them. You should find someone who will
work out for you. Do recoginze that repairing cars for a living has
costs involved and you should expect to pay reasonably well for the
service. One other thing, indie garages don't stock parts for your
particular vehicle and if you want some defined work done such as a
brake job, or other owner manual recommended work, you should go to
your mechanic, describe what you need to have done, schedule a time
when he/she can work on it and have the parts available. This may
require you to pay upfront for parts to be ordered if they have to
come from the dealer and may be potentially not returnable and then
pay for the labor when the work is done. It all depends. Treat the
mechanic with respect, thank him when he does work on time and in a
quality fashion and you will go a long way to having a shop that will
treat you the way you want to be treated. They are all not trying to
make boat payments off you.

 

Doesn't matter. They get parts same-day from wherever they want, including
dealers. Plus they get about 20% off full-retail price, which they then add
back on as markup when they resell to you.

"She"? How politically correct. Did you know 99.99999% of auto mechanics
are male? I think the entire province of Ontario has only one licensed
female auto mechanic.

Where did you get this from? This is not at all true.