Vin999
Active Member
Hey I get where your coming from with the life issues and extra expenses, and the situation of breaking down in remote places with erratic car problem/s from nursing/driving older cars, after all we all don't drive around in lastest model cars but sometimes a mechanic just does quick mechanical fixes to get you going and make some money and not waste his time, but when it comes to electrical and sensors well you need a qualified electrical person in efi systems.Not sure how good the auto electricians are near you but every time I have used one they are not God of car electricals. They know more than the average garage sure, on electrical gremlins but diagnosing intermittent issues is not an easy task even for someone with such skills. If it's a common issue they can sort it but when the problem comes and goes there is not magic tool that you run over the entire car that tells you every problem there is...... Yep the old ute has had some dodgy work done by PO's and I am getting to the stage where I have fixed most of the botched up work.
As mentioned, I am planning on taking the ute to an auto electrician as I want to see if they can just replace some of the lead cables, which have frayed near the plugs. I have had auto electricians do similar repairs to this in the past, with success. I'm just not sure if the shop near work is happy to do that, or if they will tell me they have to build a whole new harness at a hugely expensive cost. If not I have another bloke who did some decent work for me before, just not close to work.
However, this is not something I can get done in the next couple of months, I have major dental over the next three months and a shed sitting on the ground that needs to go up, before it gets damaged. But unfortunately the old ute cost me 17hrs more labour just before Christmas than the bloke said he would take, it was supposed to take six..... So it has placed me in a pickle and now I have to pay at least another $250 this week getting the ute running.
It is on the list of places to take the ute to, but it's unlikely going to get there before the middle of the year now as I have too much going out over the next few months. Chuck on top of that a bill at the auto electrician's that can't be quoted is not something I can do right now but it will get there eventually..... Worst case scenario is I catch the bus if the ute breaks down again..
Yes we have allsorts here just like in your situation, miles apart......I have 2 auto electricans that I use on occasions for real difficult do your head in issues, usually after my knowledge/efforts don't resolve/fix issues. One is a nearly retired old school small workshop who I use for minor generic issues and the other one is a modern workshop with all the fancy gear that are trained in electronic/fuel management and prefer to work on more modern cars and are very very pricey, I used them a few times with the conversions for some electrical gremlins with certain non standard setups and I paid dearly for the fix as it was worth it, but for normal standard factory stuff the other older electricitian does the job and is more price friendly.
So don't get me wrong, sometimes you have to pay a lot for certain other people, where your local mechanic just can't fix or wont, or just doesnt know how to solve your same continuing issues. Nowadays it is what it is with older holdens and everyone is in the same boat now or in the very soon future as life and things have changed from the good old days no matter where you live to reflect the 5 letter dirty word @Money, the root of all things including the best 3 letter word @sex. Welcome to the new world where nobody gives a farck unless you pay $.
Good thing is at least you didnt buy a $50K Ls whore and went to put on a $10K plus blower and have issues and the workshop wants more money to touch and fix issues they said wouldn't happen if you spent that amount with them. Imagine how those guys in that position feel about spewing having a credit card debt over $10K with a farqked running car with heaps of kw power and the speed limit is just their 1st gear/multiple speeding tickets, so really your situation is not so bad after all and quite manageable compared to what others have spent and dealing with.