Took a page out of Ripped Camel's book.

D

DieselDan

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Did a brake job on a 02 Navigator yesterday. Actually was the nicest older Navigator I think I have ever seen. It didn't look like a northern car, but it had a tiny bit of rust here and there on the frame. Took the passenger side apart and machined the rotor and installed new pads, and put the wheel back on. Took of the driverside wheel and took off the caliper and anchor bracket. I have a leather mallet that I usually use to take off the rotors. You can bang the hell out of pretty much anything, and the mallet won't marr the surface. That hammer wouldnt take it off. Hit the hub with some pb blaster then smacked the hub surface with a hammer trying to knock the rotor loose, nothing. So, I grab my air hammer and start bumbing the back side of the rotor right next to the hub and start going to town with it. Its the strongest air hammer that snap-on makes, still nothing. At this point I go tell the service advisor that we are going to need a new rotor, and we get one coming from o'reily's and the customer approves it, so I start getting out the big guns. I grab the acetaline torches and start warming up the hub surface of the rotor, got some small areas cherry red. Now I am smacking the backside of the rotor with a 5lb sledge... I'm starting to get annoyed and it is getting close to the time that the customer is going to come get the car. Here's the pics...
Rotor1.jpg

Rotor.jpg


I used the torches to the face of the rotor, but didnt go too deep, didnt want to cut the hub. Then went at it with the air chisel again. I got the new rotor and slapped on the new pads and everything seemed fine. I have NEVER, EVER had a rotor put up this much of a fight.
 
We had to beat the front wheel off a '79 Merc I got from my grandma that hadn't run in 3-4 years. Took 2 of us with 12lb sledge to get it off. We even tried losening the lugs and doing donuts and it didn't budge!
Surprised you had that much trouble on an '02 though...
 
I remember when I did the water pump in my 02 Vic I had to whack it full bore with a 12 pound sledge about 50 times to get it to budge... (and yes, I had all the bolts out.)
 
you've never ran into this before dan? alot of the f-150's etc around that year had very tight clearance between the hub and the inner rotor hat and it would rust together bad. it got to a point that when one came in i knew to price rotors too. i would take my 3lb mallet and wail on the outer rotor disc surface till it would crack completely off the hat, then the 2 pieces would slide right off
 
Well, I am one of the truck shop dungeon cronies, I dont get to work on much of anything that isnt a big ass truck. With our driveability guy, a light line tech, a service manager and a service advisor all leaving the friday before last, I've been kind of a floater, so I have gotten to do all kinds of stuff lately. They don't normally let us do normal brake jobs because it takes out of their pockets, basically the guys that know how to do the job right in their sleep, cost too much. So they let the lube guys do all the gravy.
 
What do your Brake Specialists get paid, if ya don't mind me asking?
I'm know im getting butt raped with $8 an hour as a susspension/steering/brake expert at the shop I'm at right now
 
I make 22.50 an hour, but that is flat rate... Nobody really "specializes" in our dealership. For the most part everyone can kind of do anything, except diesel, nobody really wants to do that lol. Not everyone understands flat rate but it basically works like this. That brake job for example pays 2 hours. It could realistically take me 30 minutes to do it. I still get payed 2 hours for the job, even if I get it done quicker than that. We don't get a 'by the hour' pay. Now take that same brake job and say it would have taken me for some reason 4 hours to do it because a bolt broke or anything like that, that caused me to basically lose my butt on the job, I still only get payed 2 hours, even though it may have taken me all day. Warranty is really where we get eaten up. I always lose my ass on Econoline Diesel warranty work. It pays something like 24 hours to r/r an engine, it pretty much always takes me longer than that, and there is usually something stupid still wrong with it that chews up more of your time, after you thought you were done with the job. On the other hand, some diesel stuff I have done a hundered thousand times and can do it in my sleep and you can come out on top. With how the economy is though lately, and the way we get payed, if there is no work, warranty or customer pay, we make no money. On the other hand, if you have a week where you have a lot of good work, you can make 40, 50, 60+ hours and you were only physically there for 40ish. Or, you can have a 20 hour week and physically been there 50 hours because you got there early and came in on the weekend, just to try to get some work.
 
Something that I just remembered, and Figured I would add. Is that the labor rate when we sell a customer pay job on a Diesel is 95.00 an hour. The Dealership gets 72.50 on every hour I turn. That is why a lot of guys start up their own shops, because the can charge half that and still make a lot of money.
 
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