It's even worse than that now, chip availability is so barren that now they are trying to repair damaged and defective chips for reuse.

yep, sweet man. I'll let you know if the crank doesn't clean up.

Yeah that's what I thought also, but the guy which is a buddy of my dad, said he felt like it was losing power, then he saw steam coming out and then shut it down.

It's a mystery right now lol

You can tell #3 and #4 definately had water ingestion. #1and#2 look fine

On a side note now I wonder if this tech shortage is long term deliberate, or or at least subconsciouly so.

Every passing year it gets more and more stupid, complicated and harder.

With so much lack logistical shit and no company support its just stupid now.

I just think they want to get rid of us now, nothing else makes sense. They just don't care, we have been under paid for 35 years.

They just do not care, for the longest time they have thought we were a necessary evil, now they think we are just evil.

They don't care about repair or customer care, I wonder what it's even like at RR or Bentley now, you can make 200k but are STILL underpaid by close to 30%.

I can do anything with these shits now but it does not matter where I go or who I work or for what brand its just the same shit and I'm trapped in it and I'm to old now to start over.

At least with the ev future coming my position is secured, now all our dealers have a skilled hourly tech like myself that does nothing but difficult bullshit, go figure I was the first foot in the door for starting that.

But good lord I should be making 50 an hour and no one is doing that around here save for shitcago and IL is so expensive that it eats all pay anyway.

What a fucking mess.

Sorry for being a Debby downner but danm

I just want shit to get better

Not worse

You're never too old too start something new. I didnt get into heavy equipment until I was damn near 40. I make a great living but it's a bit harder on the body than auto.

Are there any reman steering gearboxes, aside from Red Head and Blue Top, that are worth a flying flip? '11 F250.

Almost everyone today has asked me the same thing, "How are things?" and the only answer I can come up with is "It's another day in Paradise", but I'm referencing the town that burned down in 2018.
Some dark humor, but its the best I can do right now. And, yes, I was there during part of that fire.

On a more serious note, had to change the oil in a 2021 F550 with the 7.3 gas motor today. That air box is a giant pain in the ass to get back together without messing up the filter. Good job engineers, you fucked up a box.

I expect nothing less from Ford

The flash file and repaired engine control unit shipped, and its come back AGAIN because it cuts off.  Imagine that.  I suppose its my fault too.  

I'm involved in a bunch of nightmare scenario cars.  Fixed two today, one was tech error, the other was a w223 S class brand new with SRS light on.  We had a shorted LIN line and were basically told to gut the interior, heater case and all to find it.  The shop wouldn't buy a "short finder" for us.  The tech bought one today, a power probe model.  He got a little frustrated with it, I tried it and learned a few things.  It doesn't like twisted pair wiring, this LIN line was twisted together with a ground line.  It did accurately follow the wiring just by running the sensor over the carpet or door sills or whatever.  It led me to the back of the car, and I ended up finding they crunched the harness under a bracket.  Fixed and fixed.  Much easier than what we anticipated.  Tool was like $165 on the mac truck.  

I'm dealing with a lot of shit.  I've been trying to maintain my cool and try to not feel overwhelmed or like I'm drowning in shit.  I'm taking my time and working through things as I can.  They keep loading the shit out of the shop, with 50+ carryovers and cars that don't get looked at for weeks.  I'm just doing what I can with what I have to work with.  

Sometimes that aint much.  A new kid didn't check the trans fluid level after a service.  Had a stripped drain plug and was making a fuss about it.  I took his own T40 and hammer, tapped it in the 6mm allen hole, and bam, its out.  Sometimes they need to see how simple it really is to understand that there isn't any fucking magic here.  Just do your job.  

There is so much going on sometimes.....  I don't even know what all to say.  

I keep dreaming of doing some sort of youtube or something and teaching people, but I'll end up being called a dumbass and told I'm wrong and I  don't even want to argue with morons anymore.  Let them keep digging their hole and I'll keep charging more to get them out of it.  I know fuck all about video recording, editing and I don't have a chipper sounding voice.  I don't take drugs and therefore can't do anything to sound all hyped up about whatever this latest craze is.  Clickbait titles and shit are not my thing.  I'd fail miserably because it would be what I want and not what the interwebs wants.  I don't know everything there is to know, I just have a very specialized skill set that maybe others could benefit from.  I'll never make whistlin diesel money at it so why bother?

@saturnstyl

Is this the tool?
http://www.zebrahvac.com/proddetail.php?prod=ZSPRT

Pulled a D8T in from the landfill yesterday for a final being "out" (their words). I pop the cover plate off to pull the axle and see that it is noticeably sitting off-center. Got it apart today and the only reusable parts are the hub and spindle. Bearings gone in the inner planetary and the gears ate into the carrier. It even caused enough pressure axially to smear the thrust button into the middle axle and started smearing the right axle thrust button. I'm surprised it even drove in. I did hear some popping when moving it but nothing too horrible. From wobbling around it destroyed the axle seal so now we might have metal in the trans housing.

We have a new service manager that started a couple weeks ago. We haven't had any landfill machines come in since he started. He walks by the bay and says something about how terrible it smells. I said this one is nothing, just wait.

Pics?

No. I'll try to remember to get some tomorrow. Got pulled off to look at something else this afternoon, so I didn't have a lot of spare time.

Got a ton of stuff going on, nothing I can do about any of it until other people do their job. Since no one wanted to be productive today, and I can't sit around and wait, I cleaned shop, cleaned tools, wiped down tool boxes and spray waxed them, fixed a lift safety release, organized the weld shop some, and cussed my way through sorting some parts into the parts room.

Sounds like we work together... Putting out whichever fire is the biggest at that moment. I was very done a few weeks ago, actually submitted an Indeed application to be my own subordinate knowing it would go straight to our GM. Two days later my entire pay scheme and job description were changed, with a healthy bump.

Got our first EQB today, $63k EV with manual seats. Electric car, manual seats I'd drive the hell out of one, much better direction than the EQS spaceship, probably the first EQ they should have released IMHO.

With all that shit going on just imagine that at the hight of the bs a W100 Grosser rolls in with a hvac issue and a hydraulic leak

That happened to the mb dealer in town

I don't envy you German car techs

Here ya go trashwrencher.

I bet they start doing SOS now.

They do but dont use us. They've got some other place that does it. We got their reports and found that they didnt sample this final at their last service. Found the duo cone leaking slightly so what we think happened was that there was no/little oil in it during their last service so they didnt sample it and just topped it off. The PSR logged a code for plugged trans filter 1 hour before they did their last service. Cut open this one and there's metal in it, so we may have a big project ahead of us.

I’d be pushing for to get the tranny sorted while it’s in your shop.  Sucks sending a machine out, only for it to come back with the problem you said was looming.

Agreed. We're waiting on SOS to come back to see what it says. Their maintenance manager was here today and we went over what we found.

Let me stop doing this, so I can work on YOUR car.

PSA: if you're going to use a tool battery to power something, when you pin into the battery with your leads make sure the jumper on the other end of the wires is removed.

Here you go little pony. 09 Sedona that won't shift when the shifter knob is on but will when the knob is off.

Speaking of batteries~

ZAP!



The crud on top of the batteries is slag and bits of metal and jacket from arc gouging.
Eventually enough built up to allow continuity, and a nice little fire.

everything is a fusible link if your brave enough.

Diagnosed bad engine control unit #4 on the same car in thirty days.  Remanufactured garbage.

Something seems to be missing

The rest of the car old enough/cheap enough to have drum brakes?

1998 chevy truck

LOTS of industrial stuff still runs drum brakes.

button cracked apart internally?

Hell, my dad's TJ and my Focus uses drums for the parking brake, but they still seem like one of those "dying" technologies.  Thankfully, nothing at my job has drums.  I hate them.

Tacomas still have drums in the rear


Even drum parking brakes are a dying breed, Benz is probably 50/50 on the Sprinters, all the passenger cars went electric years ago.

We still have a lot of drum breaks in the HD world. Caliper systems are becoming more prevalent, but they are a pain in the ass to get parts for.

LOL in two years internal combustion is going to be a dying breed for sprinters.  

I thought they would have held on the longest, but it seems like even mercedes hates the OM642.  And they should.  Because it sucks.

I cannot see how MB thinks a non ICE Sprinter would work.
We had some in our fleet, it was not uncommon to refuel them 3+ times a week due to the areas we cover.
No way that will work with an EV.

The EV Sprinter has been around, we should be officially getting it for 2024. The range is like 74 miles or 90 with the "extended battery". They're saying it meets the daily needs of 95% of customers that would be interested in the van? Sounds like a made up statistic. "A Ducati meets the needs of 100% of people who are interested in a Ducati"

The 642 is officially done, 15 years I believe? 7 speed is done as well. 2 diesels and 1 gas next year, all 4 cylinders, all 9 speed transmissions. 4wd goes to AWD with a new transfer case and front diff.

Its something like that.

Oh for fucks sake, that is sheer bullshit.   The fuckheads pushing for an all EV fleet have no fucking idea what this will do.

I think its more that they don't care. The environmental lobby is forking out big money to the politicians to push this EV bullshit.

They'll care when it all goes to shit and their "lifestyle" is affected.

Our lifestyle will be affected, they have and are being paid enough that it will be little more than an annoyance. Remember, we are surfs to the ones making these decisions.

I am not looking forward to tomorrow, we have a huge backlog of work all showing up at once. Most will be easy stuff, but its still going to mess up my program for a few weeks.

I can see them killing the diesel sooner than later, but the range issue should keep a gas engine around for a while. The gas Sprinter with a 9 speed drives fine, you can tell it doesn't have the grunt but 9 gears and a max speed of 82 mph keeps the engine and turbo spun up. We would see more "Vanlife" gas engine builds, but they aren't available 4wd at this point. The GVWR is reduced a bit, but the basic instagram cool guy builds should get in under weight.

Time will tell, there will be less of a gap between a small 4 cyl diesel and a small 4 cyl gas engine compared to the 642 V6 everyone has been used to for 15 years. 4WD to AWD is getting people worked up too, we'll just have to see how it all goes. Hopefully Benz doesn't tank the entire segment they invented and continue to dominate.

Why do you think they would kill the diesel? Epa rules?

EPA and other issues globally. Cities in Europe have already banned diesel engines, things like that trickle down to whole product lines.

Back when there were CA emission cars and USA cars, at some point they blended together, and it wasn’t on the less regulated end of the spectrum. Why bother developing a new engine family if it’s application is already limited and it’s future is questionable? They’re saying all EV by 2030.

Gotta pull the cab on a 305 just to get to the EGR/turbo/manifold.



Factory left a bolt jammed between the tstat housing and intake housing. Its leaking from the tstat housing. I think the bolt stopped it from getting fully tightened.

By 2030 I hopefully will be driving a 1968 GMC 1 ton flatbed powered by a 6BT Cummins fueled by a mixture of whale, possum and soy oils.
I will endeavour to ensure that the injectors vomit forth just enough of this mixture to ensure maximum volumes of thick cloying smog, and maximum noise.

Copy that, we are being told we cannot buy ICE anything after 2030. Kinda hard to run a fire department with electric fire engines that can only operate for 1.5-2 hours, especially when our first in engine can be a 1+ hour response time.
Average time pumping on an active house fire is 1.75hrs, plus another 2 to 8 hours in mop up.
On wildland fires, some engines pump hose lays 24hrs straight, and get topped off with fuel from 5 gallon Jerry cans or a nurse tank.
FEPA.