Question About Buying Parts

Will most dealers sell parts to a customer without them installing them?.i'm trying to save some $$$.

Reply to
teem
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All dealers have a parts counter. Just walk in and buy what you want!

Reply to
David Teichholtz

Every car dealer I've ever tried to buy parts from has been perfectly willing to sell them to me.

Reply to
Doug Miller

And some of the parts counter folks will even give some technical tips and be willing to print out guides for you. There are some replacement parts (I have it on good authority) like sensors that are better to get from the dealer than aftermarket. When I went to replace my mass-flow induction sensor, I was going to get aftermarket. A friend who is a professional independant mechanic told me "no way", to get only OEM parts. He had used aftermarket largely and found problems so always swears by OEM dealer parts.

Reply to
Oppie

I've never heard of any exceptions, certainly. Have you tried asking them?

-- Mark

Reply to
Mark T.B. Carroll

Reply to
Oppie

thanks guys,i tend to make a mountain out of a pimple.I just have these wild thoughts of the partsman saying something like:''You know how to do this?'',or,''This should be done by qualified personnel''.I wnt to get those broken front end pieces on my Ion changed since the weathers been cooperating.i was told I need 3 parts,& the one goes from the corner of the car up,around the wheel well,if i dont need it,I dont buy it.Thanks again.

Reply to
teem

In 30+ years of buying parts at dealerships, I've *never* been asked or told anything like that.

Reply to
Doug Miller

A tip: If you can, bring in the old part. Put it on the counter and say: " I want one of these". They will ask a few questions and then you can match the new one to the old one when they go in the back and bring out the new one.

Reply to
David Teichholtz

LOL -- the first one often is "Okayyyyyy.... what is it?"

Better have an answer ready.

Reply to
Doug Miller

As others have said, any dealer will be happy to sell most if not all parts to anybody with money. Some jurisdictions restrict some items like airbags but YMMV.

The real trick is to avoid paying full retail price. Dealers will give often very substantial discounts to those 'in the trade', this is an area where there are major $$ to be saved. If you have the knowledge to carry it off it is often sufficient to say that you are working on a customers car and want the repairman's or garage discount. If you need a lot of handholding then you will more likely be expected to pay full retail. If you know enough to carry this off, you probably already have experience and know what approach works best in your area. Sometimes it is best to have a friend 'in the trade' buy or order the parts for you.

Good luck.

Reply to
Private

Yea,how do you know you're getting a deal.Unfortunetly,the 2-3 parts I need are still attached to the Ion.That's another issue,getting the broken parts off.

Reply to
teem

Long thread so I'll just add this for reference. If you're not in a hurry you can buy online for less than what a dealership will charge.

For GM (excluding saturn...) there are 3 good sites for referencing OEM parts and prices

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Shipping and time aside the prices for those OEM parts are hard to beat.

Unfortunately Saturn isnt part of the regular GM parts network so for Saturn you can try

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And last but not least 6thplanetusedparts.com

Reply to
BläBlä

Thanks for the heads up!.

Reply to
teem

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