Serenity Now!
December 4th, 2006 by SBG
Lucy was volunteering to work in the nursery on Sunday at noon over at the church. She drove over there (it's about two miles) and she called me on the way and told me that she couldn't control her car -- she thought that there was something wrong with the steering. I asked her a couple of questions and she said that she thought maybe that she had a flat tire. I came and got her to take her to the church and take care of her car -- she had two flat tires. Both of the back tires were flat. Good gravy. How does THAT happen?
Well, I've got the car on a city street with two flat tires. I go to Tires Plus, the nearest tire joint and ask them if they have an air tank that they can loan me. No. But, Firestone across the street does. So, I take the tank over to the car, hoping that I can air the tires up. One tire takes air and is fully inflated with no signs of a leak. But, the other tire? No dice. The bead is broken, there's no air going into the tire. So, I have to change the tire. Of course, it's damned cold out. It reminded me of the last time I had to change a tire -- I was in college and it was -25 out in Fargo.
So, I drove the car over to Firestone and asked them to check the tires and if they needed fixing, to fix them. But, if there was major damage to the tire (Lucy had driven on them flat) to let me know. Four hours later, they called me and told me that the bead was broken on both tires (funny, I aired the one up and it held air and was not leaking). Also, the stems were damaged and needed to be replaced. Total price? $59. Fifty-nine bertin' dollars to replace two stems. What an outrage.
The name of the place again was FIRESTONE.
I don't know how the tires were low on air (not low, totally flat). Someone likely let the air out those tires. My pregnant wife then got on in the car and drove the car without an ability to control it. Luckily, she didn't get in an accident or anything. And I didn't have to buy new tires. But, I did get taken advantage of by FIRESTONE in EAGAN, MN. So, if you are ever looking for tires in Eagan, MN and you think about FIRESTONE, don't go there, because you'll get ripped off, screwed and taken advantage of. You may be wondering why I'm writing this. Because I wanted to review the tire store in EAGAN, MN named FIRESTONE so that if someone ever uses a search engine to find tires in EAGAN or looks for tire repair in EAGAN they might read about how FIRESTONE charged me $59 for two tire stems.
This entry was posted by SBG on Monday, December 4th, 2006 at 6:54 am and is filed under Personal, Stupid Stuff. It is one of 2465 entries by the author. We are no longer accepting Letters to the Editor on this post.
Loading ...
Beau replied on December 4, 2006 at 8:40:47 am
And I was hoping for a review of Tires Plus
CarterHayes replied on December 4, 2006 at 8:49:56 am
Ouch.
Algonad replied on December 4, 2006 at 8:56:30 am
I don't think that is that big of a deal. $59 to take off the tires, check for leaks, diagnose the problem, and fix it sounds reasonable. There are some places that would have just told you that you need to replace both tires.
SBG replied on December 4, 2006 at 9:00:26 am
The one tire was off. The other tire was holding air and was not leaking out of the stem or at least not audibly.
SBG replied on December 4, 2006 at 9:07:08 am
I should note that part of my irritation here was that someone apparently let the air out of my wife's car tires, potentially endangering her and our unborn child and costing me $59. Obviously, I'm happy that nothing happened to her but the $59, while minor in comparison to what could have happened was way too much.
CarterHayes replied on December 4, 2006 at 9:07:39 am
Unfortunately, I think SBG got ripped. I caught a leak last week and, after refilling the tire at a service station, took it in to have the tire fixed properly. Diagnosis, removal, fix, and remounting cost just $20 in Chicago proper.
SBG replied on December 4, 2006 at 9:11:21 am
There's no doubt I got ripped off. Did I mention it was Firestone in Eagan, Minnesota at 1399 Town Centre Drive? Some places call it St. Paul, Minnesota, but it's really in Eagan.
CarterHayes replied on December 4, 2006 at 9:21:32 am
I actually Googled said Firestone right after reading this post. I'll be sure to pass on the info to all the Hayes relatives living in The Cities. We don't cotton to businesses like that.
brianS replied on December 4, 2006 at 10:56:55 am
I thought Serenity was an outstanding flick.
And we've had very good experiences with the Les Schwab chain. Got those in the Land of Sky Blue Waters? [plus, they do a "free beef" promotion every year!!]
Beau replied on December 4, 2006 at 12:33:37 pm
$59 is a huge rip, but I have one better. Amoco station that no longer exists in Golden Valley: my serpentine belt came off on my way to work. They were the nearest place...they wanted $185. !!!!!
I told them where to go...bought a belt at Champion Auto for around $30 I think. The maintenance guys at my work put the thing on in less than three minutes at no charge. I bought them a case of coke.
Amoco was charging me attorney's fees for a damn belt.
brianS replied on December 4, 2006 at 12:51:18 pm
Your serpentine belt came off!!!??? Yikes.
Isn't there a belt tensioner -- and wouldn't your belt falling off kind of suggest that the tensioner was bad? Or a misaligned pulley?
Beau replied on December 4, 2006 at 5:48:00 pm
It had frayed. That happens when the belt is ten years old.
CarterHayes replied on December 5, 2006 at 12:24:12 am
Amoco was charging me attorney’s fees for a damn belt.
My step-dad recently mentioned that he was getting a root canal. The price of the actual dental work was $800, and the remaining $1200 was for the hour and a half or so of labor.
He then went on to tell me how many dentists complain about his shop rate ($60/hour) when they need their Mercedes, BMWs, and Porsches serviced.
frightwig replied on December 5, 2006 at 2:18:08 am
That's because when they go to the mechanic they feel like they're being taken for a ride by the C-students who took shop classes in high school while they were prepping for college and dental school.
I think everybody feels ripped off by auto mechanics, though. Everybody has had an experiences with mechanics who didn't listen, didn't know what they were doing, only knew what the computer diagnostic program told them, couldn't find the problem but seemed to create a new one, tried to sell you on replacing something that wasn't broken, "accidentally" threw out the replaced part, or just charged an obscene amount for a simple job. I've even known mechanics who didn't trust any mechanic but themselves.
CarterHayes replied on December 5, 2006 at 7:50:44 am
Are dentists then vindicated in these feelings because of their years of education? Should they have the right to feel outraged at these knuckle-dragging, mouth breathing, highway-robbing mechanics from shop class simply because they are a doctor? Should the same standard be applied to other "uneducated" tradesmen like plumbers, electricians, and general contractors?
I'm not saying that there aren't crappy mechanics out there. There certainly are - quite a few of them work at dealerships and are, as my step-dad says, Certified Parts Exchangers. They're probably related somehow to the dentists who can't get fillings to stay in.
frightwig replied on December 5, 2006 at 11:42:11 pm
I'm just saying that doctors and dentists (and lawyers, and others with post-graduate degrees) tend to point to their years of education to justify their salaries/fees. On the other hand, people don't usually go get a Masters and Ph.D to learn manual trades. The tradesmen may have their own rationale for charging high fees, like their years of experience at their specialized trades, but that may not mean much to people who equate professional value to college education. Is that class prejudice? Of course, but it's nothing new, and it works both ways. I know that tradesmen often look down on "educated idiots" who don't know an Allen wrench from a socket wrench, too.
SBG replied on December 6, 2006 at 9:28:39 am
There\'s a difference between paying a mechanic to fix a transmission or an engine and paying somebody to inflate a tire.
Just like there is a difference between paying a lawyer to prepare a will and paying a lawyer to litigate. One job is routine and doesn\'t require the skill of the other. It doesn\'t merit as big of fees. And smaller jobs like preparing a will often bring a lot of scrutiny.
frightwig replied on December 6, 2006 at 6:12:44 pm
That's also a good point, SBG.
Trips to the mechanic can be even more aggravating these days when so many jobs seem to require less skill, since the guy is just hooking up your car to a computer which tells him what to do, and yet you can't do so many repairs yourself, even if you are mechanically inclined, because modern cars have become so computerized.
CarterHayes replied on December 6, 2006 at 7:48:52 pm
...since the guy is just hooking up your car to a computer which tells him what to do, and yet you can’t do so many repairs yourself, even if you are mechanically inclined, because modern cars have become so computerized.
Which can be a sort of Catch-22 if you think about it, because with how computerized the cars are becoming, it's quite possible any number of systems on the vehicle can cause certain problems, especially on the more electronics-intensive components. So not only do mechanics have to understand the mechanical workings of the car, they have to be versed in the other systems as well.
There are fewer car makes today than there were 50 or even 25 years ago, but even though the number of specific brands have decreased, the level of sophistication in automobiles today makes it virtually impossible for mechanics to be well acquainted with the inner workings of every car out there. That's why many good shops will have guys who specialize in certain types of cars, generally along geographical lines - a Japanese/Korean guy or two, a couple American guys, and a European guy. The customer enjoys more reliable service and the mechanic doesn't have the headache of trying to remember the specifics of Hyundai's subsystems if he usually works on Saabs.
Jeff A replied on December 5, 2006 at 8:35:08 am
While this doesn't apply to everyone, one of the factors here is that so many of us are ignorant of how our cars really work, and so feel at the mercy of the mechanic. This is especially true if you're away from home. If something goes wrong with my car, I have no idea whether the mechanic is being honest with me or if he spotted a live one. As long as I can deal locally, where I know the people, I feel all right, but if I'm on the road somewhere, I have no clue.
CarterHayes replied on December 5, 2006 at 9:43:21 am
Which makes sense. A mechanic you can trust, especially if you're not mechanically inclined yourself, is a major boon.
Rhubarb_Runner replied on December 5, 2006 at 3:36:29 pm
Even better is if he lives next door, is the shop owner, and you can give him the keys the night before and he'll return the car at lunchtime.
CarterHayes replied on December 5, 2006 at 3:44:56 pm
Or if he's your step-dad and as a class guy doesn't charge you labor at all.
ubelmann replied on December 5, 2006 at 1:36:08 pm
Similarly, I've heard plenty of stories about people feeling ripped off for dental and/or medical work, and people seem to trust doctors less and less each day.
brianS replied on December 5, 2006 at 3:33:14 pm
Well, the major difference is that MDs (and dentists, I would presume) carry major-league malpractice insurance against the very real threat of a lawsuit over a bad outcome (whether it is due to actual malpractice or just bad luck). Auto shops undoubtedly carry liability insurance in case they "fix" something that gets a customer killed or the customer's car trashed. But mostly we are talking about a class of lesser offenses barely rising above the level of small-claims court (if at all), where the transactions costs of pursuing your complaint rapidly outweigh the likelihood of redress through the legal system.
Cheesehead Craig replied on December 4, 2006 at 6:03:25 pm
Sorry SBG, you are not on the top 50 on a Yahoo! search for FIRESTONE and EAGAN, MN. Personally, I don't think it is all that outrageous. Labor alone on that is $35-$40. Car mechanics are costly, just like lawyers
New Britain Bo replied on December 4, 2006 at 8:22:14 pm
Car mechanics are costly, just like lawyers
It depends on exactly what you mean by 'are'. Or 'just'. Or 'like.'
WillYoung replied on December 4, 2006 at 10:06:14 pm
On my 1932 Brooklyn Dodgers team in a historic DMB league, my left-handed spot starter/long-reliever is Lloyd Brown. He was a stud in 1931, and pitched well for me in relief yesterday against Greg Tamer's Cincinnati Reds (got out of a two-on, no-out jam in the eighth inning of a tie game retiring Gehrig, Wally Berger, and Mel Ott). Anyway, everytime I use him, I always have to think Serenity Now! to myself.
Now back to the discussion of the horrible FIRESTONE store in EAGAN...
bjhess replied on December 11, 2006 at 12:54:10 pm
So I put the winter tires on the Jetta yesterday. Three near-flats, most likely due to the super-cold weather. (Usually I put them on after snow, but before sub-zero temps.)
One tire never did hold air for long. The Wife took the car in to have it looked at. (I don't know my terminology.) Rebeaded and restemmed. $14.