its going to cost $400-$600 for drum and brakes replacement in rear. front brake replacement in front. replacing stripped studs and possible lugnuts. does this sound reasonable? i think the price is a bit high?
Nope, might be low depending on where you live and what you drive… which you didn’t tell us.
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Buy all the parts and do the job yourself if you think it’s high.
Tester
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Well, you can always let your girlfriends brother do it, it worked so well last time he worked on the brakes.
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Could be a time-consuming job, so the fee seems pretty reasonable. The folks here could provide more insight to your query if you post the vehicle’s make/model/year and (if you know) which brake parts need to be replaced. I replaced my truck’s rear brake shoes & some brake springs earlier in the summer, probably took me (a diy’er) a total of 5 hours , more than expected b/c had some trouble removing one of the brake drums. With the amount of time required, if I had a way of doing it, I’d have charged myself $500 just for the rear brakes … lol …
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Yes, it’s reasonable near me.
its a chevy trax 2015 LT
Seems reasonable to me. That’s a lot of work.
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That might cover the parts, another $600 for labor.
We charge $600 per axle for brake pads, shims and resurfacing rotors.
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So you are getting new shoes and drums (maybe hardware) in the rear, new pads and machine the front rotors as well as install studs, that is a great price if it is a real one… lol
BTW: you have to remove the pads and rotors to install new wheel studs, so normally pays 0.1 hours per stud while replacing the rotors as long as the hub doesn’t have to be removed…
However looking at the labor there may be more involved with replacing studs on the Trax…lol
|WHEEL STUD - R&R
Application Labor
Operation
FWD Rear,w/Drum Brakes,One Side
Includes: R&I Hub & Bearing Assembly. 0.9
FWD Front,One,Both Sides
Includes: R&I Steering Knuckles. DOES NOT include wheel alignment. 3.0
AWD Rear,One,One Side
Includes: R&I Hub & Bearing Assembly. 1.3
AWD Rear,One,Both Sides
Includes: R&I Hub & Bearing Assembly. 2.4
FWD Front,Each Additional 0.1
FWD Rear,w/Disc Brakes,One Side
Includes: R&I Hub & Bearing Assembly. 1.1
FWD Rear,Each Additional 0.1
AWD Rear,Each Additional 0.1
AWD Front,Each Additional 0.1
FWD Rear,w/Drum Brakes,Both
Includes: R&I Hub & Bearing Assembly. 1.6
FWD Rear,w/Disc Brakes,Both
Includes: R&I Hub & Bearing Assembly. 2.0
AWD Front,One,One Side
Includes: R&I Steering Knuckle. DOES NOT include wheel alignment. 1.6
AWD Front,One,Both Sides
Includes: R&I Steering Knuckles. DOES NOT include wheel alignment. 3.0
FWD Front,One,One Side
Includes: R&I Steering Knuckle. DOES NOT include wheel alignment. 1.6
Note: Labor items can be added to an estimate on the Estimate detail page.|
By today’s predatory “business practices”, it’s suspiciously cheap.
lol … maybe overstating this a little? … car repairs can be surprisingly expensive though. Ray’s new column (9.11.23) mentions that replacing even simple halogen-bulb headlight fixtures, newer cars, the oem version for the part can cost upwards of $600 each. My older Corolla’s halogen headlight bulb, about $12 each.
I respectfully disagree - every single “professional” these days is trying to pull the last feather out of customer’s ass. 20 years ago, I quit doing automotive mechanical inspections because I was sick of stealers I had to deal with and switched to Software Engineering. In my days in the field, auto repair was bad. I mean REALLY bad. I recall a case with broken clip on Mitsubishi spoiler cable - they wanted $1,400 (30 years ago!) for essentially speedo cable. I asked for a bolt and a file and promised to make a clip withing 30 minutes. For free. They kicked me out of the shop.
A two month old [true] story: my son’s 4Runner needed a head gasket,I called a bunch of shops and all quoted $4,500 - $6,000. We ended up doing the job on the driveway in one day. Less than $300 OEM parts, one $20 special tool. It’s been 8,000 miles since then, and it’s just perfect. None of us is a mechanic. I am a FORMER Mechanical Engineer though.
A few years ago, my mother-in-law took her Scion to a shop with one missing cylinder. They gave her a $3,500 estimate that included almost everything"because of mileage". She asked them to fix the problem at hand, they installed the cheapest spark plugs and charged her $240 for “estimate, diagnosis, and repair”. Repair, BTW, didn’t fix the issue - it needed an ignition coil.
I live 1,000 miles away so I could neither fix it myself nor kick their butt.
To make it short, people who can’t fix a leaking pipe, replace a sink or a faucet, fix their car are perpetual victims of “professionals” taking advantage of others’ misfortune.
Not sure why you were quoted a price that high…Simple google search says it should be about $1400…which seems about right for 6-8 hours of labor. The gasket part is cheap…labor is expensive. Around here it’s over $100/hr or a decent independent. Not sure what the costs are in your area.
Here in the Pacific NW dealer labor is +/- $200 per hour with the independents not far behind. Last shop I ran our labor was actually a bit higher than some of the dealers.
Parts probably. I hope that the dealer would have done all the ancillary parts/service associated with engine disassembly. If the job was done in 1 day in the driveway the cylinder head was certainly not surfaced or inspected.
Same reason the dog licks his balls - because he can.
I called 6 or 7 different shops with the same result.
Sounds very reasonable to me. If you are comparing the price of parts online (probably about $120-150) to the cost of the job, you are not going to be happy. However, it costs money to have a shop, to hire and retain good employees, to maintain a business relationship with vendors and suppliers, to stand behind their work, etc.
That is too much money. I would NEVER agree to pay such a princely sum. Even with professional labor prices and parts markup, a basic brake job should not cost $1200. That’s insane. Anyone who would pay that is a fool.
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I am struggling to believe this. In fact, I have done head gasket repairs on several vehicles, all were inline 4-cylinder engines with a timing belt, and I spent way more than $300 on parts each time, and I bought the parts online to keep costs down. I always brought the head to a well-respected machine shop, and paid to have it cleaned and reconditioned (resurfacing, new valve stem seals, new camshaft seals, valve re-grind, etc) and that cost about $350 plus materials. For a V-6 or V-8 engine, double that.
I also spent way more than $20 on specialty tools to do this type of work. In the past, I used a fairly accurate beam-type torque wrench, and my “eyeball angle gauge”. When I did the head gasket on my Daewoo Lanos, I needed an accurate torque angle gauge, and I bought a professional model, which cost over $400. Having the right tools to do the job is a good investment, which pays for itself.