[ RANT ]

I am really tired of garages.

The local Goodyear garage today refused to align my truck. My steering wheel is almost 180 degrees out. My fault, I forgot to check the wheel when I put the pitman arm on when I replaced my tie rods (by the way it was the rods, got a different brand and they fit well).

So, the guy tells me the wheel is off and he can't adjust for it with the tie rod adjusters. Well I just put brand new tires on it up the road. I don't want to drive the forty-five minutes home on new tread with a bad alignment. All the other garages are booked, and they don't have the time to fix the pitman arm. I tried to explain to the guy that I had just had the arm off, and it took me less then ten minutes to pull it. And considering all it will take to fix the wheel is to pull the arm re-align it and re-attatch, they should have plenty off time before they closed.

Anyway, they guy said they couldn't do it, so I said align it anyway screw the wheel. And I walked up the road. A half hour later I came back still irritated, so I talked to the manager. I tell him the same thing, I just had it off the night before, and had coated it with anti-seize. It should pop right off. So he thumbs his book and says the book says its a 7/10ths of an hour job. And they charge $65 an hour flat rate. So, if the job takes the dude 15 minutes I still get charged nearly $60. I was like WHAT!! Are you kidding me? Fine, what ever, just get it aligned I'll fix the pitman arm myself.

The guy gets an attitude and walks around back and here comes my truck. They, pulled it off the lift, they wouldn't align it. Now remember I told the guy over a half hour ago to align it anyway. This was before I spoke with the manager. So, by all rights it should already be done.

So tonight I fixed the damn thing mayself in under 13 minutes. Thats really worth almost $70 bucks? And why the hell isn't aligning the wheel (even if it includes popping the pitman arm) incuded in an alignment?? So, I have an appointment with a third place on saturday to check the alignment.

Oh yeah, by the way. The other place that did my tires, said it would be done in 2 hours. I walked around for 2 hours and came back. It wasn't even in the damn bay yet. So I kicked around for another fifteen minutes before my truck went in, after that it took almost another hour and fifteen minutes to mount and balance four tires. ???? I can do four tires with a tire lever, a jack, a can of ether, and a breaker bar in less then forty-five minutes. Granted I can't balance them in that amount of time. But I can do everything else without a fancy lift, a tire machine, or air tools.

Garages are a rip off, pure and simple. Lazy, and a rip off.

[/rant]