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The parts from eBay thing doesn’t bother me because I know they make most parts already. As a professional tech, he’s correct about German and European cars. They are fun when new, but a genuine pita to service. I also agree with him on the Toyota thing, because that brand runs well for ages and are usually a breeze to service.
He doesn’t handle criticism well at all. He is also very incomplete in his instructions. He has an annoying opening and he is kinda annoying and snarky in the way he comes across. I stopped watching his channel a while back.[quote=”peshewa” post=173087]The parts from eBay thing doesn’t bother me because I know they make most parts already. As a professional tech, he’s correct about German and European cars. They are fun when new, but a genuine pita to service. I also agree with him on the Toyota thing, because that brand runs well for ages and are usually a breeze to service.
He doesn’t handle criticism well at all. He is also very incomplete in his instructions. He has an annoying opening and he is kinda annoying and snarky in the way he comes across. I stopped watching his channel a while back.[/quote]I think the thing about Ebay parts is you really don’t know what you’re getting. Yes, so much is made in China but even then, there can be a huge difference. Are they just rebadged or not badged, or are they completely different? So much bootlegging going on over there. China has no respect to pattents unless they are their own. Sometimes you find out the differences the hard way. Parts are like information, you should really consider the source.
About European cars, or any other specialty vehicle. I do not agree that they are a PITA at all. There is so much more thought put into these vehicles and anyone who has driven them can tell. (Anyone who says there really is no difference between driving their beater civic and a BMW is a automotive moron) There are specific procedures which mush be followed and there is little room for error. With cars like Toyotas they are well made, but there is a lot of room for error, that helps keep them going for so long, but then again, doesn’t contribute to a better driving vehicle. I know some BMW and MB master techs, and they say they aren’t any harder than any other vehicle and they appreciate the quality that goes into them, but they will tell you that if you don’t know what you are doing, you can screw things up easily. The problem is that jack of all trades mechanics start applying their logic that they learned working on GM’s and Fords to a Mercedes and get hung up real fast. There is one truth to a European car, and it is that if you can’t afford them new, you can’t afford them used. They can become real money pits at times. As a Nissan Tech, I will say that Nissans have their quirks and some things done wrong can cause real issues. To me they are simple now. I’m training on the GT-R now, and it’s a supercar, which takes it to a whole different level. When I first started working at the Nissan dealer and learned that in order to do an oil change, rack it up, even move the vehicle or anything unless you were a Nissan Master with GT-R certification that they were just overly proud of their little flagship. Now that I have been taking courses on it, I totally understand why and it should be that way. Apply general car knowlege to this car and you’ll cause more problems than you can fix and can cause a great deal of damage. Things must be done just so. However for someone on Scotty’s level to get in, attempt to work on it, mess it up more, and then blame the car or manufucturer says a lot of his actual level.
I understand exactly what you mean about counterfeit parts. Excellent points made.
I tend to either go with rockauto, partsgeek or Amazon also. If I use eBay, I look at that feedback rating a lot. Tons of buyer beware in there.
I don’t like most of what Scotty does, but most of that has to do with his attitude. He does have some skills, but he treats his channel like it’s on the power block on spike. It isn’t. The glorious part of YouTube is that you can watch both novices and experts really take their time and break it all down. Scotty doesn’t do that. That’s why I dismissed it as mildly annoying and mildly entertaining fluff.
I saw a clip of his on why you shouldn’t buy an English made car. He was right about things like changing a fuel pump requires removing the entire rear suspension THEN the fuel cell. That is a genuine giant pita. I appreciate well engineered cars. The thought and intentions that go into them are wonderful to contemplate and.enjiy as you drive. If your in a real shop environment, then your options to love them even more are there. I don’t like them because I’m no longer in a shop. I’m partially disabled and working on cars in much the same fashion as the well intentioned but unskilled diy dudes, on the ground with minimal tools. If I had a floor.lift and garage of my own to use, i would welcome more exotic imports. I also know that factory trained techs have little issue with them because they are trained on them and they are used to them.
If you make highly decorated chocolate cakes daily, then that task is common for the person trained on that. If the average dude just wants a simple chocolate cupcake, then having to follow a grand factory trained recipe in a specially equipped shop becomes very daunting.
I used to specialize in autobody that did common wreck repair, but also frame of reatorations, resto mods and licensed salvage rebuilds. I stopped doing that in 2002 when I left Texas and moved bqck to my hometown in Iowa. Around that time is when there was a giant uprising of diy shows, like power block, monster garage and many others. It was both mind blowing and kind of annoying that I can, and have done a lot of that stuff and now I just watch it on TV occasionally.
I’m no stranger to very complicated,stuff, but when I’m in a customers driveway trying to hang some.parts correctly and maybe make small extra improvements where possible, it sticks a horn in my side when I have to spend most of the day removing additional parts to get to a small thing that could have been so very simple if it were designed logically. Got a Dodge ram? Ford Taurus? Want to change the heater core? Remove the steering column, then the entire dashboard, then replace it. You have a Toyota? Peel a bit of carpet back near the gas pedal, then remove two screws for a panel, then the heater core pops out like a cassette tape. One job is all day, the other is less than an hour. Same thing goes for the fuel pump.
The cost of ownership has to be addressed. There are multiple car manufacturers that want to make it illegal for the home mechanic to fix anything. It could then be argued that they make some things difficult on purpose. That tends to rub salt in the eye of the average dude. I can appreciate the complexity of of supercars, custom builds and other high dollar stuff. If I had to defend one point that Scotty makes but poorly communicated, is that some of this stuff seems to be designed to piss people off. Cars are not made of unicorn farts and Godzilla’s piss. Car manufacturers should not try to perpetuate the myth that they are by making them nearly impossible for the home mechanic to fix.
A part of what I do locally in addition to hanging parts, is to inspect cars that my customers wish to buy. In this, I also advise on what not to buy. I tend to advise against purchasing anything from Mitsubishi, Saturn, Cadillac, all Chrysler Jeep Dodge, and almost all European makes, sans Volvo. I do this for numerous reasons. First of all, personal experience. If I work on 50 Mitsubishi cars and trucks and find they are assembled oddly and have a poor history of lasting, then I say they are bad. There are some that last for ages, I know I will get responses on that, but the law of averages says that there will be some who love them and some who hate them. I go by personal experience as a tech and my customers feedback.
I usually tell them to buy Toyota, Honda Nissan, subaru, some gm and fords models and sometimes Volvo.
Most of my customers are.buying used cars. Things that will need work now or in the near future. In these cases, which are common, people have to play the odds. Is this going to cost.morw than I can afford to keep it going? Will it cost more to fix and maybe enhance than it will ever be worth? Is that a bit of mild rust, or is it rotted in structural areas?
I do a lot of work for low to middle income people. These are good folks that have little desire to consider the engineering aspects of its design. Some of these folks are difficult just to convince to do simple maintenance for at times, but I try to educate them as much as I can without making their eyes glaze over.
So again, yes I appreciate the technical aspects of it all, but such a small fraction of people buy cars in my town based on the engineering aspects. They have to have a lower cost of ownership, meaning being easier to service.When it comes down to it, all vehicles with an exception of just few very expensive cars, the #1 concern when building a car by any manufacturer is cost. The lower the cost, the more options they have for making a profit. They must make a profit to survive. (Profit ins’t greed, they have to pay their bills and employees). If they wanted to, they could build vehicles many times more reliable and durable than they do, but then again it would probably cost $100,000 for a Corolla. If fact, the more upper end you get in the market, there has been less cost cutting. What goes into cost starts with the engineering and goes all the way to the raw materials to make the parts, to the actual cost of putting it all together. Amazing how cutting a few pennies here and there can amount to thousands of dollars if not tens of thousands of dollars through the whole vehicle. From there all they have to cover is the warranty. So, if the part doesn’t fail often under that warranty period then little thought goes into what they will have to do to replace that. I;m sure many of the engineers do think “god help them if that fails” but the reality is that the service department pays the bills for the dealership, which allows more room for sales. Fact is that 90%+ of all new car buyers put little thought into the cost of ownership beyond tax, gas, and insurance because most of them are not going to keep that vehicle more than 5+ years. Very rare does someone buy a car new and keep it until it’s worn out. The manufacturer could care less about the 3rd owner of the vehicle on down, they only might care for the 2nd because they need someone to offload that new car customer’s car so they can buy a brand new one.
As far as manufacturers making it illegal to work on your own car, it’s going to be next to impossible for that to happen. However, licensing for professional mechanics is a very real possibility and may happen, which will basically killing off all the shade trees and hacks out of this business and honestly I’m all for it seeing what so many of these guys do. It almost happened in the early 70’s, where licensing through the NATEF was going to become law, but then along came ASE but unfortunately that is not mandatory. For me, the more complicated the more I can charge more hours, and the less people who can do the job.
[quote=”peshewa” post=173087]The parts from eBay thing doesn’t bother me because I know they make most parts already. As a professional tech, he’s correct about German and European cars. They are fun when new, but a genuine pita to service. I also agree with him on the Toyota thing, because that brand runs well for ages and are usually a breeze to service.
He doesn’t handle criticism well at all. He is also very incomplete in his instructions. He has an annoying opening and he is kinda annoying and snarky in the way he comes across. I stopped watching his channel a while back.[/quote]It’s the old saying , attitude is everything , going on Kilmer’s attitude , I wouldn’t take my lawnmower to him
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He doesn’t impress me, seems he does more “go to Walmart and mask the issue” fixes. I work on cars professionally and I can say I enjoy Eric’s videos. It’s nice watching someone else struggle through some jobs (no offense eric!) But watching while not working on them in the comfort of my room is nice.
I watched scotty but unsubbed hes bad. I have watched eric since 10-20k subs and I have watched ChrisFix for the last few weeks. I loved his joke video about headlight fluid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6GsXhBb10k
I know it’s not relevant, but the joke about getting a radiator hose for a VW beetle , and long wait springs to mind
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[quote=”pcmdjason” post=20163]There were one or two videos that just made me think, I don’t recall what they were about but it was something along the lines of just pour a bottle of Bob’s Mechanic in a can and you’ll be as good as new..[/quote]
I’m always interested in a mechanic’s perspective on quick solutions to problems, even if they come in bottles. Of course it’s up to us to vet any such recommended solutions. Scotty gets bonus cred points for recommending a product described as a “clear, oil soluble polymer” ( product name omitted to avoid “Shilling” moniker). This product is advertised by the vendor as a polymer that replaces elastic properties in oil seals for auto trans, PS systems and engines.
I nearly pulled my hair out after replacing a rear crank seal on a GM 3.9l in my G6GTP with scarcely 55k miles, using the improved GM seal, using the improved GM seal installer tool and subsequently experiencing the leak continue unabated. Scotty recommended to just pour the bottle in. After some tripidation, and scanning user reviews; I poured in the recommended quantity and cleaned the area around the seal. The leak stopped. Users advised that the polymer may need to be reapplied some time after fluids are changed. The leak never returned.
Emboldened by this, I added the recommended quantity to my Porsche 928 auto trans so as to avoid a tear down to fix a fluid pump seal seepage. That was two years ago and it hasn’t leaked a drop since.
So, in light of the vast quantity of snake oils sitting on shelves, there still needs to be the way forward for someone to recommend a product that seems to reasonably work.I went back and forth on Scotty, I loved him, hatted him, loved his videos, could not stand them and now I am at peace. I respect the guy and his knowledge now that I figured out what his channel is all about. To me, it is about general info, tips, his experience, a repair overview, viewers showing off their rides and most important of all feedback. I ask him questions and he actually replies, how many of the hotshots out there reply, if you are an average Joe hardly anyone will take notice! He is NOT a step by step repair guide, and he will not argue with you if you don’t like what he has to say just move on! Yes his channel is geared at low to middle class folks, who are not mechanics, don’t mind DIY to save a buck if they can, need a car for transportation not to show off that will be both easy and cheaper to maintain. Now the people whining about the adverts, are you that dim that you buy anything with a link!? Surely you must have some common sense. Finally you hardly see any true step by step repair guide on You-tube anymore, but thanks to Eric and a few others we have a decent library to go back to, so we never have to go to a mechanic again 🙂 While most seem to be decent some of those I encountered are dishonest incompetent thugs and there should be some sort of oversight in the industry to weed out the bad seeds.
Only watched maybe a couple of his videos over the years. When he RTV’ed a sunroof shut, that did for me. Pretty much stick to SMA, ETCG, & Scanner Danner.
I am a mechanic myself, have been for 36 years. I agree with Scotty about 90% of the time. I especially like his disdain for new technology. He’s spot on about that. It is garbage. The reason older cars did not last a long time (though I have a ’64 Ford that still runs fine) was because of poor quality, not lack of technology. Most new technology, especially electronic technology sucks big time. It’s so bad I finally couldn’t deal with it anymore, gave up a job I’d had for 28 years, since I was 18, and became a vintage vehicle only mechanic. I now actually enjoy my job. I get to turn wrenches, not mess with computers. I also now only drive pre computer, pre emissions vehicles. I have about 6 years to go before retirement, but I will probably still do some work on the side.
I also agree with him about which car brands are junk (like Nissan and Fiat) and about cars being made in third world countries being very poor quality. They use local unskilled labor to keep costs down.
I do disagree with him that newer cars do not need to be warmed up, or need their oil changed every 3,000 miles. If we still have ICE vehicles 50 years from now, they will STILL need to be warmed up and have their oil changed every 3,000 miles.
I agree with him that CVT transmissions are JUNK. I’ve actually had a couple of them apart. They were unrepairable, even if you had the parts. They were designed to be disposable. In fact, new cars in general are designed to be disposable. I grew up as a kid learning how to fix things. How long will it be before mechanics, or “technicians” as they call them now, are no longer needed?
I guess when alternators, electronic ignitions, & disc brakes came out, it was a scary thing the old timers then as well. SMA, Scanner Danner, ETCG, Pine Hollow Auto Diagnostics & New Level Automotive for me. Scotty who?
Alternators, ANALOG electronic ignitions, and disc brakes are not even remotely comparable to the trash they are putting on modern cars. Old car electrics could be checked with a simple multimeter.
Maybe simple now but not back when they first came out. You can still use a testlight or Dvm to check for power and grounds to modules just like back in the day. Of course, having a good scan tool and a scope won’t hurt. Today’s cars will probably seem easy to work on when compared to stuff coming in the future.
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