Some cool and funny pictures I have taken over the years. Some are good, some are scary, but this is ALL real!

Shop Shots Volume 3

Due to the launch of the Forum yesterday, and some other things going on, I feel like I left you guys with out a really good post yesterday! So to make it up, I am doubling up on the “Shop Shots” today!

This is a picture of a V6 Passat axle. The axle is what connects the transmission to the wheels. Without axles, the car will not go. The picture is an inner joint. Somehow, it came apart. It’s acutally not something that happens all that much. I think that I have seen just a couple over the years.

While we are on the drivetrain, this is a close up picture of a tire that I took. I was standing under the car, which makes this the left rear tire.?. Tires are much more than just round and black. The technology is pretty amazing. Before I start going on and on about speed ratings, temp ratings, performance(sorry, I started) 😉 well lets just say they are rubber compounds, with steal imbedded in it. When the tire wear down far enough, you can actually see the metal cords. The line in the picture is where the tread(parts that makes contact with the road) meets the sidewall (where the words are written) I know that I left out so much info on tires, or tyres if its a VW, but I will save that for another post!


This little guys was sitting on the dash of a 2012 Golf. When I got in the car, I totally didn’t see him. I pulled the car around to the back door of the shop. When I seen him, I screamed. I mean, like I screamed out loud. Then I started cracking up because I just screamed at a tiny little snake on the dash of a car. So I took a picture of him. In the back round, you can see my tool box. 🙂

Here is a side by side shot of a VERY common issue on our 2.0T FSI, engine. These are called cam followers. The one on the right is the new and updated part. The one on the left, well, it shouldn’t have a hole in it. The follower is an internal engine part. It rides on the cam shaft and operates the mechanical fuel pump. I guess the issue is too soft of metal. It wears the cam shaft, and the follower. I have also seen these metal chunks clog up oil passages and ruin engines. BTW, replacing engines is not fun!

HAHA,(yes I just laughed when the picture came up), This Jetta came in the other day. The service advisor came back and asked my how much it would cost to replace a customers fuse. He said it “Cracked in half”. What had actually happened is the fuse blew. A fuse blows when too much current goes through it. This is the fuse panel on top of the battery. It is the main power junction of the car. The wire that looks weird is the one to the alternator. The fuse blew, and someone just taped a wire to it, instead of ACTUALLY fixing the car. I am not sure who did the job, but holy crap, its kind of a hazard. The customer declined the repair, they said they would “wait and see”?

Ok, I have been saving this one for a while. I think it happened a few years ago. I was off work the day this happened. I got a text from one of the boys at work saying a car fell off a lift. I of course asked for a picture! I guess what happened was the guy doing the alignment was moving the wheel back and forth. That is called doing a “sweep”. When we do a sweep, the machine measures the suspension angles. When he did the sweep, the wheel cought the edge and rolled off the rack. He was ok, mad at himself, but ok. To make things even better, the customer was standing right at the window to the shop. That is about 20 feet from the rack. Everyone was ok, the dealer paid to have the customers car fixed, and gave him a car to drive while his was getting repaired. 😀

Well, that pretty much sums it up. I am sorry I missed a good post yesterday! The forum is LIVE and doing awesome. Please come by, sign up and post in the First 50. When we hit 50, I will lock the post and do a drawing for something. Not quite sure what it will be yet, kinda depends on how fast we hit 50 😉

 

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Shop Shots volume 2

So last weeks “Shop Shops” was a pretty big hit! Thanks Brett for the great name. I think this will be a Thursday post from now on.

This picture could fall under the “Tech Tip of the Day” post. This is a transmission seal on a 2002(or so) VW passat. One of the mechanics in the shop replaced this seal because it was leaking. This is actually a pretty common repair. Well, a couple of days later the customer comes back in saying his car is leaking worse than before.

The mechanic that had replaced it was off that day. One of the other guys had to remove the axle and the flange to gain access to the seal. He called me over to show me what he found. It turns out that this seal is installed BACKWARDS! We fixed the car no problem. The guy that installed the seal, got the time taken back for his mistake.

This is actually a mess that I made. I had to replace the engine on this 2004 VW Passat. The engine locked up and broke the timing belt. I think it was due to lack of oil changes, but could not prove that. The engine on the right is the new one. This type of job usually takes about 2 days to complete.

I think I took this mid day. No way I would have left this mess overnight. This is not really my favorite job. There is a lot of “How does this go together” on a job like this.

This is a picture of a buddy’s Passat. I have turned a few wrenches on this car. In fact, I think we rebuilt the entire front suspension, among other things. He bought this car with 187,xxx miles on it. He actually knew the original owner of this Passat. Not only that, but he worked on the car starting at 30,xxx miles.

With 284,xxx miles, he sold it to buy a newer Passat. It couldn’t have been 3 weeks after he sold it, it got totaled. It was really sad to see a car that was so well maintained, with such high miles go to the car grave yard. Don’t worry, everyone was ok. It just stinks.

Be sure to subscribe for email updates. I don’t want you to miss fun posts like this one!

Thanks for reading
Charles

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Some car pics from over the years

I really felt like keeping today’s post fun. I thought I would post some pics and tell you guys the stories behind them. I think this will be cool. Post in the comments what you think. Also, this might be a cool post to share!

This is a picture of a VW thing. I don’t really know what the year is. This is the very first thing I seen when I went to the dealer for my interview. I flew out of Chicago Midway in the dead of winter. I got to the dealer and it was 55 degrees. They had just cleaned up from an ice storm, the reason for the snow on the ground. I remember leaving Chicago, the temp was, -14 degrees AIR TEMP! Talk about shocking.

I flew down for just one day. In that day I had a great lunch/ interview, got the job(DUH) and found an apartment. Needless to say, it was one for the best, most stressful, craziest days of my life. I had to call my wife and tell her, in 2 weeks we are moving to a state she had never been to before. Oh, by the way, this was my first trip to NC as well. Nuts? Maybe, but I wouldn’t change it for anything.

This is an EOS. I took this at a training course in Atlanta. It was the first and only time I have ever been to Atlanta. Not much of a fan, but whatever. This is actually the service position for the convertible top. The trunk is fully released, and the top is about half way open. I would bet that any mechanic that has to do this to an EOS, will not be happy!

The one good thing about Atlanta, is that I got to visit a good friend of mine. I had not seen Katie in years, so it was great to catch up. We had some good sushi and craft beer. If you guys didn’t know, I am a HUGE craft beer fan. I actually home brew as well.  🙂

AH, the Bentley. This is by far the most expensive car I have ever worked on. I think this model is a Bentley Continental. The general manager of my(and several other) dealer got married. I guess they took this Bentley to the wedding. The owner of my dealer group has millions of dollars worth of cars. Its actually crazy some of the cars this guy has.

On the way back from the wedding, the Airbag light came on. My boss asked me if I could check it out. I did my normal diagnostic routine, and found that the fault was for the drivers airbag. I started to take the airbag off and found something familiar. It looked just like a VW Phaeton. Turns out, it is a fancied up Phaeton. Even down to the clock spring, it had the same part number and everything. Crazy right! So I was working on a $125,000 car, owned by the owner of the company, driven by the general manager of ~9 of the ~30 dealers in the company. No pressure right?? WRONG! I was tweaking out. I got everything worked out just fine..

 

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