Manager Forum

For some years now I have known that my engine jobs take longer than some of the competition. Say I am replacing the head gasket on an engine. I clean up all the bolts and parts I remove. By that I mean I wash the rocker covers. I soak the fasteners in carb cleaner, and I wash out the intake manifold, and the list goes on. I am beginning to wonder if this is necessary or am I doing the right thing.

Our shop has a rather slow turn around time, but few comebacks. I clean everything except maybe the inside of the intake, depending on how dirty, and how easy to clean. Some of them [intakes] are almost impossible to clean. My theory: if the trans pan isn't clean on the outside, why would the customer think it's been cleaned on the inside. Also, If I had to remove a valve cover again after our repair, would I be embarrassed if the customer watched and saw it come off? My techs haven't always agreed with my theory, but my names on the sign, not theirs. I figure pride costs me a lot of money per year, and hopefully, it makes me a lot too.

personally i feel that presentation is an important part of a good job. it's like doing a tune up and not running the plug wires in the cleats. the vehicle could run like a top but when the customer opens the hood and sees the wires just hanging there it could mean a very happy customer turning into an angry one. in today's world there are no longer any short money repairs. during the winter months when we do any big money repairs we'll run the vehicle down the street to a car wash. yesterday we had a bronco in and did brakes, ball joints, and a fluid service. road salt all over it. ran it through the car wash for 12 bucks and when the customer picked it up he was absolutely thrilled that we took the time to clean it. i have a hot water high pressure parts washer and i'll wash anything i can. if i went to a restaurant and the food was slapped on the plate like it was when you were is school i'd be reluctant to return no matter how good the food was. i'm not saying i want a fancy presentation like you see on the food network where the meal looks like a sculpture just as much as i don't want it to look like floor sweepings. on rare occasions i take into consideration the fact that if i clean the parts that i'm dealing with they will make the rest of the area that's not clean stick out like a sore thumb. selective cleaning is called for. the road salt is a killer for me. it's hard to clean certain areas and not completely clean the whole vehicle. i remember a vehicle that one of my techs got a bit of grease on the seat and when it was washed off there was a huge difference in the cleaned area opposed to the rest of the seat. we washed away 5 years worth or dirt. i ended up having a complete interior detailing done so all the seats looked alike. years ago i would pressure wash many engine compartments. i had a pressure washer set up near the bay door and it would take only 5 minutes to do it. that ended when vehicles started coming in with a multitude of sensors and wiring connectors. cleaning that way caused a series of problems. i blow all the acorns, leaves, pine needles, etc off of vehicles as well as the wiper bays with tree muck in them. customer notice that the leaves are cleaned from the wiper area right away and will call and thank me. it's just good business.

Ruger77 wrote:Our shop has a rather slow turn around time, but few comebacks. I clean everything except maybe the inside of the intake, depending on how dirty, and how easy to clean. Some of them [intakes] are almost impossible to clean. My theory: if the trans pan isn't clean on the outside, why would the customer think it's been cleaned on the inside. Also, If I had to remove a valve cover again after our repair, would I be embarrassed if the customer watched and saw it come off? My techs haven't always agreed with my theory, but my names on the sign, not theirs. I figure pride costs me a lot of money per year, and hopefully, it makes me a lot too.

Your customer shouldn't be watching you remove that valve cover. They have no reason to be inside the shop and legality wise they shouldn't!

We definitly clean everything. We also pressure wash off alot after repairs are made. I add for this labor wise and for degreaser most of the time.

by Eddie8 on Thu Jan 06, 2011 8:53 am

Your customer shouldn't be watching you remove that valve cover. They have no reason to be inside the shop and legality wise they shouldn't!

Eddie8,
It was just a hypothetical situation. If you don't agree, no problem, but a lot of my customers do some of there own work (oil changes, etc.), and will be under the hood later.

I have a solvent washer and a hot soap transmission washer that works on a timer. If it fits in there it gets washed. We even clean the diff covers good and paint them flat black.

No one has mentioned my main reason for cleaning parts before reassambly, I hate to get dirty and if your are installing dirty parts, you get just as dirty on the reassembly rpocess as you do during disassembly. It also makes the job look better, I will add time to the job to cover this, the nastier the more I add. As far as degreaser, I just let the shop supplies charge cover that. Also have the hot pressure cabnet and love it....

As a transmission only shop you can eat off our floors. Perform surgery on the inside and outside of the case after installation. Most customers pop the hood and see the battery cables cleaned and protected, thats all they know to look for. I call it the domino theroy. If they see something you did correctly (in their eyes) you won't have to explain anything. We have 2 vibratory tumblers, 2 media blast cabinets, 1 soda blast cabinet, Naptha spray cabinet and 8 water or solvent washers. Yes I think you can only win by through cleaning.

wbuxton wrote:. We have 2 vibratory tumblers,.

Bet Tina wants to work for you

OH, OH.......

Steve used caps! Someone is in trouble, probably me. I'l get back to you....

wbuxton wrote:Steve used caps! Someone is in trouble, probably me. I'l get back to you....

I really think it be me that made him get all excited and use caps....

i overlooked the good point lil joe mentioned about installing greasy, grimy, slimy, parts. i'm by no means the king of clean but the part i'm dealing with is spotless. when we do a timing chain for example it's spotless when it goes back on. gasket surface clean and shiny. we put 90% of the bolts we take off of anything through the wire wheel and inspect them. i replace the wire wheels on my grinder about every three mos. we even go as far as digging the crud out of areas of no real consequence. in doing this we've discovered fail points that wouldn't have been found until the vehicle returned. g.m. intake manifolds jump out as a prime example. upon cleaning the bolts or mounting points we can see what condition they're in and replace as necessary. i don't mind my wrenches being dirty when disassembling but when assembling a slimy wrench aggravates me. i wear latex (ya i said laytex ) or nitrile gloves when taking apart but when assembling i don't like to wear them. all my tools are cleaned before assembly, and the rags on my work cart are clean. i'll stand ankle deep in crap when taking apart without a problem. but going together, talk about the anti steve, i'm completely opposite. the most important part of the job is when i'm through is inspection it for finger prints, grease on the headliner from hat buttons, door handles, etc. i've found the cleaner i am the cleaner the car stays. heck i even change cloths after taking some vehicles apart. if i get a drop of burnt posi fluid on me you would think i was on fire. as far as my shop goes it's been compared to a junk yard. it's not like the shops of today. there are parts on the shelves, tools everywhere, a couple of "project" vehicles in a corner, a camaro in the process of being set up for drag racing, (my lead tech's car. personally i don't understand the whole set up to racing against the clock not the guy next to you, he has a monte carlo that he races and he lost to a malibu because it had a head start, whatever) but when the vehicle leaves it's spotless and when (and all do) the customer opens the hood and pokes around to help accept the thousand dollar expense, everything is clean and organized. i've had plow trucks come in after plows have been recently installed and the wiring is all open and scattered around. we'll put it into looms and secure it like it should be. the owners are so thrilled with that i could have charged them triple what i did to do what it was brought in for. i guess all this stems from my first boss. it was drilled into my head that no matter what we did to a car the battery posts were cleaned and painted red and black and the air filter housing cover was cleaned and if necessary painted. back then there were two colors, black and ford blue. we were instructed to wire wheel the wing nut as well. on some cars we would spray them with silicone to make them look new. this was reserved to the big money jobs like a 80 dollar major tune up. usually a tune up was about 45 dollars.

liljoe wrote:

wbuxton wrote:. We have 2 vibratory tumblers,.

Bet Tina wants to work for you

I don't think you're gonna get away with that one Liljoe

Perception is God in this business. If the customer doesn't see it clean, then they perceive it to be a sub-par job. Just like an alignment. The angles can be perfect. But if the steering wheel isn't dead on straight, the alignment is no good. I'm like you. It leaves cleaner than when it came in. It's all part of the job. It separates the professionals from the amateurs.

I wash all parts that I touch or that the repair pertains too. If I am doing an intake for example, I clean the engine block off so there is no residue. I don't like it when I get a car in and you can see that someone did a repair and there is still oil marks or coolant marks evident!! Attention to detail is my biggest thing. I even wash the exterior windows and vacuum the floors when I am finished with a vehicle. I have a nephew who is helping me once in a while and one day he said to me why do you waste the time to vacuum the floors and wash all exterior windows? I said it is all customer care, have had a couple customers either say something right away or come back and say they couldn't believe how clean their car was. The parts that go on the engine get the same treatment. Otherwise a chunk of crud could fall off and get on a gasket surface and create a leak or worse. Just my thought on things.

after building engines for 30+ years there were 3 things the old man drilled into my head a long time ago clean, clean, then clean it again. in my opinion it not only adds to the visual portion of the repair but tends to help the customer in the these guys care dept. and yes my techs not only clean the shi--- out of our parts but will also if needed paint or repair anything that may look out of place. we will also clean the engine compartment of anything left behind by the repair. yes it cost the company some money and time. but i beleive it will come back in spades when dad pulles it in the garage at the house and pops the hood. i have had some resistance to this method in the past with the comeback the outside of that oil pan doesnt have anything to do with the repair. and he didnt think the customer would crawl under the car to even care. well as its been said in this forum before my names on the frt. of this shop. and thats how i want it done. and wouldnt you know it about two days later i get a voicemail which i of course replayed for my favorite tech. thanking me and my crew for a great job no more leaks and everything looked factory new. well cool for me. and of course you have to look at the other side of that coin in that if he had looked under his 05 4x4 durango and found an oil pan which wasnt cleaned yes its not leaking oil anymore but it doesnt look like they even touched it you can guess what that call would be like. in closing clean clean clean. it never hurts too look good too.

crmeyers wrote:Perception is God in this business. If the customer doesn't see it clean, then they perceive it to be a sub-par job. Just like an alignment. The angles can be perfect. But if the steering wheel isn't dead on straight, the alignment is no good. I'm like you. It leaves cleaner than when it came in. It's all part of the job. It separates the professionals from the amateurs.

Chris,

I take that one step further and clean the wheels and add a little dressing. See..... I did something. Customers love it.

great point about the wheels. often overlooked. i also clean them whether it's an alignment, brake job, new tires etc. when the vehicles come in salty and crunchy i always wipe the windshield clean and head lights. i also make it a point to let the customer know. if the weather allows it i'll even pressure wash a vehicle if it's real bad. when they come in with road salt all over them and you use fender skirts or for that matter not, you'll leave clean spots all over the vehicle and salt your uniform. we will clean the vehicle with a steam pressure washer and we also have a washer dryer on sight to clean our uniforms. like this week, i got slushed real bad a couple of times and i just change and throw the dirty cloths into the washer. there is no way when you've been slushed that you're comfortable and won't spread the dirt around.