Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

1987 Thompson 290 with twin 3.7 Mercs and Alpha 1 Stern Drives

Mechanic A - I delivered my drives to their shop to rebuild the water pump/impellers.
They completed the job and gave them back ready to re-install on my boat.

Mechanic B - Came to my house and installed port and starboard lower shift cables and installed the drives. Once the drives were back on, they could not engage forward gear on either port or starboard. They told me Mechanic A put the drives back together incorrectly.

Mechanic A said Mechanic B is crazy and they put the drives together fine and that Mechanic B messed them up installing them.

Who Is Lying?

Mechanic A _____

Mechanic B _____

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

This will actually help me b/c I am looking for a good reliable mobile mechanic for my boat. I don't know much about the drives or installation and hoping you guys can help me with this.

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

mech A could have put them together wrong. the shift shaft coupler will face straight fwd when in fwd gear. the shift shaft turns to port and in it's fully turned to port condition the drive is in rev.
this is the criteria to be met.
fwd- prop lock ccw, ratchets cw, shift shaft coupler facing fwd.
neu- prop freewheels in either direction w/o sound or resistance, shift shaft coupler rotated maybe 15* to port
rev- porp locks cw, ratchets ccw, shift shaft coupler rotated another 15* to port.
as for mech B. only thing i can think of when installing that would mess it up would be letting the shift lever fall out of the shift slide all together. that would give you no action (shift) at all. other than that, assuming that you had fnr to start with. and only disconnected the lower shift cable. pretty much ya install it. with the drive in fwd. and the remote in fwd. set the barrels on the shift cable at 6'' and ya should have a winner. if someone adjusted the remote. all bets are off.

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

Yeah remote was in F. I made sure of that.

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

IDK If I had to guess, I would guess mech b...

Putting in impellers is fairly simple, and there isnt a whole lot to mess up...

But sometimes getting those shift cables in just right can be tricky... I have had to pull/remount my outdrive a few times cause I got em off just a tad, and they would stick.

Kind of hard to say really..

Maybe go to mech C and get a seperate opinion on whats wrong, and take it to the ones who messed it up to correct the problem?

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

I'm with Numlaar on this - its time to establish a "wonderfully satisfying" relationship with Mechanic C. Go find some folks with outdrives in your area and ask them who they prefer.

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

That's exactly what I am doing. trying to find a good reliable mechanic.

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

I think the lesson to be learned is don't use two mechanics. I have to assume they don't work together.
I have, however, had mechanics or other service techs blame others in their company ("well Mike musta done that not me") where I say "look Bob I didn't hire you or Mike I hired [company name] and as far as I am concerned there is only one of you." As if I'm going to say, "Oh well, if Mike did it wrong never mind I'll just go home now."

Re: Who wants to play, name that lying mechanic???

Home Cookin' said:

I think the lesson to be learned is don't use two mechanics. I have to assume they don't work together.
I have, however, had mechanics or other service techs blame others in their company ("well Mike musta done that not me") where I say "look Bob I didn't hire you or Mike I hired [company name] and as far as I am concerned there is only one of you." As if I'm going to say, "Oh well, if Mike did it wrong never mind I'll just go home now."

Click to expand...

Soooo true!

I was an ASE master tech for over 10 years... worked up from lube tech to running a full shop for for the last 5 of those years... one thing I can tell you right off... is if a shop and/or mechanic starts placing blame on someone else, rather than own up and try to make the customer happy, you should find a new mechanic... That is extremely poor service and point blank, just bad business... but definitely thats the problem when using multiple mechanics, as it gives them the chance to say, hey so and so did it not me...

One thing I NEVER did was not fess up to a mistake... they will happen (I once ripped the door off a toyota in a lift "incident", that was fun to explain!), its inevitable, but how you handle it is the key to being a "good" mechanic. I have found that if you admit to the mistake, and offer to make good on it, it goes a long way in the relationship with the customer and most people are willing to continue working with you as long as you just do whats right!