The dilemma that honest, competent mechanics (and other highly skilled trades) face in today's world...(SEE EDIT)

[Ace-Garageguy]

17 hours ago, Brudda said:

Yup, glad I’m passed those days. Same goes for collision repair. I usually can read a customer. We have writers and they are good. And we have to deal with insurance companies. That’s a whole discussion in itself...

...I have one customer, Ferrari and they do not care about costs, they just pay their bills. I’m very lucky in that way. 

The shop where I'm building the Chevelle primarily does late-model collision repair. They used to do a fair bit of custom work, and the current owner's father built several national-level touring showcars. The '59 El Camino they're wrapping up (that I made several custom parts for, and which is currently being upgraded to Inglese stack-type fuel injection), and the '66 Chevelle I'm doing (that the shop owner will paint) are the last two custom jobs that will ever be done there...because try as they might over the last decade, they haven't been able to hire ANYONE either competent or trainable to work to their standards.

The shop still works for insurance companies, but the writer-manager is as tough as they come, knows the business inside out, and gets every penny it takes to provide as close to "undetectable" repairs as you can get. He's ex USAF and ex Lockheed, and isn't intimidated by insurance clowns.

The shop owner is now the only bodyman (the best I've ever seen on normal production vehicles) and his BIL (who races SCCA and builds street rods on his own) helps him. The shop owner has a '69 smallblock Camaro he built and painted, it's gorgeous, and also has a matching multi-award-winning chopper built by a very well known shop for him.

The collision painter has been working for them part time off and on for decades, and paints semi-full time since retiring from a career in law enforcement. He's also finishing up his own '66 Corvette coupe that is the straightest, best-fitting C2 coupe I've ever seen, anywhere...which he's done all himself except the engine build.

They're all hard-core hands-on "car guys" with a very broad knowledge base, and I count myself lucky to have been able to work in a shop for a while with people who are ALL as quality-driven as I've always been...and people who know a lot of stuff I don't, but never pretend to know anything they aren't 100% sure of.

I just sometimes wish I'd met this great crew a long time ago. 

Edited 21 hours ago by Ace-Garageguy
punctiliousness

[Brudda]

I was at laguna seca several weeks ago with MG1 Ferrari. I had my MG1 shirt on walking the pits, I’m talking to people from all over the world. The owner from MG1 must have told them they had a guy repairing their cars. Guys and girls from all over wanted to shake my hand. People would introduce them selves and I did not know who they were. Danny Sullivan was walking by and stopped to shake my hand and asked me if we could talk for a few minutes. He wanted to know how I straighten out aluminum Ferraris. He has several in need of repairs and asked me to stop in at his Los Angeles house. I was like a deer and a car comming. I did not understand any of it. Then Scott, a guy (billionaire)from Seattle told me that there is only 5 guys in the US that can do what you do. Everyone wants to hire you to repair their cars. I did get offers from all over the world at laguna. Told them all that I’m ready to retire. They did not hear that and kept throwing numbers at me for three days. I’m getting calls from every where. The call today was from London. Really? No more guys that can repair aluminum in a short period of time? Scott told me these people only expect the best. And only a handful of people are accepted in this community. I’m very lucky to be one of those guys. But where has the talent gone? I’m just stunned. Also very lucky to be in this elaborate community. My dad taught me well on sprint cars , Indy cars and hand made Ferraris. I never thought I would be doing this. Another thing he taught me is to be humble. I’m trying not to let any of this go to my head. I’m lucky I have a beautiful wife that settles me down,LOL here is a pic of my latest project. It was hit every where. I’m putting her back together, this car is Scott’s, the billionaire from Seattle. 

[Bainford]

Fantastic story, Bruce. That's a good position to be in, especially in the rarified atmosphere that you are working in.

[Ace-Garageguy]

9 hours ago, Brudda said:

 No more guys that can repair aluminum in a short period of time? Scott told me these people only expect the best. And only a handful of people are accepted in this community. I’m very lucky to be one of those guys. But where has the talent gone? I’m just stunned...

Not only in the rarefied atmosphere you're working in.

I've been seeing the death of the skilled trades for many years, particularly the very highly skilled trades, and trying to make people aware of it everywhere I go, everywhere I post.

People in general don't want to hear it, and though you may not want to hear it, much of the popular perception is that we're knuckle-dragging mouth breathers, no different from the guy who mows the lawn, too stupid to do something that involves a keyboard, so we end up working with our hands because we're capable of nothing 'more'.

Never mind that 99% of the people who embrace this attitude don't have the innate set of talents (or the tenacity to develop talent into skill) required to do what we do, and simply could not do it if their lives quite literally depended on it.

Where has all the talent gone? A lot has just walked away. Josh Mills, an internationally known builder working in his own small shop, quit and went to work as a fireman to get the benefits package he needed to support his growing family...when he found it impossible to get competent or even trainable help so he could grow his business. I saw his mounting frustration over the years I worked with him.

It's tragic, as Josh was one of the best 'period' car builders out there, with an unfailing eye for proportion and line and what looks 'right', and a range of fabrication skills.

He built this for himself:   https://customrodder.forumactif.org/t2950-1935-ford-josh-mills-mills-co

It looked like this when I met him. Note the flawless metal work and door fit on the chop:

 

 

He built this for James Hetfield when I was there (I had nothing to do with it) and it was chosen as a contender for the AMBR: 

https://www.petersen.org/vehicle-spotlights/1932-ford-roadster-blackjack       

This is one of the other client cars that went through the shop during my time there (and again, I did not work on it): 

https://www.throttlextreme.com/danny-bachers-1931-ford-model-coupe-hot-rod/            

These are not by any means typical hot-rods. They are all exquisitely turned out, engineered, and detailed automotive sculpture. And they run. And stop. Very well. They're fast and handle well for what they are, and they're reliable. Josh's '35 Ford was his daily driver for quite a while.

I always wondered why there wasn't a line of young guys out in the paring lot trying to get hired just to sweep the floor, but there never were, and Josh, Gary, me, and the one young guy who did come in to train, were just not enough to turn out the volume needed to make buckets of money. So Josh quit.

But because of the work I did there being seen by the owner of the shop where I'm doing the '66 Chevelle, I was hired immediately after leaving Mills, as they needed someone who could not only do metal fab and bodywork, but who could also do engine work, machine work, electrical, AN-plumbing, and integrate complex electronic systems...to world-class standards.

But I'm old. I'm tired. I have health issues. And nobody has come in for years who has any hope of taking up where I leave off, but I'd dearly love to teach somebody what I've learned over the decades. The shop owner, though still relatively young, is well aware there's just no one available to help him carry on (as I've written above), and will be shutting the doors soon after the Chevelle is done. 

At its peak, the shop where I am now supported 6 full time bodymen and two painters, turning out collision repair so far beyond what's accepted as 'industry standard', it might as well be on another planet.

EDIT: Ford's CEO recently announced the company has 5,000 openings paying $120,000 annually at dealerships, presumably for competent line mechanics. And no takers.

Where has all the talent gone? Indeed.

Edited 6 hours ago by Ace-Garageguy
punctiliousness