bigfish1965 Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 A friends vehicle (1996 Mustang) ended up a with a few nasty problems as older cars tend to do. First one of the catalytic converters got a hole in it, the shifter cable seized, the muffler broke off ( a few days after a visit for an estimate at one of the major muffler shops, no less...coincidence I am sure ) and the lower door hinge let go on the drivers side door. She took in for a few estimates... Catalytic converter... $1700 Door Hinges $450 Shifter Cable $500 Muffler and Tail pipe $350 Total... $3000...value of car...much less. Now I've a family friend in Welland who owns a Body and Mechanical Shop. His father and my grandfather were best of friends. I took the car in and told him the deal. He said to let him look at it and see what he could do. A few days later the car is done...total cost $700. The cat was repaired rather than replacing the entire assembly, the new hinges (upper and lower) installed and painted, new exhaust, and shifter cable. There are stil decnet honest mechanics out there (other than Nipissing of course). So a big thanks and great job to Georges Body Shop in welland, ON. http://www.georgesbodyshop.biz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PERCHER Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 Good to hear that there is still some good honest folks out there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OhioFisherman Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 Rick, believe it or not they steal Catalytic converters down here, usually from car dealerships. A cordless sawzall and take 10 or 15 at a time. Some of them are very pricey? A good mechanic is hard to find, reasonably priced one even harder. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ecmilley Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 nice when someone does you a favour, but realisticllly the price of the original estmates would likely what she should have paid regardless of the worth of the car, seen some of those ford front pipes are crazy priced but never seen a stang one that was 1700 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigfish1965 Posted August 28, 2007 Author Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 Sorry..re-reading the original estimate from the muffler shop had the cat assembly at 1200, not 1700. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raf Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 straight pipe + header, problem solved. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gerritt Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 Rick, believe it or not they steal Catalytic converters down here, usually from car dealerships. A cordless sawzall and take 10 or 15 at a time. Some of them are very pricey? A good mechanic is hard to find, reasonably priced one even harder. You should see the gangs stealing airbags here.... big business.. an officer was killed because of it just 2 weeks ago... our cities are going down the tubes... Gerritt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burtess Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 Good to hear, but hard to come by.... I had some work done on my '98 Transport recently. The gent that did the work (out of his garage) is working on his own now after getting tired of seeing all the garages in my town (Dundas) and dealerships gouging people. Front rotors, pads, (all Raybestos parts, ceramic pads), both tie rods. Blocked the front end as not to have to do an alignment. I brought it in with a VERY loose front end and grinding brakes. Out it came driving straight as an arrow and stopping smoothly. Total damage: $268 parts and labour!!! Burt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danc Posted August 28, 2007 Report Share Posted August 28, 2007 They steal the Catalytic converters for the palladium content. I haven't seen the market price for palladium recently. Probably a couple hundred bucks an ounce, but a few years ago it was worth over $1000.00 an ounce. There's a large palladium mine just north of here that I do lots of work at. I could have been rich and retired if I had bought their stock instead of just watching it. Oh well.... Maybe I'll just go out and steal mufflers at night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Handlebarz Posted August 29, 2007 Report Share Posted August 29, 2007 that is funn we have the same thing here at one shop they are always $100 or more then the oter for the same thing its nice to see shops that care. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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