Given the current state of affairs with respect to supply line deficiencies and labor shortages, I'm sure we're all seeing longer repair times for our automobiles. The service advisor at my local dealer tells me they're doing a booming business on repairs, thanks to the unavailability of new cars. They're way busy, but they're in the same boat as the rest of us -- a bit shorthanded, and having trouble getting all the parts they need in a timely manner.

I'm in the waiting-for-parts boat myself, and I'm wondering how affected others are by it.

Question:
So... if you don't mind sharing, what's the longest you've had to leave a vehicle at "the shop," and are you seeing increased repair times lately as well?

Choices:
A week
A month
2-3 months
4-6 months
longer than 6 months

 

I think it was about an hour and a half (Takata airbag recall).

Happens to be the only time I took anything to be worked on by someone else.

A year. Literally. Got it back and now there is no coolant overflow reservoir. I mean ffs.

Body shop forever, repairs much less.

45 days. My brand new 2018 Silverado was T-boned at an intersection. Took that long for parts and repair. My body shop had liberal visiting hours so I could keep it company.

I've been waiting over 6 months to get a vehicle in for repairs. It's an atypical vehicle, and I had to find somebody even willing to work on it given the particulars of the situation.

It started out with a shop that said they would do the work, but were unable to source the parts. I sourced the parts from overseas, but then they said they couldn't perform the work with my parts.

quote:

My body shop had liberal visiting hours so I could keep it company.

^^^^^^^^^^^^
Hahah. I bet there were long lonely hours when NOTHING happened, but your vehicle gathered dust. Did the workers round on a daily basis?

Not my personal vehicle, but a school bus last school year Went into the shop the end of August and came out the middle of May. The whole school year basically.

They could not get the parts to fix it, but it gets better. The sub bus ended up in the shop for two months, and that sub bus ended up in the shop for four months.

The parts to get them back on the road were totally unavailable. They were in for different things.

This year, my bus went in for monthly service at the beginning of October, in inspection it need breaks, it sat for almost a month because they couldn't get break shoes. I got it back on the 2nd, drove it a day and a half and the red check engine light came on, and it's now setting in the shop, don't know how long, as of Friday they still haven't figured out what is wrong, as the diagnostic test isn't showing any fault, but they can't get the check engine light to reset.

Soooooo, it's probably out for the rest of the year.

ARman

The neighbor lady across the hall had her Honda mini van in the shop for seven weeks
When
She trashed the driver's side with 60 feet of highway barrier cable.

Her insurance only covered a rental for three weeks.
The body shop picked up the rest of the rental car bill

Even when visiting hours were closed, the phone app let me check on the truck anytime. The location updates made me sad.
More fun: My insurance only paid for 25 days of a rental car, during which I cruised in style. When that ran out, the body shop took pity on me and let me drive an ancient Subaru that they had "rebuilt" after it was considered totaled. The noises it made terrified me.

That was funny.

Never more than a couple days, in the past.
Our Expedition goes in Wednesday for cam phaser replacement under warranty, we'll see how long it sits. Hopefully they ordered the parts when they made the appt when we bought it.

My dad was working for a performance shop briefly.
They were doing maintenance jobs on German cars. The local Audi dealer was quoting people 3-5 months out, for an oil change.

9 Weeks.

I have a 1999 Chebby S-10 pickup which I bought new and now I just keep it around for the occasional lumber yard/plant/nursery/whateve trip. It only gets driven a few hundred miles a year now. Camry is my daily driver.

It has always been trouble free, no issues, but 2 years ago it ran fine when I parked it. It would not start the next time, cranked but would not start and run.

Towed in, a few weeks ago get to it, then they said it seemed to have a broken valve spring. It did, once they got it torn down a bit.

Turns out this basically amounts to an old fashioned valve job. Turns out the modern time issue is there there are very few machine shops left around (same as with starter/alternator and radiator repair shops, practically extinct).

I'm in no hurry, Camry is my daily driver, and I have access to another vehicle.

From the time it was towed in until I paid the shop for the repairs, it was 9 weeks.

(I considered scrapping the S-10 for salvage, due to the cost of $1750 repairs, but when I found it was worth a fair amount above that, I decided to fix it. The cost of a new or newer-ish truck is astounding, and I don't need a truck very often. The S-10 runs amazingly well and has been nothing but dependable all these years).

My 03 Tundra needed new loaded struts and shocks and the front end raised to make it level. The shop got it in and unfortunately many of the bolts in the suspension system were badly seized. They just kept breaking upon removal. New parts, including both lower control arms were very hard to source from multiple Toyota dealerships. It ended up disassembled and clogging up their shop for about 3 weeks.

I haven't had my car in the shop for longer than a week. But, I did have problem getting service for my car very recently. I had my clutch master cylinder fail. I sent an appointment request online to my goto shop, but I got no reply. I sent another one. No response. I figured they might be busy these days, so I tried to contact another shop. No response. I sent another—nope. My aunt used to work for a garage that moved to another location. I tried contacting them. No response. I was like, isn't there anyone that can work on my poor car?

I eventually walked into a local one-man shop that has no online presence that my buddy recommended. That guy was able to finally fix my car in a day, once I was able to slip-shift it all the way to the shop from my house.

I had a BMW that went in mid-pandemic that needed a computer which took close to 2 months to source from Germany.

Someone rear ended the BOSS, and so it took 3 weeks to get it back.

A former coworker had his cats stolen from his Outlander and it sat for 4 months the first time. The second time he took it to an exhaust shop - $800 and a couple of hours for him aftermarket high flow cats.

November 2021, I hit a deer, the day before my wife's thyroid surgery
still driveable,
so while she is being worked on, I call insurance,

Dec (roughly 4 weeks) before I can have my car even looked at,
the Feb 1 for a scheduled drop off at the body shop,
3rd week of March before I get it back,

due to the lack of availability of a hood for a 2015 Honda Civic 4 door,,



shop van shits the bed,
towed to mechanic, who declines and has me tow it to the local Foad Dealer,

week later I get less than 45 miles and it breaks down again, and the keep it a month,

runs like a champ now, replaced the entire fuel delivery system, (Diesel,, not cheap)

Twice - 30 days. The first was a faulty wire harness on a new 1993 Ford Taurus. Intermittently it refused to start. It would turn over but not catch. Dealer was good and provided a loaner while they struggled to fix.

The second time was on a 2002 Dodge Durango. It blew the engine with 3,000 miles on it while we were 450 miles from home. Terrible dealer and terrible response from Dodge. We did get a rental loaner on Dodge but no expenses. Dodge dropped a Jeep short block in and screwed up the A/C and hood latch. That was our seventh and last Dodge.

We’ve owned 39 vehicles in our married life. 2 clinkers aren’t bad I guess.

My Cherokee was with the dealer for almost six weeks when it needed a new long block (under warranty) and FCA wouldn’t authorize it until they sent a factory tech to confirm their own dealer’s diagnosis. Took weeks for the tech to get there and confirm the cylinder scoring. Only took three days to get the new engine and about another 3-4 days to get it installed.

FCA ended up paying for my rental on top of the $8,500 engine swap.

-Rob