Dyno numbers are for reference only - they mean next to nothing,
Every dyno reads differently.
Even the same car on the same dyno on a different day with different weather, is going to read differently.
Chasing numbers is almost always going to result in disappointment.

The graph is what matters the most.

 

Clutch was installed today and I'll be picking it up tomorrow. They said it would be 8.5 hours to replace the clutch, flywheel and adjust the clutch pedal. I tried looking online to find what the shop hours should be by the book and couldn't find it. Can anyone here help me with that? Am I being overcharged? Shop rate is $124 per hour.

Greg

 

My shop is either 165 or185/hr (can't remember) so yours sounds appropriate

 

How many hours would the 'book' say for changing clutch and flywheel?

I looked at Repair Pal online and found this

The average cost for a Nissan 350Z Clutch Replacement is between $1,391 and $1,518.

• Labor costs are estimated between $387 and $488 while parts are priced between $1,004 and $1,030.

Greg

 

Hey TN350,

An experienced technician can replace the clutch in a 350Z relatively quick. It's not that difficult of a job. 8.5 hours seems like a lot for a pro shop with access to a lift and pro-grade tools. Perhaps they're padding the job a bit because of the clutch pedal and/or other unknowns. For example, I could easily imagine it going up to 8+ hours for a rust belt car since one of the 1st steps is removal of the exhaust system from the cats and on back. The interior work, removal of the wiring harness, starter, driveshaft, and draining fluid is all pretty quick/easy. The bell housing bolts can be a pain if you don't have all the right tools, but I can't imagine a pro-shop not having the tools.

Me and a buddy, doing this job for the very 1st time using wheel cribs (working on our backs), in my garage, with basic hand tools, got the transmission out in under 3 hours. Now getting the new flywheel and other items re-installed took more time since I'm OCD and wanted to clean everything while it was apart. I would imagine the standard shop book time would be something around 4-5hrs from start to finish. At the very least, you would need to leave the car at the shop for a day.

A bit anecdotal, but I think still relevant.
Cheers!
-Icer

 

Thanks Icer

They still don't have it done. They think the Master Cylinder is bad now. Maybe that was it all along and not the clutch.

I miss my Z so much I bought a 986 Boxster!

Greg

 

That's really odd. Didn't you say you had the master cylinder and slave cylinder replaced? Or was the fluid just flushed/bled?
Cheers
-Icer

 

Austin did a service to the clutch where he may have replaced the fluid and bled the system. It worked fine for hundreds of miles after that service before it started to act up. We didn't replace the cylinders.

Greg

 

I still don't have my car back. It's been over two weeks since I dropped it off there. The total for this whole fiasco is going to top $2,500 when done.

I was informed yesterday that while they were changing or adding fluid, the pump/machine they were using had a blowout and sprayed the fluid on the front of my car and damaged the paint. So now they are going to repaint part of the car.

This has not been an 'Elite' experience for me at Elite Automotive Repair in Sparta, TN. I think I'll be looking elsewhere for service on my cars.

Greg

 

Yikes! It is totally unnecessary to use a pump/machine to exchange the clutch fluid. The clutch system's capacity is so small, I want to say that even the FSM does not recommend using a machine. What a disaster, I'm terribly sorry! It's stories like this that keeps me working on my own vehicles. At least if I cause the damage, I only have myself to blame and there's some odd comfort in that.

Check more than just the exterior paint on your car. There's a really good chance they got fluid in the engine bay and damaged the paint there as well. If they acted quickly and hosed off the affected areas the damage could be minimized or prevented, but often times the techs running these fluid exchange machines walk away for a few minutes (set it and forget it mentality). Sounds like they had a rookie tech working on your Z.

Two weeks and still not done? Over-estimating the labor/time required? Now paint damage on an otherwise pristine vehicle. Not only should they fix their mistake, but they ought to knock off a huge amount on the labor charges and kiss your *** while begging for forgiveness. Get the name of the body shop they are picking, look at their prior work (If they have an online gallery or social media, etc), hell, even call the owner and have a chat. I would be very concerned about the quality of the aftermarket paint. If an auto shop can't do a basic clutch job right, would you also trust them to pick a good paint/body shop?

I think I'm more pissed off about this than you are.
-Icer

 

Yeah, I just called them and gave them some ****. I'll be going there this afternoon to have a look at the paint damage. MC and SC parts have been ordered and I'm crossing my fingers that they can get the clutch working properly after that. I can't think of any other parts to replace to make the clutch work!

They have their own body shop there and I'll get to meet the guy who will do the painting. I'm going to try and turn this into a positive and have them also fix the little niggling paint issues that I see every time I wash the car. It's also an opportunity to fix the dent in the top of the windshield frame from when a small tree branch fell out of the sky on a particularly windy afternoon drive with the top down. I ducked my head under the windshield to avoid getting hit.

I'm a little pissed - but getting really pissed won't really help anything in the end.

I will not be bringing my Boxster there like I was planning to do.

Greg

 

anytime i mess with the clutch fluid on my car, i cover the fender/painted areas with a towel with a trash bag over it.

 

Hey Trav,

I also take similar precautions to protect the exterior fender/bumper paint as well as the engine bay's paint. When I replaced the MCC and SCC I did use a vacuum bleeder to suck out as much of the old fluid as possible before disconnecting the lines. This minimized any potential drips on painted surfaces. But that's as far as I would go in terms of using a specialty tool for the clutch fluid.
Cheers,
-Icer

 

Damn that sucks, sorry for your experience with this, but yeah the clutch should all be done by hand.

 

My 350Z has only 25K miles on it, and while it is not perfect, it is very clean everywhere you look - inside (most of the inside), outside, the beautiful denim roof, under the car, in the engine bay, in the trunk - almost - almost like new.

I went to see my Z today at Elite Automotive in Sparta, TN where it has been for over two weeks waiting to get a clutch and other clutch parts replaced, and I was simply devastated. For reference, just so you know, Elite is the place that you take your exotic or your Audi SUV for service if you live anywhere in middle TN. When I pulled in, I saw several Porsches, a Hurricane, a Ferrari, etc... There were at least thirty cars inside the building being worked on. A beehive of activity from the techs working on them. I've had cars serviced there ever since I moved to to TN - my Audi S8 in particular. But I will not ever go back there again.

Over the weekend, last weekend, my car was on a lift, about a foot off the ground with the hood closed, and a container of brake fluid that was left under pressure and sitting in front of my car had a hose blow off the top of it, spouting brake fluid up into the air and down onto the hood of my car. I saw splatters of brake fluid on my windshield - probably secondary splatters from the fluid that hit the hood. I found some on the windshield frame and side mirrors as well. All dripping down the hood and over the front bumper and spoiler. The clearcoat ruined everywhere it hit.

Overall my car was filthy, having been left outside for a week under some trees that leaked sticky stuff all over it, and then another week inside this filthy shop and all the dust they create in there.

I felt sad. At this point I could have just dealt with it and said you know, **** happens in life. It was an accident. But then I saw something that really changed my thinking on this . . . .

I looked down at the lift arms and saw that they didn't even have the car properly supported on the lift arms and it looked to me like the lift arm was actually making contact with painted surface of the rocker on both sides of the car. That's when I lost it. My blood pressure went sky high and I tracked down both owners of the shop and had it out with them. There were swear words (which if you don't know is rare here in TN, not like the Northeast where I'm from). It was tense in the shop and it took me quite while to calm down to the point where I could actually have a discussion with them. In the end, they assured me that they would be painting the whole front half of the car and detailing the whole car to the point that when I come to pick it up it will look like a new car.

I really don't have a lot of faith in them actually fixing the car completely. I've lost confidence in them. At this point my hope is that they will get the clutch working properly and have the car painted and looking decently nice when I go to pick it up. I know some of you are going to suggest that I get my car out of there and have it fixed elsewhere and then fight with them to get them to pay for the repairs. But I'm not willing to go through that fight. I'm not willing. Too much stress for me. It's not worth it to me. I'll take what they give me and I'll never go back there. Life moves forward and then you die. I have no time in my life for lawyers.

As I think more about this situation, I realize how poorly they handled this. How poor their communication was not only with me, but internally. The owners didn't know about the paint damage on my car until I got there, so they were as surprised as I was when I showed them the issues. They must have been devastated as well - I could see it in their faces. One of the owners remained very quiet, the other took control and reassured me. But what should have happened and didn't is that the owners should have been aware of the problem and they should have had my car cleaned (in their internal wash bay) so they could assess the damage (it was so dirty you really couldn't tell what was tree sap, shop dirt, or brake fluid), and then they should have called me and explained the situation and invited me down to see the car with guidance and assurance. Instead, when I got there, I was told where my car was by the adviser at the front desk and I was escorted over there by one of the body shop guys who had NO authority to help in any way, and I discovered how bad it was on my own as I walked up to the car. Just terrible customer service with a capital T.

Greg

 

Wow. Sorry that happened. I hope they do take care of it.

 

Everyone makes mistakes, it's part of being human. But that setup with the lift arms is a super rookie mistake. Especially for a shop that works on exotics and high-end luxury vehicles. They should know better. (It's borderline looking at the pictures, doesn't appear to be creasing/crushing the rockers, but it may leave permanent marks or indents in the paint! The fact that the owners appeared unaware of the situation tells me the service department was trying to keep this incident quiet for fear of repercussions. I suspect the service advisors or technicians or both parties felt that a 350Z was somehow beneath them and therefore didn't deserve the same care and respect they would give to a Porsche or Ferrari. Maybe this mindset lead to them handing it off to their junior technician, coupled with other larger jobs with more margin for the business, you got shuffled to the bottom of the priority list.

If I was in a similar situation, I may also have made the same decision. I do like to believe in second chances, but if the business failed to deliver on their promises or my property was returned to me in worse condition than it was received, it would be time for legal action. We're not talking about <$1000 in damages here, a pro paint shop could easily charge above $5000 to repaint the front half of the car. If the wiper arms, wiper cowling, mirrors, sail panels, or window glass is also damaged, then the damage costs could increase considerably more.

Since they are selecting the shop, I would get a detailed run down on how they plan to tackle the paint job. Many paint shops will simply mask off the car and paint the body panels mounted. This is cheaper and more efficient, but this also leads to all manner of paint defects/tells that a trained eye can easily spot. Things such as tape lines, fish eyes, dirt/dust inclusions, holograms, voids & pits from oils/contamination during prep, excessive orange peel, blistering, and so on. I didn't even mention color matching properly, but a good shop shouldn't have any trouble matching the color. It's nearly impossible for a human to re-produce the same quality paint job as the robots in the factory, so some minor defects just have to be taken/expected. The main thing...does the paint/car look better after vs. before. If they repair the pre-existing defects that's a nice bonus (Look on the bright side right!?) If you have the front bumper lic plate holes drilled, ask them to fill and smooth those out.

Really hoping you come out on top in the long run.
Cheers!
-Icer

 

Icer, they have their own body/paint shop in the same big building. The owner gave me a tour to make me feel better that they were capable of painting my car properly. I think they will do a good job. Whether or not it is up to factory quality level, I don't know. But I hope it will be good enough for me and my 17 year old car.

They use PPG water based paints and mix their own colors there. They have the PPG machinery to do that, including the scanner to read the paint on the car.

The service advisor that I've been working with for eight years (a true car nut like me) said that he's very sure that the paint job will look great. He knows the painter well and told me he's one of the best in the area and not to worry. BTW, the advisor has given his notice because he's not happy there anymore.

Do you think they should remove the fenders and bumper and hood?

He offered to fix the dent on the windshield frame from the flying tree branch. He said they would look at the rockers and fix those if need be.

I looked at some pictures and I don't see any license plate mounting holes.

Greg

 

I think the fenders could stay on the car. But the bumper and hood should be removed (same for the rockers if those require some work). This will give the painter the best chance at a quality finished product (good even coverage, less visible tape lines). New fender and bumper emblems should be purchased, don't bother re-using the originals, they aren't that expensive (maybe $120 for all 3). Push for new if they mention anything about re-using the originals with aftermarket double-sided tape.
Cheers!
-Icer

 

What a nightmare. I hope it works out for you in the end.