Your Thoughts & Opinions Please

It's possible that you had two leaks one frome the water pump weep hole and one from the intake manifold gasket. When the repaired the water pump leak the pressures in the radiator became higher forcing it out the next weakest spot in your case being the intake mannitfold gasket. Should they have see it before they returned your vehicle? Absolutely! Are they ripping you off? Doesn't seem like it.

Sounds like an honest case of fixing one problem and missing the other. It is VERY likely that boththe waterpump and intake manifold gaskets were shot and they just happened to miss the intake manifold gasket leak, which is hard to pinpoint at times. I'd pay my $70, be thankful for the extended warranty, and apologize to the shop guys for giving them a hard time.

Doc

I hate taking my vehicles to the shop because I've found that they just don't give them the kind of attention I would, which is why I do most of my own work. I'm telling you this so you know that I'm very suspicious of shops to begin with. In your case, in all fairness, if it takes overnight for that leak to be discovered it hard to expect them to find it on initial troubleshooting - shops don't normally keep vehicles overnight as the first troubleshooting step. It's especially hard to blame them if they found another leak. I would've thought that was the problem. I'm in agreement with the previous two posts - pay the $70 and pray there are no other problems.

Joe

. .

. . You should call the owner of the shop and explain that after having a couple of days to think the situation over, you can understand the initial diagnosis. Especially after having being given sound advice over the internet by several qualified individuals.

Then.......

You should remind him that you DO HAVE an extended warranty and you would like to use his services for ALL your future repair needs, and if he feels that he would like to give you another shot at being a customer, you would like to let him go ahead and initiate the intake gasket repair for you..... IF JUST THIS ONCE.....he would forgo the deductible on your claim. You should remind him about the mileage on your vehical and ALL the information you've been seeing on the internet about the cost of Transmissions and the likelyhood of it's failure. You should remind him that just before the warrranty runs out, that you intend to have the entire vehical inspected for ANY repairs that may be needed and may be covered under the extended warranty contract.

And.....you would like for his shop, and not his competetors, to handle all this for you.

any whoooo......

that's whut i wood doo....

~:~ MarshMonster ~thinks the owner dude wood be an idiot not to drop the $70 deductible~ ======= ======= Your Thoughts & Opinions Please Group: alt.trucks.chevy Date: Sat, Sep 25, 2004, 2:55pm From: snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com (WhyZeeGuy)

I am looking for this groups input on what I believe was a bad service experience, but I'm not sure if I am being unreasonable, or the garage is truly obligated to correct what was an essentially a bad service repair.

We put our 99 GMC Suburban in a local shop for repairs because we found radiator fluid on our garage floor. Close inspection seemed to indicate that the fluid was coming from what appeared to be weep hole in the water pump, but not being sure & lacking the tools & time to do the repairs myself I decided to use a local shop for repairs. The shop called me later & said it was a bad water pump & the ticket was going to be $550, not to bad since I have an extended warranty, so my out of pocket was minimal.

Within in two days of the repairs being completed we again found radiator fluid of the garage floor so my wife took the suburban back to the shop.

The shop pressure tested the system, but said everything was fine. I later called and explained to the shop owner that everything was not fine since there was radiator fluid on the garage floor. We took the suburban back in & they let the vehicle sit over night, & sure enough they found radiator fluid on their floor.

Here is were it gets sideways.

The service manager calls me & says that they will need to fix the intake gasket to correct the problem and this is going to cost me an additional $70. The shop is also billing the warranty company another $390.00 for a total second service job of $460, on top of the original $550 service charge! I explained to the service manager that I am not happy about this and don't think that I think that I should not have to pay the second charge of $70 since they missed this in the first place. He says that there is no way they could have detected this & I would have to pay. I then speak with his manager and the shop owner but only get the same story from them also. This are the facts as I see them.

How would ya'll handle this? ========= =========

Thank all of you for your feedback.

I now see my expectations are higher than what would be realistic for most service shops. When I repair something I typically replace it with higher quality parts and inspect surrounding components & replace them if they even look just a little suspicious. I hate having to go back to replace something when I was there just 6 months ago.

I should stick to repairing the vehicles myself but when you have an extended service warranty, it hard to justify giving up play time to go slam knuckles in to metal. Plus I have a race bike that must be maintained and the trucks definitely take a back set to that.

Again, thanks for your input.

I would have the red ass myself if I were you. It reminds me of having my water pump changed on my 98 3500 dually. The local dealership changed it for me and accidently forgot to put the battery cables? back over the radiatior and left them up on the top of the engine. wel somehow I made it 360 miles to Glen Carbon Illinois and that cable worked it's way down to my fan and just ripped it all apart and made a mess. so they took it to Jack Schmidt Chevrolet and fixed it. our local dealer did pay them plenty and they did a good job. while we were there I was looking at new deisels before picking up my truck. I was Serious about trading/buying. so I told them we would come back. I went back to get my truck which had been in there possesion all night and found that my winsheild wipers were missing. after asking and damn near putting up a fight they would not pay me for the $15.00 wipers.. they offered to sell me some..?=BF? I was pissed and drove off with no wipers. Don't Buy from Jack "SHIT" Schmidt Chevrolet in Collinsville,Illinois...what a joke they would rather you leave and bad mouth them than hook ya up with some piddly wipers that dissappeared in their possesion..and lost a possible deal on a $50,000 Truck... DUH Bad Business... I am ashamed they sell Chevy's..

Have a Great One ! Bob

"WhyZeeGuy" sez:

I'd pay the nominal charges and be happy. If the water pump oozing through the weep hole, it is a slam dunk that it would be replaced. As far as the intake manifold gaskets go, these engines are notorious for that particular failure. Some will leak internally thereby contaminating the oil and lunching the engine.

Your out of pocket expenses are more than reasonable given the work that was done and the dealership did the right things in the right order. IMHO, you have nothing to complain about.

sez:

Well, the "lock up torque converter solenoid" (TCC) *is* in the valve body and is what the Sonnax bore/sleeve repair mitigates on the 4L60E transmission. I took mine to a ma'-n-'pa shop that knew their stuff and not the dealer to get the fix done right.

As far as the water pump and intake manifold goes, I did my own and after having to fight and wrestle with that snake-bit sonnabitch to get the job done, I would have been pretty damn happy to only have to cough up around a couple of hundred or less to have someone else do the job (but the requirements for cleaning the threads and torqueing it down to only 11 ft-lbs. with good thread locker means that most any shop out there would have borked the job).

What kind and how much of your own wrenching do you do to have standing in order to render and informed opinion?

Talking about me? I do all my own repairs, unless I dont have the correct tools, or if its electrical. But pretty much anything mechanical I fix myself.

Ah, high-class parts changer huh?

GMC Gremlin

If I owned a shop I would pressure test the system BEFORE allowing the vehicle to leave. Wouldn't take but a few minutes, billable minutes for the shop, and doing the test would help ensure the job was done right the first time.

What a concept.... ensuring a job is done correctly the first time to maximize customer satisfaction and minimize down time for that customer.

Americans, on the whole, have become a lazy people seeking quick easy fixes. This attitude is apparent as the poster's problem indicates. Now, thanks to a job not being done completely the customer has to experience further delays, having to arrange alternate transportation, etc.

Obbop, I agree, we as Americans can get pretty lazy but many people do not know how to do there own repairs. These shops know that, which is why they can get away with teling any story they want about why it wasn't fixed the first time. That is why I love this group I can give a somewhat evaluation of a problem and I get a Straight up answer on the fix and how to do it. Some of the people here have taught me a lot and I have saved a bunch $$$$$ thanks to these fine folks.

Have a Great One ! Bob :)

But haven't we? Remember boys & girls, lazy is good but lethargic is better.

GMC Gremlin

lethargic is the same as fat, just a synonym, isnt it? Porcine is also a nice term. Fat and pig like, I know a few people like. LAZY!!!!!!!!

By the way, I bought the truck from the dealership, and at the time, I didnt have time to go anywhere else, but like most people, I learned from my mistake.

My old man taught me how to do repairs, plus I took Auto Service Technology in High School, my kids will be FORCED to take a similar course. Its good for them in the long run. Most people are in such a hurry or on tight budgets and don't want to spend the money either, they take the fastest and cheapest way out. My sister is one for doing that. She had a 96 Grand AM GT she bought with 50,000 miles. At 115,000 miles it spun a bearing. She never changed the oil, and along with that the intake gasket was leaking. You couldn't even change the oil because when you dumped it back in, the heads were so plugged up, the oil would flow out the top of the valve cover. She now drives a 93 Buick LeSABRE with 210,000 miles, the throttle position sensor keeps going bad for some reason, last 6-9 months then takes a shit again. Oh well, she doesnt need crusie control or a passing gear.

BY THE WAY

Does anyone know anything about LESABRES and why the f*ck the Anti-lock brakes dont work when these cars get old. my friends ABS didnt work either.

"Bob Perkins JustaBenz" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@storefull-3132.bay.webtv.net...

No lethargic means slow. A sloth could be defined as lethargic, and someone who is lethargic could be defined as 'sloth'.

GMC Gremlin

We now have a english/grammer teacher in our group people, lol. Dont let me catch any spelling errors GMC, I'll give ya hell for it. lol

Kiel