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Well we can chat about that if you want, and why I got out of automotive :) Depends what your interests are. It's a highly regulated area and mfgs would rather sue joe home owner out of existence, than allow you to help people.

That said, tech life is not easy. Most guys get into it because its another trade for kids that don't know what they wanna do. It pays better than many trades but is hard work too. MFGs try everything they can to squeeze money out of dealerships and repair shops as well. While theyre forced to offer tools for repair by the government, it doesn't specify what ways they can offer it.

At some point Ford engineer gave us a megashare link to a firmware download for something one of our techs was working on. (funny story Siglent recently sent me a megashare link for a firmware recovery package XD)

For our shop, it was run buy guys who were highly motivated (3 of us started the show, I was just an employee though). We were one of the most expensive repair shops though, and generally turn down small jobs like the equivalent of your situation.

Dealership techs are usually a different story though. I've been offered tech jobs and declined because the work sucks relatively speaking in the trades. Usually the pay is lower because dealerships don't make much money in comparison to 3rd party shops. They have more overhead, mandatory warranty work (they usually lose money on) and they are required to set repair pricing based on the mfg book time which usually isn't enough for the dealership to make much on, despite it feeling like they are telling you to bite the pillow. Dealerships make money on sales, not service, may around here avoid service as much as possible. That and for the past few years they have been short staffed and hiring kids fresh out of tech school.

My experience was mostly in calibration firmware engineering (or reverse engineering).

ChipTuner 5mo ago

Also, on the parts. Parts are hard man. Since about 2018-2019 mfgs make it hard to get OEM parts after the model is out of MFG warranty, usually like 5 years. After 5 years sometimes even dealers have to go aftermarket. Even oem parts suck too now-days though. Blame mfgs or mfg parts suppliers idk. But what I can say is that Bosch is usually pretty good. If you have a car (usually foreign) with Bosch equipment, they make it easier for distributors to purchase. While they do have multi-million dollar minimum purchase orders, they almost always have 20+ parts available though some part of their network in my experience.

Navistar/International, CAT ,(Ford diesel engines), (mostly diesel engines) use a healthy amount of bosch components that can be sourced. A B2B that offers some retail purchases is Alliant Power (they're called something else now, again parts is a fucking mess after 2020)

Really the only US domestic parts sources are like Dorman, or Cardone Group (I think they even merged now idk). There are some others but mostly just resell dorman or cardone white-label parts. Denso for asian stuff (high quality usually).

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Discussion

Matt 5mo ago

Sure, but mixing parts is a pretty good way to end up with problems. In this case, a $20 part resulted in a return and a lost future client. You do the math.

Matt 5mo ago

Well fuck I hope my wife doesn't cause more body damage but you know what I mean. That's where we always went for work. Probably wont next time. I don't know, but it's a potential loss. For fucking nothing really. I would gladly pay $20 for the companion part. To just not ask and half ass it is bizarre, but you know more about the scene than I do.

ChipTuner 5mo ago

I know people say "lost future client" often, but the truth is, and I'm not being rude when i say this, I promise. Chances are you actually saved them money or frustration which is also money. From experience, generally customers in that category who were on the edge already we not going to be future customers, and possibly saved the dealership from a loss in the short term.