Fleet Work vs Auto Repair and Why Mental Health Needs More Attention | Riley Spence

0:07I want to be as good as I can be. Like, I want to learn from the best and stuff, and that's why I love working at different places. Like, you go to a new dealership or a new garage or wherever you're to, and like, like you say, if I walked in to work with you tomorrow and there was another really good tech there or whatever, like, that's a gold mine of information that you can absorb if you're asking the right questions and if you have have the right, uh, traits as a person.

0:35Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to another exciting episode of the Jaded Mechanic Podcast. So this is kind of a second run at a, out of something that's kind of like, you know, you guys that ever been hunting and you got a deer cam out there and you see a deer and you go up maybe and you, you go at one fall morning and you take a shot at her and she runs off, you fucking don't see the rest of the season.

1:00You gotta come back and you get another crack at her, you know. So next year maybe you finally get her. This is kind of like, this kind of situation's happening today. Now, my good friend Riley, he's not a deer, he's more like one of them Newfoundlander mooses. And we recorded last week and we had a lot of problems with Wi-Fi 'cause he was up at the hunting camp and the Wi-Fi was not good.

1:25So he's back down now. You're at Goose Bay this morning, aren't you, Riley? Yeah, I'm back home in Labrador, in Goose Bay. I've been back now for a week, so a bit more closer to civilization, I guess. Now, if you're listening to Riley and you're like, what the hell is he saying? Um, I understand, uh, you know, uh, the Newfoundlanders, or as we call them, the Newfies, have got an awesome dialect and an awesome accent.

1:51So, and as his isn't as thick as some, but as you get to listen to him, it sounds really, really cool, and you begin to understand. But just, you know, you're not— it's not like it's on the wrong speed. That's just how we talk. So, Rocky, how's it going, bro? Not bad, man, not bad. Uh, just, uh, beating around the house today a little bit, getting the skidoo clean, getting the skidoo ready for a ride and stuff.

2:14And, uh, you know, trying to get ready for the upcoming work week. Now I gotta tell you, we, we got rid of all our snow by Wednesday last week, and then we got a little light flurry on, uh, Friday, and we got dumped. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, how much, how much did you get altogether, do you think? Uh, that last snowfall?

2:37Yeah. Oh my God, I'd say like probably 15-20 centimeters. Holy jump! It's pretty, pretty average. Like here in this, like, we're so far north and the air is really like dry. Uh, we just, oh, throughout the winter we'll get like consistent every day 1 to 3, 5 centimeters, and then every now and then we'll get like a big dump of like 15 plus.

2:57Yeah, uh, so the company I work for, we're a, uh, construction company, uh, and we also maintain the provincial hydro company's automotive fleet and heavy equipment and stuff. Yeah, uh, and we also maintain the road site going to Muskrat Falls energy project. So we are pretty big in the snow clearing. We got a lot of loaders, uh, a lot of two-flyers right now, and some sand trucks and stuff.

3:24So it's a big part of our business in the wintertime, like keeping people employed and stuff. Yeah, it's a good contract to have though. Really, it's great. We're basically Hydro's construction company, like, that's the only way to put it. Like, we're so tied in with them, um, it's pretty cool. And we do a lot of other heavy civil work, like, uh, and, uh, other projects too.

3:45And this is, this is a relatively new job for you, right? Yeah, I started last May with this company. I left the dealership and just wanted something where I'm writing my— like, I coming into it, I knew I'd be writing my own service, finding my own parts, submitting off the invoicing for payments and stuff. And it's not like out of my wheelhouse where I was in service before, as at the dealership and stuff, and this is tech.

4:10So yeah, uh, just being in— going into that job, I was so excited for it, just for the change. It's so nice. Like, I go into work and I work with a lot of very high, high professional people. Like, I, I'm in the fabrication shop where they have my hoist put there. Yeah. Uh, and it's like, it's probably one of a kind in the province outside of like major industrial sites like mines and stuff.

4:37Like, we have a metal sheet that's probably 16 feet long. Uh, we got a plate bending machine that's massive. Like, it takes 2 people to switch the jaws out, like and wow, it's pretty insane. You guys have some pretty cool stuff then. Oh, it's— yeah, nuts what we can make. Uh, we made snow buckets before I started there, like for loaders. Uh, it's, it's crazy.

5:04And I work with a— he's a journeyman welder, and, uh, man, to watch him— he's after teaching me how to aluminum weld with the spool gun. Yeah, I've been practicing at the TIG weld with TIG welding aluminum, because when you TIG weld aluminum, you don't have whole— like when you with a spool gun, you make a hole, right? And it's not watertight.

5:24But when you TIG weld, it's— if you do it right, it's watertight. That's what you want aluminum boats. And I was just like, you know, I'd like to learn how to do that. And so been fooling around with that a little bit whenever we got the time. But for the most part, we're extremely busy. Like, that, uh, definitely keeps me on my toes.

5:41It's like, you must be an incredible welder though, eh, to watch. Because like, lots of guys can stick stuff together, but like, to being able to build a bucket, even just a bucket Oh God, you know, that's some cool stuff, eh? It's really— well, right now he's— they're putting in a new, a new bottom and back into an excavator, a 320 Cat bucket.

6:00Yeah. Uh, and just watching them do it, like, he used flux core for that. It's a lot hotter, right? So, but like, it's just crazy what you can see them doing. It's not— it's a lot more to it than just going to Canadian Tire and buying a fucking Millermatic 120 and calling it a day, you know? Like, it's Serious skill, and it makes you more self-conscious about your own weldings.

6:22Like, as techs, like, we all weld a little bit, like, whether it's bolt extraction, pipe, stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, uh, yeah, it's pretty cool to be, be around it like this. And then we got heavy equipment mechanics there too. We got, uh, a really good journeyman there, uh, and our— and the owner of the company is also a journeyman heavy equipment mechanic too.

6:40Oh, that's pretty cool then. Yeah, yeah, he understands, like, when— well, I don't really see him much because he's dealing easily with on-site a lot, being deal with projects and stuff. Yeah, but when I do talk to him, like, it's really cool, you know. He understands, like, what the industry's like. He understands, like, what it means to actually work on some of these systems, uh, and, you know, he does value, like, our opinions.

7:02Like, you know, if you're given constructional, like, actual words that mean something and not just baffling them with bullshit, right? Yeah, because you, you come, you come from the background of the dealership where you kind of made it up pretty high up in terms of some of the decision-making that was going on. But you and I kind of shared how it was still very frustrating because it's like you're the— I don't want to say the money is the limiting factor, right?

7:28But it's, it's just way more, way more hats to wear, right? Way more plates spinning in the air at the same time, whatever analogy you want to use to— yeah, able to just manage all that in once, right? It's, it's tough. It is, it's extremely hard. Like, uh, when you're dealing with like— all it takes is one irate customer who things went astray on and things weren't communicated to properly.

7:52And like being in Goose Bay, geographically you're challenged without solid town customers because like the nearest town is almost 300 kilometers away. So it puts everyone in a bit of a situation, right? Well, that's when a vehicle is not drivable and they came from a town. And you and I talked about even getting parts, like we're spoiled here, like, and even some places on the mainland, right?

8:13Which is, I I don't mean mainland, you're on the mainland, but you know what I mean? You're not up, up north of the where you guys are. Sometimes 2, 3 weeks for some parts to come in. Easy, easy. And like, it's— and as a— we were a new dealership too, uh, so like there's an established dealership here. Sorry to cut in everyone, but this is really important.

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9:20They're a partner in success. I've been in the trenches and I know what works. TechMetric isn't just managing shops, it's transforming them. Measure up by every measure with TechMetric. Hit the link in the show notes below for more. And they get air freight next day. Like, I order parts from a lot because Hardro's fleet is primarily Chevy vehicles. Right. And like the next day they can have a part for me from the warehouse in Montreal.

9:42And like when you— and like when I talk to the district service manager, they're telling me that, well, that's the way it is up there. I'm like, well, no, it's not the fucking way it is up here because there's a Chevy dealership 10 kilometers up the road who can get parts next day. So like either put some more time and care into it, or like, you know, you're putting us in a hard spot.

9:59Like how can we tell a customer to buy our product when, yeah, you know, we can't compete with the turnaround on the vehicle being down. Yeah. And then your CSI score gets hit and everyone's heads roll. Yeah. So you left that behind and went to this job. And what was like, did it kind of freak you out the first time that you wrote up an estimate for like, you know, for your new employer?

10:22It's like $10 grand. No, fuck no. Like, I like, fuck, like, listen, if you want a white glove service, yeah, if you want someone dedicated, married to your fleet and taking care of it and may like properly maintain that, like I tell, like, because I'm dealing with elements agents when I submit these things. And like at $100K, I generally— like around $100K, I usually go through all the driveline fluids.

10:46I'll go through the transmission, transfer case, rear diff, front diff, because here in Labrador you're in four-wheel drive from the end of November usually till May. Yeah. And they're used in a poor air quality area as well. There's a lot of fine particulate silica— silicate particles in there and stuff. And you see it, it's very evident when you take an air air intake off and like the whole throttle body's dusted.

11:10And I'm like, you know, every oil change I go right through the filters, check everything. And when I submit it off, they're like, oh, it's not due at this time. And I'm like, I got to the point now, like, because I'm after putting through, like, I think I looked at it, it was 200 and something work orders since May. Yeah. Of last year.

11:25And I just told him, I said, listen, you can either change the air filter now or you can change it when the engine's dusted and it's consuming 8 liters of oil every couple thousand kilometers. It's up to you. Yeah, like, I'm not fighting with you on this all the time. Like, it's driving me nuts. Well, because, I mean, and that's the thing, we all saw, we've all seen, if you worked in the dealer long enough or in this industry long enough, you know, guys don't want to spend $50 on an air filter but, you know, $7,000, $8,000 for a turbo job, right?

11:52And all of a sudden they're like, damn, I just wish I'd have changed that sucker out every time, you know. Hindsight's 20/20. Yeah. And again, it is like I'm not— because you've heard me, you know, Riley, rip on some of the quick lube places where they're like down here where our air is pretty, you know, we don't have that particulate and they're selling them an air filter every time they come in for an oil change.

12:12And, you know, everybody's like, oh, it's ridiculous. Well, in some parts of the country, it actually makes a whole lot of sense. The difference is like, you know, you're charging $60 for, you know, an OE filter for a Power Stroke Ford. You know, hypothetical round numbers and they're charging, they're charging $60 for an OE filter for a Pentastar Caravan, right? Like it's just, you know, they're making up that labor that they lose on the oil change loss leader.

12:38But who are they hiring though? You know, that's it. That's— oh man, we could— oh, we could go on. That's a whole, whole different can of worms. But we could go on that because you see like the, the comments and the stuff and the every neighborhood group on Facebook's got the same thing. I saw a guy yesterday and he was like, he was complaining that the dealer wanted to charge $170 for an oil change on, I think, on his brand new Silverado, right?

13:02And it's like, you know, where I can get it done cheaper. And it's like, oh, you can get it done cheaper lots of places, but I wouldn't do it, you know, ever, because you're not getting the oil that's supposed to be put in there. Do you think that new place is going to stand by that oil change if someone double rings an oil filter and fucking blows the engine?

13:19You know what I mean? Like, and here's not Here's the thing, comparing, you know, the— that segment of the industry to us, because, you know, Riley, I'm not sure maybe you've seen it, but I do know, like, the dealer around here years ago, they O-ringed a filter and the engine left. And of course the engine locked up. It was a 2.7 in a Sebring way back when, right?

13:38So I don't know. I've seen them, but I never done a lot of work on them. Oh, they were trash, man. I can tell. They didn't need any help blown up. But anyway, so the difference was is that as soon as that happened at the dealer, it got a brand new Chrysler Long Block, right? And it gets put in there. Everybody forgets that when we go to these quick lube places and they do something like that, they go, oh, they came good for it, they helped us out.

14:03You know, first of all, you can't send it over the dealer and say, hey, put an engine in this because the customer's gonna, you know, they're gonna know something happened. Yeah, they go and get you a used engine. Which has probably got more miles on it than the one that they blew up for you and you don't know anything about. So when I get on them so many times about like where you take your car or your truck for basic maintenance, you got to really think about how they handle it when it goes wrong.

14:32And everybody goes, oh, well, they took care of me. Like they replaced the engine. Yeah. And then that engine has phantom, you know, electrical problems because of the way you put it in or, you know what I'm talking about. So anyway, A whole other conversation. What's some of the other challenges you see besides being so remote? Like you were talking about that, you know, they live in four-wheel drive the better part of most of their lifetime.

14:57Yeah. Other— well, like the other thing about this particular part of the country too is our temperature swings are massive. Like summertime, you're looking at plus 30 to like not plus 30 constantly, but you get to do— get a stretch of like hot days. Yeah, and these trucks run like a lot of them got like 4 or 5,000 engine hours on them and it's at like probably 200,000 kilometers.

15:21So like they're running a lot. Uh, so you see these major temperature swings which breaks down oil and then people are still like even on outside of the fleet and in dealership world like you're seeing people have like, uh, cylinder wall scoring prematurely like under 100K. Yeah, and Like, you've got to educate the customer then to say, like, listen, like, the temperature swings are crazy here, the oil is breaking down so fast, and we're— you're driving it till 100— to like 14,000 kilometers, like, whenever the indicator is going to go off, you know what I mean?

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16:57So it's just not feasible in that way. Like, you can't expect something to last in those conditions. It doesn't make any sense. And our fuel quality here is extremely poor as well. Yeah, so it's like, you've taken spark plugs— I took them into my truck at 30,000 kilometers, uh, and my spark plugs were covered in— I don't know what to call it.

17:19It's like a carbonized coating, and you can chip it off like So yeah, that's awesome on the engine, right? Like, I was like, I was just like, holy fuck, man, it's a wonder anything here runs. Like, it's not— oh man, that's— and then in the summertime, you see like, like these vehicles, they'll go on dusty, in dusty conditions like we talked about.

17:42So you end up with dirt in your EVAP system. The EVAP system is not able to properly vent off the tank. The pressure builds in the tank to the point where it's not enough to set off an engine light, but it's enough to vaporize the fuel. Yeah, and then you get an airlock. And then it's like, I was looking at the maintenance history on a truck the other day, uh, and at one point she had 6 fuel pumps put in it in the span of like 30,000 kilometers.

18:06Wow. I was like, holy fuck. And the fuel pump's like, it was a 2021 2500 6.6 gas. Yeah. So the fuel pump for that is fairly expensive. It's like, I think it's like 5 I think I want to say it's $500 and you can't— you can only get it at a dealer. So I'm just like, fuck me, like no one caught on to that.

18:25Like, and what was causing that failure? The fuel— I don't know, the last fuel pump fixed it apparently because there was nothing there like afterwards, like engine diagnostics or anything like that error on the maintenance history for like EVAP system or anything like that. So I don't know if it was dirt in the tank and they weren't draining the tank and cleaning out the dirt or yeah, what was going on there.

18:45But I was just like That kind of baffled me a little bit. I was like, what the fuck? Now how about when you're up in that, like, is there— are animals coming into contact with some of the vehicles a little more prevalent? God, yes. All the time. We got the ptarmigan here, uh, or like rock— I think it's called a rock ptarmigan.

19:03Yeah. Uh, and like in this part of Labrador, they're super stupid. Like, yeah, they hang out on the side of the highways, they'll fly in front of vehicles. Like, it's not uncommon to have someone come in with a headlight beat out, or like the grill of a brand new truck beat out, and stuff like that. They do a lot of damage. I hit one one time in a Jeep Gladiator doing 120, and it bent the hood to the point that the hood had to be replaced.

19:30And when it hit the glass, it was Gorilla Glass in the Gladiator, and it flexed in, but it never broke. So, wow, the Gorilla Glass is a pretty good product. Because I know I've heard lots of people, like my friend that was from Nova Scotia, he set out that way. And you know, like, we, we joke down here, there's a lot of whitetail deer, right?

19:51And you hit a deer, oh yeah, yeah, fuckers, it'll write the car off. But like, they talk about when you see a moose and you hit one. I hit a moose doing 120, uh, came like on a stretch. I hit the moose, uh, and when I struck it, the head was across the A, like the A-pillar. Yeah, yeah. Bent the A-pillar in, the head came in through the window and the— or the glass, or through the windshield.

20:17The windshield hit my hand and then the moose flicked off and came around and struck the back of the vehicle. It was a 2019 Ford Edge that I had. Yeah. And I did $60-something thousand worth of damage when we did the estimate up on it, uh, but I managed to keep the vehicle on the road, uh, and just pulled over. I got out, couldn't find my cigarettes.

20:37I was pissed. And then my grade 11 high school music teacher came along with her boyfriend and I was like, can you fuck off? Yeah, I don't want you here. Because like hitting a moose is not— it's like hitting another vehicle. Like hitting a deer is like hitting— I don't know, it's like hitting a deer, but it's like hitting a car. Literally, you're hitting a brick wall.

20:59Yeah, they weigh about A mature moose weighs about 800 pounds. Yeah, plus for sure, easily. So yeah, you're not going to want to hit— hit— it's not recommended. And they're so fast too. Yeah. So when you left the dealer behind, like, when we talked before, I know your stress level working there was, was getting pretty high. Yeah, you know what I mean?

21:22Like, you had— you were just kind of fed up because you'd started out, you'd work your way up from being a technician to being like service manager to you know, like pretty involved in all the stuff that was coming in and going out. Yeah. And, and that, that took a toll on you, eh? It really does, Jeff. Like, uh, not just in that circumstance though, either for me myself, like it definitely did affect me, but like as technicians as well, or just people in this industry as a whole, uh, the mental health aspect on it is, is massive.

21:57Like we work in a negative environment, like it can be a negative environment, like where nothing goes right. And you have people that are there working on a vehicle who are like, say if you're an apprentice, like just starting out, you're 2 years in, you're like continuously buying tools because your tooling's not up to par. You're probably making some mistakes on your electrical diag or other diagnosis general.

22:22You might not feel like your person is supposed to be your mentor is helping you the way they're supposed to. And the relationship there is as a roadie, and it just really comes down on you. Like, I remember being in that situation specifically, and like at the end of every day, like you're sat down in your truck or your vehicle when you're getting ready to leave and you spend like 10 minutes just thinking like, is this what I'm supposed to be doing?

22:45Like, is this the trade for me? Like, should I get out? Like, it's, it's really difficult on the head. And like anyone who's in that situation For me, I had— I ended up reaching out and getting going to counseling and stuff when I left the dealership. While I was still there, I mean, I started doing counseling. I— and that helped a lot.

23:07Even if you're not in a situation where you're in a crisis, like just to do the preventative maintenance on your own mental health, the same as your car, to have the tools to, you know, make it through the hard days is is really big. And I also, I think that's the beauty of networking, like through this, like you and I, or, you know, any kind of that just, you know, I know some people don't like social media, but I know that like for me, finding Facebook all those years ago and being able to just have conversations about what we did that day or what we were struggling with or something like that, a lot of

23:43times, like people would think, well, it keeps you in a negative headspace. And it, and it does, because you sometimes you're only dwelling on the negative. But the, the fact that like I knew I wasn't the only one, you know what I mean, I wasn't alone, um, probably kept me from, from completely walking away, you know, and doing a bad thing. Because like it's not a situation— and you know, men, men are weird, right?

24:06Like we talk about all the time about like, you know, you see it on Facebook and, and, you know, like you said, you sit in your truck at the end of the day and you just go like What the hell? Nothing, nothing went right. You know, is this really what I want to do with my life? And then, you know, we talk about like sometimes the women, like my friend Ashley, she talks about like, you know, you go into the restroom and you have a cry and you get mad and you wash your face off and you go back out.

24:31Like we as men are not— that's not something you can do. It doesn't make the situation better. It makes it— it makes it more difficult. You know what I mean? Because if you have got a toxic environment or a coworker or something like that, it just paints the X even more bright on your back, right? That they see that, that chink in your armor, that, that weakness, and they're going to pile on it.

24:53Right. I think it's that alpha ideal about versus, you know, and so I tell everybody, like, if you're struggling, reach out to somebody else that's been there, reach out to me, reach out to, you know, have those friends, right, Riley, at another shop or in your shop that you can go to and just say like, man, we got to go get a beer and have a conversation because like you know, or we got to go fishing and something and, and just this for a while.

25:21Because otherwise it'll eat you up, man. Like, it will. It was all in like either you leaving that job and then you might find yourself then, especially being a younger apprentice, and like say if you're in a smaller area and like the shop owners know each other, you'll probably end up in a situation where it's really difficult for you to find stable employment in a good place where they're willing to invest in you, right?

25:43So like Uh, I, I have apprentices now, like they're not my apprentices, they're heavy equipment apprentices, but like you see them, uh, have hard days sometimes. Uh, just with things that's not normal. And I try to talk to 'em and just say like, listen, man, like, you know, if every day was easy peasy and nothing went wrong, you'd never get better. Like these days when like you're struggling with something, like something won't go right for you, that's what makes you better.

26:09You're not gonna, you're not gonna become more skilled. By always having the easy job. That's right. You know what I mean? You need the salt in your face. You need something to not go right. Yeah, fine-tune your skills. Like, you're like a knife, you got to sharpen yourself, and this is what's going to sharpen you. Well, and that's the thing, like, it's sometimes it's healthy to be humbled, you know what I mean?

26:28Like, you can— I had it. I, I was 100% convinced I was going to put that module and was going to fix that car, and it's like, nope, it didn't do it. You're, you're Like, you know what I mean? Like, you're just so deflated, you're so beat because you're like, man, I, I, I, I, I thought that's what it was. And, you know, and then we come and it's like, that's how you make yourself better.

26:53Your process becomes better. It's like it ended up being a pin fitment issue, hypothetically, right? And you're like, well, I never pin fit before. Now you check pin fit every freaking time, you know. It just is— it's the way it goes. It's good to be humbled, but you gotta like, you gotta celebrate the victories way more than you gotta dwell on the defeats.

27:14That's the whole key to making it through this. Because I say it all the time, if this was easy, everybody would do it right now, especially with what the pay can be for the skilled trade versus, you know, like, there's not a lot of, there's not a lot of people crazy enough to do it right now. If it was easy, everybody would be choosing this.

27:34And if it was— fuck yeah. But, you know, people have figured out that this is like the glory days are of, you know, I say it all the time, fast cars and freedom and all that kind of stuff as well. Yeah. Skin, knuckles and dirt and grease. It's not— it's not that anymore. And you're never going to go back to that. It's— this is the area like this trade now has developed into the spot where like You don't need the lower echelon of people on intelligence coming in.

28:06You need puzzle solvers. You need people who are, uh, extremely multi-talented, multifaceted. Like, this trade covers so many fucking groups of other trades. Like, you know what I mean? Like, we're dealing with vehicles with Ethernet, ADAS. Uh, we're not necessarily designing the fucking ADAS, but goddamn it, we gotta fix it. And like, same thing with EVs, hybrids, stuff like that. Like, to me, in my mind, like, we do— with the tech shortage that's, uh, well, here more or less, it's definitely here, uh, for me, I, I don't, I don't see it as a bad thing.

28:48Like, it's gonna suck for the people with vehicles, but for the people that are in this trade now, like, for me, I'm, I'm 28, uh, I'm at the pinnacle where it's a— where it's like ability to do it and knowledge of doing it is soon going to meet. And when it gets to that point, like, name your price, really. Yeah. And that's what's going to happen.

29:09And that's— I was told all that from the time I was a kid. You were always going to be able to name your price. And I mean, it hasn't really come true till now, and that's okay. You know, it's like, I, I'm able to— like we talked about before it turned on, I'm working for somebody that treats me really good and pays me really well, but And most days they're not that tough a day anymore.

29:29You know, my tough days are behind me now. The tough days are your shoulder acting up or something. Yeah, like that's where it's to now. And, and, you know, do you still have sometimes a tough one? Yeah, I had one last week where I almost got the diag wrong, and it was just a situation of like I had to slow down. And, and, you know, because it's like the same thing, you always got all these other jobs that got to get done, and then you got this diag that you got to do, and it's like you're trying to rush the diag because you know you've got 4 other cars all of a sudden that are

29:56sitting there that I gotta go. Everybody's promised everything at the same time. They're— and they're, they're routine jobs, you know. It's just like, if I can get them in here, I can get them knocked out and then come back to this. Well, the diag is still waiting, right? So you rush it. Well, if I hadn't gone back and said, well, wait a minute, before you send that over there to the dealer for the warranty, you know, engine control module, let me have a look at it again.

30:19And that takes, that takes some guts to be able to go to somebody and go Wait a minute, I might have been wrong. Now, you know, it's tougher when the customer— you've already find that out after the fact. But I mean, sometimes we just have to slow down and go, you know what, Mrs. Smith, I understand you're frustrated and you're here and your car's been here today, but like, we're just trying to get this right.

30:43So, you know, like, I cannot rush my technician. This is for the advisors that are listening. If you're still listening, I cannot rush my technician through this. It has to be done a certain way because we don't want to be wrong, right? And, you know, guys talk all the time, right, Riley? But like, I had a guy talk to me the other day, he's just like, I put a crank sensor in it because, you know, it was a $50 part and it's, it's easier to swap that out than to actually, you know, grab a lab scope and access it and take the connector apart and start to do it.

31:13He's like— and he's not wrong, he's right. No, he's not. No, but You know, the crank sensor didn't fix it, so now he has to take that back out again. So he's doing his labor twice, which is— I'm not judging. And, you know, but it's one of those things where we're always behind the proverbial gun of trying to get this stuff done as fast as possible.

31:34And that's what I just keep telling everybody is like, slow down. You got to slow down to go fast, you know. Think about every step that you're going to make. Think about, is it really the right step to do at this particular moment? Because for me, it ended up being— for me, it was just I wasn't testing spark output the way I should have been.

31:52I was testing it lazy, and that's what bit me, is I just go get a different tool. Oh look, spark ain't being shut off after all, it's just being moved around, if people know what I mean. And it ended up being that the cylinder that's low in compression is the reason that it's doing that, you know. It's still a warranty problem. It's still a warranty with Nissan.

32:11It's got— I've done my problem. But I mean, I'd look like a real fool if I'd have sent it over there and said, just jam an ECM in this and bring it back, and you got a cylinder that's not creating enough compression. You know, I'd look like an idiot. And I mean, I brag and talk all the time to my boss about how smart I think I am, so I'd look pretty stupid.

32:32Yeah, just slow down. So Man, you can't. Like, to be a diagnostician in this industry, like, it's no good to be the shop manager or the owner and to look at your tech and say, "Oh yeah, just do that real—" Like, to say, to start the sentence with saying "just," like, I learned that from someone that was on your podcast one time and it like struck to me.

33:01Uh, and I've always over-examined my words now when I'm talking. But yeah, so like, to hear— for someone to say just do this or just do that, like, man, it's not that simple. Not every— like, these vehicles aren't like people. Not everyone works the same way. Not everyone takes the cranking— like, takes the crank sensor data and uses that for a signal to start firing injectors.

33:23Yeah, like, you know what I mean? Like, it's just so frustrating. Right. To see people do say those things. Think about how many cars now we've seen that you can unplug the crank sensor and it'll still start. You know what I mean? Fuck. Oh, 3-liter EcoDiesel. They changed it. They changed the whole mapping for how it fucking starts because they made the thing out of some shitty Chinese plastic that like that's in the most hot spot they could put it.

33:48If it was any hotter, they put it in the fucking seventh ring of hell. Oh, I can remember that. Yeah, I did one of them before the recall came out., and you had to pull— we're talking about, guys, is the reluctor that they put on the back of the 3-liter EcoDiesel for the Rams, you know, and they put that reluctor on the back of the crankshaft right in the bell housing so that it can get a crank reference.

34:08And it's as simple as they were able to like make a software fix so that it doesn't matter. That thing can like— because what would happen is the little tape that goes around the reluctor, which is magnetic tape, have you seen the new modern wheel bearings? Right, guys? The same thing. It fails, right? It rusts up, falls off. They made a software patch where you don't even need that damn thing anymore.

34:29No, it reads off the solid tone wheel on the fucking camshaft, but it'll still run like shit. It'll just— it just won't shut off on you. So you're good. This is no longer a safety issue because I can remember you would pull them apart and, and Riley's done probably more than me, but I remember the last one I did, you could buy that part for like $25 right from the dealer.

34:49But it was all— and the time, what, you remember the time that it paid for? I think it's 4.2 hours now to earn our— to earn our— that, that tow wheel and do the software update is 0.3. Like, that's fucking ridiculous. And they wonder why guys are leaving the dealerships like running out the door. Because I know for me to do it, I was— I started it the one morning and I was finishing up just before lunch the next day.

35:13The last one, four-wheel drive 2500, you know, pull the transfer case with the, the transmission on the back, you know, move the exhaust tossed around a little bit so you can get it out. Like, it's, it's not an easy job. And I think it's not— and no sensors, the, the, all the temp sensors and stuff on that SCR, on the DOC pipe, they put those right at the tippy top of that fucking transmission, and they put the most annoying connector locks ever on there.

35:40And like, you almost rip the fucking pin out of the connector trying to unhook it. Yeah, then you might as well pull the cab off it if you got to repair, you know, anything else, like, you might as well pull the cab. Like, if you got a coolant line that lies underneath the valley, that's— that's— oh, I got out at the right time.

35:59I think we both did, Riley. We both got it at the right time. I got it, uh, just as we started getting more Wagoneers in, and it's like in there. Hornets were my best friends. I love those things. I never saw one. I've— I mean, but I've never got to work on one yet. Like, it's not— 90% of the issues on it is just the pro— is, I don't know if it's what the word is for it, but it's just the way that all the modules communicate.

36:27Yeah. And it really does not like a dead battery. Uh, as soon as the battery dies or the battery's disconnected, you got to do a recalibration on the steering angle sensor. And until that happens, everything's locked up solid. Nothing will work. Uh, you can't even take the electronic park brake off. You can't put it in neutral. You got to do it wherever it's to.

36:50And then like there's a million different calibrations on the valves you got to do. Like sometimes we had them come in like where they were dead for so long, uh, the calibration was lost in the ABS module for the inlet and outlet valves and stuff. Yeah, so like you'll start it with 329 DTCs do your steering angle calibration. Once your steering angle calibration is done, then you got to do all the calibrations on inlet and outlet valves on the ABS module.

37:17Then you got to do ABS initialization. Then you got to do like— it was just like an hour worth of programming and calibrations that you got to do. And then finally no DTCs. All because the battery goes dead. Yeah, I know. Yes, it's crazy, man. So what, um What did you— what do you do to, to try and, and then maintain the— like, what's your go-to for sanity?

37:42I know, like, we were talking last week and you kind of— you're up around the hunting camp, but like, is that the best thing for you, is to just get away sometimes? Uh, I don't get away as much as I want. Uh, it's now— right now we just had our daughter in October. Yeah, uh, man. The solace I find in just spending time with her.

38:04Uh, like, I get up at like 5 o'clock to start getting ready for work. I'll take my daughter out to the living room with me. I'll put her in her playpen or in her, uh, pack and play. Yeah, like a bassinet. And I put her in that, and then like I'll start making breakfast for myself out in the kitchen, leave everything a little bit dark so she's not overstimulated, and I'll just hang out with her on my lap.

38:24And yeah, you know, is that— look, to me Like going from being just completely jaded and done with this industry, like it got to the point of the dealership where I was like, maybe like, am I the problem here? Like, you know what I mean? Am I the one that's attacking the— are my coworkers making them feel like shit? And are the one that's pissing off the customers?

38:48Like, am I doing more harm than good? And that's kind of where it got to that point. And I was just like, you know what, maybe it's time for me to just walk away. And since I've been where I'm to now, like I go into work in the morning, I put my headphones in, I listen to your podcast, I listen to Dave Ramsey, listen to whatever.

39:07I don't need to have, uh, be a social butterfly at work and just do my job. And break time comes, sit down and have conversations with coworkers, stuff like that. Like to me, I found the job for myself that it's to the point where I don't, It's not to the point, but it's, it's, I found a job where I don't need to run away from it.

39:28Like, you know what I mean? I appreciate it where I'm at. I respect it. Like, I enjoy my coworkers. I like the work I do. Like, you know, I'm happy because I know for me, you know, and I keep talking about it, I know there's people have heard me say there's a reason I won't work at a dealer is because I'm a toxic person when I work in one.

39:49I am 100% toxic when I work in one and it's got to do with the— it has to do with the pay plan, but it has to do with like— I joke, I could walk in and you could guarantee me 60 hours paid a week, right? At whatever the hour amount wanted to be, I would still be hard to be around because I have such a— in that environment, I have such a high standard of what I expect everybody else to be doing.

40:15That it, it trickles down to where it's just— because like, I see it in the end game where it's like, if everybody's not on their ball, so many factors have to line up for it to be efficient and productive, right? So I— it doesn't matter. Like, even in my own space right now, I have an advisor that like, he's forgetful. Or I have, you know, parts that come in and their parts are from the parts store, and it's right next door, it's across the parking lot, they're wrong.

40:40Like the old me would lose my mind because of like, I'm supposed to have this brake job done already, right? And I do it to myself. It's not them doing it to me. So I totally understand that like I have to work every day to keep this toxic person from coming out because it was just the way— it's like forged in fire.

41:03It's like I was born into that when I started in this industry. And it just became the norm, right? And then you hit the window where it's like you can't get any more done, you can't get any more focused, you can't get any more, um, angry without having that negative effect. Now you come over the other side of the roller coaster and you start heading down.

41:24I can't, I can't do it anymore. I'm no good there. No, it's so much energy used too. Like, like, I, I know right now, like, me talking, I seem like a calm person, but like, fuck, would I ever get angry. Like, I'd get so pissed off. I'd be like, I'd have an advisor there staring at me, a person who I don't know what the fuck they did there.

41:46Yeah. And, and they're dragging you away from a transmission rebuild to ask you how to, how to put this part on, uh, on VOR status. And I'm just like, why the fuck is this the 20th fucking time I'm showing you guys this? Like, And then they'll ask, like, they'll make a comment about something. I can't remember what the exact scenario was, but something about like, uh, about what I made or something like that there.

42:12And I was like, I'm— do I make this because I can do your job, your job, and your job, but you can't do fucking mine? That's true. That's why I make that. Yeah. And like, you know, looking back on that, like, that was a very cuntish thing to say. Wasn't very nice. Yeah, but you know, I still love them. I like, I think the world of all those people, right?

42:34Like, even though— because like, your job is not your worth. No, as a person. And I feel like in this industry we forget that so much. Oh, it took direct link it together, right? It took me so long to realize that, like— and it's funny because like, you know, I said to you last time we were talking I'm not, I'm not a— in my heart, I'm not a mechanic that goes fishing.

43:00I'm a fisherman that fixes cars, right? Because that's like where my true identity of what I absolutely love and adore is fishing. That's what my brain now— because for so long, all I was was a mechanic, right? It was part of my whole identity. And there's still this platform, which is a big, big part of who I am. But man, like, I don't, you know, if I had to stop fixing cars tomorrow because of the shoulder or whatever, it doesn't change who I am.

43:25But 10 years ago me, oh man, I'd have been— when I was off on COVID, I didn't know who I was. Did not know who I was. If it wasn't for my little dog and the fact that it was like I could fish, I'd have been probably in jail, you know. Yeah, COVID never— like, when COVID happened here, I was just— I wrote my second block exam on that Friday.

43:51And Monday everything shut down. Yeah. I moved back home, started another new job back at the dealership, my earlier sub-dealer I first started at. And man, like people just, that was when things picked up for us. I don't know why. Like it was just all of a sudden, like after 2 weeks when people realized the world wasn't gonna fail, they were like, okay, well my vehicle still needs to go.

44:15And then the price of vehicles went up, right? Just that was another contributing factor too. Like that was the heyday for dealerships. For fixing what they had because you couldn't get a new truck, you know what I mean? But here in like— I joke and I shouldn't, I'm not gonna get— but you know, as Ricky and Bubbles used to say, worst case, you know, Ontario.

44:35Worst case Ontario. Yeah. You know, it became a really weird spot because everybody, you know, we had a lot of people that like could shelter inside, you know what I mean? Could stay home. And then all of a sudden those cars weren't traveling at all. And then it was like, you know, I can remember seeing the post and it'd be like, I haven't driven my car in 3 weeks and I can't get it to start.

44:56What do I need? And you need— well, you need a battery. Like, well, why? I never did this before. Yeah, because you're driving every day. Now you work from home like dumbass. You only, you know, you're sitting there with your mask on, only going out once every 3 weeks. Like, of course your car is going to be dead. Driving by yourself wearing the mask.

45:14Oh, bro. Oh, man. I still— I saw one 4 months ago and I just like They used to make me really angry and now I just shake my head and I want to hug that person and go like, "It's going to be okay. It's okay. You can take that off now." Yeah. And that's all I want to say about it because otherwise I'll probably get canceled.

45:35But yeah. I saw a lot of— that's when I really started to think of my mental health was during COVID because I had a friend that their marriage went to shit during it. Right? And another friend that after it committed suicide. You know, I believe that that was the real— that was the real pandemic was what the mental health was, not the COVID Yeah.

45:59You know, and mental health is something, like you said, we don't, we don't talk about it enough. And, you know, going forward with this podcast, that's what I want to be doing. Sometimes something every week is just trying to make people feel better about, you know, the chance you can do it because like you're doing this for your daughter, you know what I mean?

46:17Like, this is everything you do is for her. And I mean, that's cool. And she's gonna love you, you know, whether you're, you know, the top technician at your job or whether you're just like, you know, it's just a job to you. She doesn't see you as, you know, Riley technician number whatever, service manager, blah blah blah blah blah. She just sees you as dad, right?

46:41And that's the, that's the important thing that we've got to remember here is that like It's important to be good at your job, and it's important to continuously try to be better. But like, this isn't a— there's no gold medal for this. There's— this isn't a race. This is just how we earn our money and pay our bills. And, you know, you want to become better at it and, and make more money to pay more bills, but, you know, you want to have that, that balance, is I guess is what I'm trying to say.

47:11So yeah, 100%, like, uh, I mean, I still, I, I still, like, I just subscribed to Paul Danner's, uh, premium thing. Yeah, I started doing his classes or whatever, uh, on my own time, uh, because like I want to be like, like, like anyone who cares about this, about their skill set, like I want to be as good as I can be.

47:33Like I want to learn from the best and stuff. And that's why I loved working at different places. Like you go to a new dealership or a new garage or wherever you're to. And like, like say if I walked into work with you tomorrow and there was another really good tech there or whatever, like that's a gold mine of information that you can absorb if you're asking the right questions and if you have the right, uh, traits as a person and not just a little prick that's going to come in and make everyone else's life hell, you know, and leave a mess everywhere and not clean up after themselves and shit like that.

48:07Yeah. So like, I feel like in the trade that like in this industry that like it gets missed a lot too. Uh, like people come in as apprentices and they're not taking in the etiquette properly to like, you know, follow suit with the rest of the shop and like just pick up where other one, like pick up after themselves and yeah. You know what I mean?

48:33Not be an idiot in the garage, right? And you see, and you see it a lot, like especially now with a lot of the young guys, uh, and I was like it too. I'm not gonna say I was perfect, but I definitely had, had that issue. But over time you work it out of yourself and, you know, it's just— I was that shit.

48:51I was that guy that, like, the, the apprentice who worked in the bay next to me, like, I kept telling him, don't leave your airline all over the floor because I'm tripping on it, right? Because when we're walking between the— I have to stand between his hoist and my hoist, and of course I was skinnier then and they make it just like, you know, skinny enough.

49:06So you're standing on his airline to use your hoist controls. Holy fuck. And I was, I was like, you gotta, man, you gotta roll that up. Don't leave it on the floor. Don't leave it on the floor. And finally I cut it in half, you know, because he would not roll it up. And it was like, and think of back to him, like, am I proud of that?

49:22No, I'm not. That's a dick move. Yeah, it definitely is. But I mean, you know, and this is not me ripping on the young people, it's just Now I look back and go, yeah, he was— they were running him dry. Like they were running him ragged trying to get this done, get that done. Like he's just a, you know, first year starting out kid apprentice.

49:41But at the same time, me is also like, it's also important that, you know, you can tell them to 2 extra seconds, roll it up and hang it back up. We all do it. You know, it's the same as like I had to train myself for years when I got a magnetic work light to actually make sure that I put it back on the bench before the car left because otherwise it was stuck on the bottom of the car.

50:00We've all done that, right? I'm still not there. I lose them all the time. I go down to Princess Auto, whatever's on sale, I just buy. Fuck, man. Fuck flashlights. It's such a rabbit hole of like money to spend, and it's just like, this is the easiest thing I'll ever lose, but here it's $120. Yeah, well, you and I were, you know, we're old enough to remember like when you burnt yourself on the old work lights, you know.

50:25Oh my fuck. When they still wire cage and like Oh yeah, you know, we bought the LED bulbs and started putting them in. It was so much better. But yeah, I do remember those. The young kids, they don't know, they have no idea. They're like, what? Oh yeah, these old lights that used to drop, and if there was gas, you went running for the door because, you know, you might have like burnt yourself up, or, or have to run.

50:49Or, or the other one too is like when you're taking off like the underbelly plates off an excavator and it was from the day when they didn't have impact, electric impacts and stuff. We were talking about that the other day at work. It's just like, man, what a shit fucking time it would have been to be a mechanic back then. Like, I would not want to be that.

51:05I joked, you know, early in my career, I can remember going out and digging a hole in a pile of coal in Hamilton to dig underneath and to be able to get the skid plate down to help the tech I was working with, you know, do a hydraulic repair on the bottom of the excavator. You know, like, and digging a hole into the pile because that's where the machine died, right on the pile, and they weren't bringing the pile, right?

51:26So it's like, okay, get under there and, you know, dig out enough of a hole that you can kind of kneel and work underneath and get the skid plate. It was— yeah, I mean, it's— oh man, it's just when you think about the stuff, you know, what you did, like, it's cool as hell, but like the young people now They're just— they're, they're, they're, they're— whole challenge of this industry is so different, you know what I mean?

51:51But like, some of them too, at the same time, they— and they're not like— not to talk shit, but like, it's like a lot of them that come into the trade, like heavy equipment especially, because heavy equipment is, is, uh, immortalized as, oh, you're a heavy equipment mechanic, you're making six figures starting out, uh, you know, shit like that. But like there's no fucking passion behind it.

52:15No, you're working here because some old fella in a bar told you that he was a heavy equipment mechanic and he made six figures. And you're like, well, you know what, maybe I want to make six figures. So you fucked around in school for 9 months wasting some money, and you get into the trade and you're like, what, I gotta crawl around in the snow and set up a Frost Fighter underneath the base pan so I can get this Pete to start?

52:36Yeah, no fucking shit. That's the reality of the trade you're in. You're at the Bottom of the fucking pole. Yeah. And the money is there because it is such shit work, you know? Yeah. No passion. Because it's not like— well, you've heard me all say what got me into it was the idea of fast cars, you know what I mean? I thought I was going to be— I thought I was going to be driving Vipers and, you know, cool shit.

52:59And then you realize, you know, all those fancy trucks and all those fast cars, like, they're just attached to customers. And it doesn't matter what they drive, you know, the customer is the customer. It can be— they can be a certain way, they can be cool as hell, or they can be— you know, the hardest part of the whole repair is just dealing with the customer.

53:21Um, but when you're doing that heavy equipment stuff, like, all you're doing is like high-stress, dirty, heavy, noisy work, and you don't get to even really enjoy it because it's like, how fast does an excavator go? Not very freaking fast. So all of a sudden the tracks start turning again, you could roll back out to the job site, and then you can watch the guy put a 12-hour shift in spinning around and using the bucket.

53:44There's no, there's no, there's no, you know, sex appeal on that, right? It's just you did your damn job and you get to those cars that I got to work on. That was the highlight, was just being able to see it start up and drive it and feel how it felt, you know. I had a customer with a Redeye Hellcat. Yeah. And he brought it into the shop and he said it gets wobbly around about 200.

54:10What did I do? What did you tell him? Yeah, I said, all right, I'll have a look at it. So he gave me the— not the valet key, the one with the red logo on it and stuff. And I took it for a drive and sure enough, she got wobbly at 200. I was like, I brought it back to the shop and looked it over and the tires were just fucked right up from just burnouts and everything.

54:39And the guy used the car, it was like, it was a— I can't remember why he bought it. I think it was like for his 50th birthday. He's a construction company owner too, like really nice guy, super smart. Yeah, good businessman. Like, I really respect him. Um, but yeah, so I just told him, like, yeah, you're gonna need a set of tires.

54:56I wouldn't recommend us do it because our tire machine is just it's probably gonna chew the fuck out of the wheel. Yeah. And here locally there's a near garage with like a tar machine set up able to do that properly. So he did it when he was in Toronto that summer. Good for him. Yeah, it was, you know, that to me, that was crazy.

55:16I was like, this is like a highlight reel moment for me. Like, I'm not wasting this opportunity. Like, customer concern, wobbly at 200, fucking right. I'll pay the ticket. Oh man, so up here if you got that ticket, like, you're— that's considered up here stunt driving. Yeah, your license is gone here too. Yeah, if you got that, yeah, you might as well run off into the bush and, you know, burn the thing and hope that nobody finds you because you're never driving again.

55:44Like, it's just— yeah, I don't know. I, I, I got to drive an SRT8 a couple times and that was pretty sweet. Yeah, it's pretty cool. Drove one of the old, uh, do you remember the Viper trucks, the SRT-10? I've seen one. I've never ever worked on one, but there's one I think on the island. Uh, I got to drive one. It was pretty sweet.

56:03It was pretty cool. That must be nuts. Yeah, it's— I actually prefer driving it over the Viper because the Viper, like, it, it just feels like you're in control, whereas the truck, you never felt like you're in control, you know what I mean? And, uh, whereas the Challengers and the Chargers, the SRT-8s, they always felt really good. Like, you always felt like you were in control.

56:22But yeah, the suspension geometry on those is fine-tuned. Perfect. That old— those old SRT-10 trucks were just stupid. Like, it was just a pickup truck with way more horsepower than it ever should have had. It was like a death trap, right? It's like, it shouldn't exist. It shouldn't have existed. But like, you know, that's what they do, I guess. So what's, uh, is that what you kind of miss from the dealership, is the variety?

56:47Uh, Yeah, I would say like honestly not so much from the dealership, but like from just working in an independent garage as well too. Like I, I've worked in spots where I was like, it could have been— it was Hondas, Toyotas, uh, Nissans, everything, right? And I really like the variety, uh, but yeah, now it's just like it's all Chevy pickups. Yeah.

57:12And a couple Fords, but I can't really complain though too, because like I do get to go into the heavy equipment and truck and transport a little bit when it's not as busy, uh, for the automotive. Uh, I started like started the process now to challenge the first block exam for heavy equipment so I can, uh, pursue a dual ticket. Yeah. And I think that would like, not like, not so I can like go and leave and make big money in the mine or something like that.

57:42Like you can go do that as an automotive mechanic now. Like if you really want to, you go go up north or wherever and make, um, $150K a year, but it's not what I want. I just want to have that, uh, the knowledge more so. That's like to elevate your skill set and stuff. Like a lot of guys, like when I was doing my Red Seal, like a lot of them, they're like, I don't give a fuck if I ever even look at another engine.

58:08Like I just, like, I don't care if I'm doing brakes for the rest of my life. I just want the ticket that's going to say you got to pay me this. That's right. And, you know, it's crazy like to see that, like, and to hear people say it because like I think in our class there was 18 of us and there might have been 4 of us that like were the dig deeper kind of guys, right?

58:26Yeah. So it's— and again, that's, you know, in the long run it's going to be good for guys like us because who's competing with us, you know? Like, so let me ask you, what do you think about in the States where you see some of the conversation comes up and it says like, uh, we need what they have in Canada, we need that certification because like You know, if it gets to the certification, it means that like they're more competent, more qualified, more trained.

58:52I, in the States, is not legally required for you to be certified to work on vehicles. I think that that's a huge mistake. I think they should definitely have some sort of certification, whether it's the recognized ASE as the, as the parent holder of that. Uh, but our Block Pro, our apprenticeship program here, it's cool. But what you learn in school is like you're basically getting recycled 20-year-old GM training stuff, right?

59:21Like, it's not one size fits all. It's impossible to put everything into the curriculum. Yeah, uh, it gives you a base, but it doesn't make you competent. Uh, no. Yeah, there's a lot of— I don't think we— no one's gonna have it perfect, I don't think. Uh, but the The information that you're giving people needs to be more modernized. It needs to come up to date.

59:46Because it, it could really put you in a situation where if you don't sit down and read the description and operation of the system, and instead you just hop into it thinking that, oh, well, I learned this from my teacher, and he told me this, and this is how this works. Well, guess what? It's not like you have a short band O2 sensor there, uh, and the information you're taking from it is not going to correlate over to what they taught you.

1:00:14Yeah, it's a completely different way to diagnose it, you know what I mean? What you're, you're looking at an amperage trace on a lot of them, you know, a wideband versus a voltage trace. And it's— and I know, understand, you know, like, oh well, yeah, it's still kind of the same thing. They kind of work in reverse of each other. And that's where if you, you know, you spend too much time and don't learn it, then it's just like— and I mean, my friend Brian, he made a really good— we kind of had a talk on Friday and he says like, so Brian routinely handles like 10 to 13 dye eggs a day.

1:00:47That's just what he does. And he says, here's the reality. He says like with Identifix, he says, and a little bit of testing, say like 20 minutes of testing and Identifix, you can get about 75% of the cars fixed. The right— the first way, the right— the first time, the right way. He says it's that other 25 to 30% that'll be the ones that are going to kick most people's butt in the industry.

1:01:13He says, and it's not just like it'll kick because it won't be— it won't be the same two things that are just not published by Anademics. It'll be completely two different things, completely at a left and right-hand field that no— you wouldn't have thought to even look there. You know what I mean? And he says that's the struggle that, you know, when we're trying to bring up now this process and how do you teach them, the reality is right now, like, if we can just figure out by some basic eval what if it's going to be one of the 75% or if it's going to be one of the 25%, and then the 25% is

1:01:49like, just say no. And the other 75% then is just have the process in place that you can get through it. You know, and the other 5%, there are still people in the industry that can fix them. But man, it's like, it's a completely different conversation you got to have with your customer. Now going back to it, when the customer comes in and, you know, you were saying like everybody, you know, wants to have a pretty good idea about what it is in an hour.

1:02:13And yeah, that's 100% the truth, right? Like it's, it's, you should. But man, when they come to you and it's like, hey, I've already done X, Y, and Z, You don't even start with the hour. I, I feel like you have to make the customer have that conversation right away. This is probably going to be a 2 to 3 hour thing. Yeah, because we got to go back now and see what, what was done, if there— if those parts are actually working the way they're supposed to be, you know, if they're not some junk aftermarket eBay crap.

1:02:42And then we still have to track down the original ghost of the machine. That's not a 1-hour process. That now is a 3 to 4 hour process. And that's like You know, Paul Danner talks about that and, you know, the retainers and everything else. It just comes back to communication. You know, be honest with yourself, with your ability, and be honest with your friggin customer.

1:03:01That's the part that always yanks me is that we overpromise, like you said earlier, overpromise, underdeliver, right? And you can't do that. You cannot do it. It's why everybody gets upset. They don't even care. You could take the most complicated problem and if you told them it'd be done Friday and you don't get it done till Monday, they still hate you for it because it wasn't ready on Friday.

1:03:25And that's the part where it's like the technician has done everything they could have done, they've worked a miracle, they solved the problem that nobody else could solve, but damn it, we told them it'd be Friday without even checking with the mechanic, you know. Yeah, customers pissed. So when you talk about getting the— kind of like we were talking about dual license— what's, um Like, how, how easy is some of that that you've taken your work experience translate over to being able to, to kind of apply it to what you are doing day to day?

1:03:59Or do you struggle with the hydraulics kind of thing of some of the, the way some of the stuff works? Hydraulics isn't— it's not too bad. Like, I feel like in our, in our little like part of that industry. Like, we're not getting so in-depth to like the diagnostics of the hydraulics. We don't see a lot of those kind of breakdowns. I feel like that's more of like if you were working for like a Brandt dealer or a Cat dealer or something.

1:04:27Okay, okay. Uh, you would see those complicated like electronically controlled pump scenarios. Uh, for us more so it's just generally hydraulic leaks, uh, maybe rebuilding cylinders, stuff like that. Yeah, I have— I haven't done any of that myself. Like, mostly what I've done is, uh, like done some minor engine work, stuff like that, uh, reseals, uh, maybe diagnosing a speed sensor on transmission here and there.

1:04:56Yeah, uh, but like, it's not— hydraulics isn't a hard concept to grasp. No, you know what I mean? The biggest thing I find that is difficult about that It's part of the industry, especially for the truck and transport stuff, is like the service information is not there. Yeah, there is like no support when something's outfitted. It's like, so you're literally just guessing really at the end of it.

1:05:22And even like if you go into like the motor for heavy trucks or whatever, like some of those aftermarket, um, service information systems, they're 2 to 3 years behind, you know what I mean? Like it says you're working on a 2024, but that diagram's from like 2021. You know, and they just— it's almost like they make it and then it's like if there's changes, they add it to it after the fact.

1:05:42Whereas it's not like us where we can log in and ProDemand is probably updating stuff, you know, every hour somewhere on the program and you're not even being told about it. But for the most part, it's accurate. Yeah. When I worked on the truck thing, it was like, it was, you know, you could almost not even worry about sometimes the diagnostic time because everybody just knew that there was nothing out there for you to work on, like, information-wise.

1:06:07And that's again, you know, you talk to all these guys and it's like everybody had to phone a friend at the dealership. Like, they'd call the International dealer and say, you know, I gotta, I gotta whatever, you know, an International with a Cat in it and it's doing this. And they'd be like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, we know what's going on with that because they fixed it when it was under warranty, right?

1:06:26And then they're talking You know, for us it was like, you know, it— I laugh all the time because it's like people think I'm crazy, but you know, parasitic drains like in cars, people are going nuts. And you and I know the outfitters, they put them in anything they put in with no regard at all if it's going to drain, because they're like, this thing's not even going to shut off.

1:06:48Like, it's going to be— and if it does, we just put a switch and shut the— you know, open up the master switch on the battery. Yeah. So it's like, I, you know, people think that's, that's nuts, but I mean, that's just the way it's always been done in my— yeah. And like in Truck and Transport, all of our fleet pretty well has like anything that's upfitted, or like just in general, all of them, I'm pretty sure.

1:07:11Like all of our Kenworths, all of our Peets, they all got master switches in there on the seat for that reason. Like, like what the fuck are you gonna do if you got a parasitic draw on that? Like, where are you gonna start? You know, like, well, you're going to unplug, you're going to unplug the monitoring system that tracks, you know, the hours and the payload and all that kind of stuff.

1:07:30And that's probably going to fix the drain. But like, here's the reality. You're not supposed to use the machine without that in it because like they want it in there, right? So, so guess what? Master switch it is. Master switch it is. And then it's like, you know, I remember we had a fleet of garbage trucks and that was just our, that was our thing every night as we went out and we took their logbooks out and and we looked at all the repairs that they wrote down that the truck needed.

1:07:54And then if we had time, we did them. But then we made sure that all the master switches got shut off because otherwise by morning they wouldn't start, you know? And people just shake their head and they're like, and I'm like, yeah, it's serious. I had, what the hell was it? A 2023 Mazda on Friday that had only like 30,000 kilometers on it.

1:08:15And I know our American friends are either gonna get pissed with all this. I communicate, right? The way it is up here. But it had an onboard battery charger that somebody wired in under the hood and run the cord down next to the block heater cord, right? And they're plugging that car in forever. And it's like, I remember looking at this thing going— because I finally had to put a battery in it to sell it— and I'm like, what a rigmarole mess this is, right?

1:08:41And he cut it all out. But there's somebody that way back when used that car so little that it needed a battery, and they're like, I'm not buying a battery. And it wasn't going to be worth it. Like, I'll spend $100 on a battery charger and stick it under the hood. Like, you know, there's, there's always more than one way to fix something is what I'm trying to say.

1:09:00It's just what's your, what's your desired outcome, right? Like, you know, it is, it's, uh, we— there was a, like, on the newer GM, uh, 2500s, they got the auxiliary battery with the, with that mess of a relay and fuse system there, and it's super common to see the auxiliary battery relay block fail. Yeah, uh, the fuse pops for the charging side, uh, and I had a couple now where like I've replaced that, and then I've seen one there a little while ago.

1:09:35My assumption is, is that the driver for the truck replaced it himself, and instead of disconnecting power, uh from the other side where it's also fused again. He left it hooked up and he dropped that cable to ground and popped the fuse on the other side. Yeah. So anyway, they ran the slip tank pump off of the auxiliary battery, and instead of just moving the wiring until we got the part in, he hooked up like a— I think it's a— it must have been like a 20 or 22 gauge wire wire with alligator clips, no fuse.

1:10:13Yeah, just hooked that up and ran it over to the other battery for like, so I could power his slip tank. And he started telling me about— he was like, what do you think of that? You think that's a good idea? I was like, I think you're a fucking moron because you're gonna catch the truck on fire. But yeah, sure, like whatever your desire, whatever you want, really, like it's up to you.

1:10:32I don't care. Like, do you get a funny smell when you're running your slip tank? Like, you know, he had to— you could see the insulator on the wire was like crinkled up like you put a heat gun to it too. I was like, man, holy fuck. Like, you like— and up here, like, in like where it's so remote, like what you see is a lot of people like grow up, they growing up they get like the tinkering and like the repairing your own stuff, right?

1:10:58So everyone thinks they're a mechanic, everyone thinks they're whatever, and you end up with a mess of just shit that's been fucked with to the point where it's just unfuckable. Like, yeah, and you see it so much, it's, it's crazy. Like, the stuff people will come up with and do. And you'll get some— you'll do brakes on someone's vehicle and then they'll come back with an infrared gun telling you that one side's a little bit hotter than the other by a couple degrees or something like that.

1:11:24And it's just like, man, there's so many variables to put in here. Like, the braking doesn't happen in a vacuum, okay? Like, each side is seeing different things. Things. But like, you can't explain that to them because they're mechanics, not astrophysicists. Like, it's so fucked. And the thing is, like, these are the same people that'll come back with an infrared gun after they paid you, right, and think you did something wrong.

1:11:45But they're the same ones that did it themselves. They'd only put a rotor on one side if they could get away with it. And you see that though, you do. Like, I see— I've seen it from dealerships here, and it's just fucking crazy. I'm just like, man, there's— the rotor is like probably— there's 3 mils in difference in thickness Yeah, and you're just gonna throw one on new like this?

1:12:05Hey, it makes you shake your head and just question so much. I remember cussing out the parts store one time because I'm like, he only had one rotor in stock, and I cussed him for like a minute and a half. It seemed, how the blue hell can you only have one rotor? Like, that doesn't even make any sense. And he's like, well, sometimes people just warranty the one, you know, they have a caliper that sticks or something.

1:12:25And I said, and that's your fault because how many times have you guys have a somebody walk in and they want to buy just the right rear caliper. I was sitting at the parts store Friday morning waiting for to get my part, and the guy walks in, he says, I need a right rear caliper for a 2016 F-150. And then he was like, well, what's the, what's the, you know, is it going to be a rebuilt caliper, is it going to be all new, and how's, what's the warranty on it?

1:12:47And I'm thinking, you freaking chucklehead, like you actually need two calipers, dumbass. But I didn't say anything because you know what, Riley, maybe last month he did the left-hand side, you know what I mean? And now So it's like, I don't know. It's— and you can't know. But I used to like, I'd cuss people out for that. I'd be like, are you like, you got a hole in your head or what?

1:13:08Like, what is going on that you think that that's the right way to do something? And what I've learned is that sometimes it's just they don't know no better. And then the other half is like, there's so much now. Financial is just everything that everybody can do to get by. And I think that that's We're going to see more of that going forward, especially up here with the way our finances are, our economy is in Canada.

1:13:31It's very different. And the tariffs are making things, you know, everybody's all the sky's falling, the sky's falling. And, you know, but it is having an effect. Somebody was telling me there's going to be these, these like these EVs that are going to come from China and he couldn't remember the name of it, but he was telling me like he saw something on YouTube and they're like, they're going to come here for $20,000.

1:13:51They're going to be able to sell an EV for and I'll have a 10-year warranty when it hits. And I thought, wow, that's going to be something to see. You know, it won't be able to get fixed anywhere but when it was sold, and there'll be no friggin' parts available for it when it is broken. But congrats, you got a $20,000 EV.

1:14:12So, you know, but like, someone explain— and like, that's the other thing that just gets me, man. Like, just The amount of misinformation out there and misunderstanding of how these things work and like the supply chain of parts and then everything else there. It's like half the fucking parts that are out there for vehicles right now, they don't even exist. Yeah, like no one's had— no one got them built.

1:14:35Like a 6.8 RFE transmission for a Cummins or a 2500 and up Ram, like best of luck to you, my friend, to get one. We had one one time, it was a year, it was exactly a year, I think it was 13 months on our lot before we had the transmission show up. Yeah, I know, like, and, and I saw, I saw a post today where somebody was like they had a quote for 9 grand for a new transmission from the dealership and they couldn't believe it was 9 grand.

1:15:02They wanted to find somebody that wasn't going to rip them off. And of course they don't mention what kind of car it is or anything like that. And you know, somebody I saw post, it might have been one of the guys on TikTok, and he says is you can kind of— if it's— you can kind of calculate now for $1,000 per speed.

1:15:17She's got a 9-speed, 10-speed, something like that. And it's Brendan Sloan. It might have been Brandon. Yeah, I've seen— I've seen one of his videos and he said that. Yeah. So he's like, yeah, if you want it rebuilt, it's a 10-speed and it's— you want it rebuilt with a better billet converter and all that jazz and all the stuff that's going to make it last a little bit longer than the OE one, calculate on $10,000.

1:15:37And everybody goes, That's a ridiculous price. It's a $100,000 truck. It's 10% of the value of the truck is the way they look at it, right? And you're like, 10% of the value of the truck. It's kind of how it always correlated to how it always did cost. But we just all of a sudden now we forget that we're spending $100,000 on these vehicles, you know.

1:15:59And my clips blow up because Sherwood's like, you know, from Rhodes, he's like, don't tell me I can't charge $200 an hour labor. When they sell for 100 grand. Don't tell me that, man. But you know, people just lose their ever freaking loving minds. And it's like, the one guy tried to tell me— this was cool— he said he had an estimate.

1:16:16He never said what car, for 2 sway bar links, and the estimate was $980 at the dealer. And he went and bought 2 links for $86, and it took him 40 minutes. And then I said, you know what's the greatest part of these stories that everybody always shares them with me? And I said, nobody ever has any paperwork to prove that it was ever done.

1:16:37And I said, he's like, well, it's just the way it is. And I'm going, it is the way it is. Because like, I, I saw Bigfoot walking around last week, you know what I mean? And he was, and he was carrying a leprechaun under each arm. That's about as realistic as some of these things that people say now. And it goes back to that misinformation thing.

1:16:57That's a funny mental picture when you think about it. I had coworker bring up at the break room table there a while ago about the price of his oil change at the dealership that I used to work for. He said it was $550 for an oil change. I was like, well, what else did you have done? He was like, nothing, just an oil change.

1:17:13And I asked him, look at this and look at this. I was like, well, you saying can you look at this and look at this, bam, that's $300. That's right. Yeah, like that's the engine, like that's like— and then he started saying, well, that's ridiculous, it shouldn't be that much. I was like, do you know what it costs to operate a business right now?

1:17:29Like every month? I can tell you the exact dollar figure it is for that business to operate every month. And it's not ridiculous when you break it down and look at it. Like, yeah, that's how it is. And thank God they're finally doing that, because when I came up, it was like, here was an oil change. Oh, and the customer's got 2 other complaints.

1:17:46Look at it real quick. And, and, you know, we're not going to pay for those 2 other things. You hopefully can find something you can sell the repair on, and that's going to cover your time. Mm-hmm. Now at least we— people have got the guts that when you come in, it's an oil change and two other things you want to complain about, that they're allotting some time with a charge to check those two things out.

1:18:05Because it should be. If I'm going to walk to the computer and look up a bulletin to see if there's a software patch, or if I'm going to look over to see if there's a TSB, or if I'm going to look over Identifix to see if there's a common thing to look for, that all takes time. And I'm going to charge for it because my people now Thank God the technicians are starting to listen.

1:18:25And what does Identifix cost a month? Oh, it's got to be $100 a month easily. What is all— and all that, I think that's $2,300 for the basic subscription for a year. That's if you pay up front like that. So divide that by 12. Like, it all costs money. It's not— no one's doing shit for free for us. And even if you buy the software or you rent the software, or you can call it, and you don't charge for the time, right, or you don't— your technicians now are walking up going No fault found.

1:18:51No fault found, you know. And they're just doing what was allotted to them to do if they're paid on flat rate. Because if there's no time on the ticket, I don't— you don't want me to spend any time because you don't want to pay me for that. And thank God we finally got to the place where we're having a conversation now where it's like people have got to stand up to the customer and go, okay, do you really want this investigated or not?

1:19:13Because like our door rate's $150 an hour and, you know, they're going to spend probably the better part of an hour looking into this. It could be a really common thing and there's a software, you know, and if that's the case, we're going to roll it in. But, you know, be prepared for $150, you know, $150 per complaint. People go, I'll just live with that.

1:19:34Cool, cool. You know, I don't— I think we finally got past the point where we're starting to realize we don't have to give this shit all away, you know. No. And, and it cranks people up, but I mean, that's just the reality of it, is like The dealer, you know it, the dealer doesn't— Chrysler doesn't say, uh, Riley, you guys had a shit month last month, we're gonna not, you know, charge you to use Wi-Fi, or excuse me, you know, uh, the Wi-Tech and everything else.

1:19:59You get that free. No, it don't work like that, you know. Um, here's a new tool room full of tools that, like, you know, you can't say no to because you gotta have half a million, right? Everybody, everybody forgets that, and it's like You see it, they rip on the dealership guys, and I'm like, and I'm standing my up all for them all the time going, I understand, you know, they're, it's, they're, they're not always doing the best thing for the customer, but here's the reality of it, like, they are forced to charge what they have to charge because they're not, they don't have a choice.

1:20:33A lot of what they get every month, they don't have it, they can't say no to, it just gets built, you know what I mean? And, and Everybody thinks that it should be— they should be doing this for free and that for free, and it doesn't work like that. It does not work. I had a, I had a guy one time, he bought a truck at another dealer out on the island.

1:20:52So first off, you know, about the truck from us, whatever, no big deal. Uh, but anyway, he bought the truck used and only had one key, so he brought us to program the key. And for us, we're like, obviously YTEC costs a lot. We were charged— it was one hour minimum charge to use Witech if you wanted something reprogrammed or whatever. Uh, so anyway, I reprogrammed the key, or programmed the key to the truck, and you know, whatever, came out of my day.

1:21:18And then next thing I know, he's calling the advisor flipping. What do you mean it's a 1-hour charge to program a key? The dealership I bought the truck from told me it only takes 20 minutes, this and that. Anyway, I went on the phone and I was like, I was like, man, like, listen, The stuff costs money. Like, to have the software to do this, I was like, it's probably— I think it's a couple grand a month, I believe, as a dealership, plus the cost of the pods, plus the cost of tablets.

1:21:45And, uh, he was like, well, that's ridiculous. So I can bring it to them and get them to do it and charge me 0.5. And I was like, well, bring it to the other shop in town that can program your key. He's like, but there is no other shop in town that can program a key. I was like, well, Here we are.

1:22:03And I was like, that'd be 1 hour, sir. And that's, that's where you want to, like, whoever told them, you know, because we have the conversation all the time, you know, you need to stop telling, having conversations with people about time and just about price. Stick to, with, you know, each job has a value, right? And we don't necessarily have to be like, you know, if It's the same thing.

1:22:27Like, I got 0.6 for just about everything we had to do with the DRB3 way back when, or even the YTEC. And that was kind of how long ago I date myself. Well, I got to the dealer because the time didn't really go up. But I mean, but the OE tooling, and back before NASTIM, I mean, you could program all the keys you'd want within half an hour, within 30.

1:22:44It wasn't a problem, you know. Um, we didn't have people bringing in eBay keys and saying, can you program this? And we didn't have you know, all these other things that were wired into the car that might have stopped the, you know, being able to program. We didn't have those obstacles right now. It's like people go, oh my God, I can't believe that, you know, it costs X amount to do it.

1:23:07Well, the unfortunate thing is like it's a big part of your anti-theft system now, and everybody's so crazy about like keeping these cars safe from being stolen. I can remember when if you had a Chrysler and you had two good keys and a Ford as well, you could program a third key and a fourth without having to touch a scan tool. There was just a sequence.

1:23:27Would everybody love to have that come back? Sure they would, until your vehicle's stolen. That's right. Think about it. And now, and now on the tungsten model Rams, they got the, the credit card for starting up. You ever see that? I had not seen that. That's just good. Okay, when I was doing my tech training for new technology updates or whatever, uh, that was one thing.

1:23:47It's like, so the customer can have— it's a basically like a hotel room card key. They can, as long as they got that on them, and they can put it to their Apple Wallet in their phone to start the truck. And then if they bring their truck to the garage in the new technology, like educational video, or it said if the vehicle is started with the wallet, with the wallet on the phone, and they drop off the vehicle and forget to leave you a key or something, you can just have a key on hand and it's $100 to program it to the vehicle.

1:24:19Yeah. And then like, that's their cost they have to incur. I was like, how fucking easy are you making it to steal these things now? Well, and that's the thing is all that technology is stolen from— or not stolen, excuse me, that was close— is from Tesla because Tesla had that like there. Tesla has that. Yeah, that little tiny stupid thing, you know.

1:24:39And same thing if it's— I remember the boss, he could do anything he wanted with his Tesla anywhere in the building. He, as long as that key was in his pocket, that car would roll the windows down, do all that. You know, I'd be doing brakes on it and he'd cycle the wipers or some stupid, you know, just— and you know, people, it's like, yeah, it's the same thing.

1:24:56We had a Mitsubishi that we were trying to— an EV at the shop, uh, hybrid, excuse me— and we're trying to charge it. We don't have a charger at the shop that'll work, so we had to look around Kingston. There was only one car lot that had a charger that we could go and charge this car with. No big deal, except we had to build an ID and pay $50 before we could even go and charge it for an hour.

1:25:19Holy shit. This new tech that everybody just got— I gotta have it, gotta have it. Well, you know, especially on the EV side, because I mean, what the hell, I might as well. I'm getting enough shit for it from the Post-its. Um, you know, people that go and buy those cars, like, you might as well make friends with your dealer and, and, and, you know, or somebody if you're in a different area, like if you're in Toronto or a major city, yeah, there's somebody out there, not the dealer, that is really well schooled with this kind of stuff.

1:25:51You get away from those big cities like where you are, you know, um, you're kind of at the mercy of whatever you can even find a place to charge it, let alone if it's broke, where are you towing it to? You're not towing it 1 hour, you're towing it a day, right? And then you're— yeah, we— there, there's a bit bit more of an initiative being brought forward now by some of the Indigenous government councils and stuff to have it here.

1:26:18Like there is a couple Level 1 charging stations here through the town. They got the YMCA and then at one of the hotels and stuff. But like it's funny because like when EV readiness became a thing, they ran that campaign through Mopar or FCA or whatever. They basically forced the dealers to buy the $60,000 Mopar Level 1 charger. And it was anyway, then all of a sudden they're like, oh, hold on, we're not sure.

1:26:44Like we're putting a pause on this. And then they were like, sorry about you spending $60 grand, but you can just put that thing in storage until we're ready to do this. It's just like, what the fuck, man? Like, do you realize how much money like that is? Like, that's a wage. That's a year's wage or something. That's right. It's a, it's yeah.

1:27:02And, and so people that are like, oh, my shop can't afford this. My independent shop can't afford that. You know, and then them dealers that are just the devil, like, you guys just got billed for it. You had no choice, couldn't say no. None. I rest— you got no choice. Like, if you— and like, we had a parts manager one time accidentally ordered 124 bottles of R1234yf.

1:27:28Oh, I don't— he was fired before when we caught it. Like, he was done. Yeah, but like When I seen it, it was like the price was a— I think it was $98,000 is what was going to be billed to us. And like, you think someone on the other end of that computer when they seen that order come through would be like, maybe this is a mistake.

1:27:49Yep. You know, but no, I managed to cancel the order of $99,000, but then the order $24,000 or whatever it was showed up. So that was like still almost $20 grand. Yeah, but like, that's, that's a hit, man. Like that, like stuff like that, those mistakes, that, that could bury you, right? Like in the long run. Oh, I'm sure they're still down there.

1:28:12Mopar bottles of fucking Freon. Like, oh, and that, that mistake would bury a lot of independent shops for 6 months, you know what I mean? That, that little mirror. So it's like, we all have to be a lot more forgiving. Of people, you know, when they do make mistakes about like that. And I agree, like, you know, unfortunately with all this AI and ChatGPT and stuff, when you place your orders and you do your estimates and the whole thing, like there's nobody that's going to pick up the phone on the other end and go, hey Riley, um, this 99 bottles of, uh, you know, 1234, did you mean 9?

1:28:47And you go, of course, yeah, oh, we just meant 9, not 99, you know what I mean? And, and yeah, it sucks. What's, uh, in closing, what's the goal for the next year for you? Uh, I want to get to, uh, one of the trade expos or like trade shows. Uh, that's kind of what I got set in mind there now. I'd really like to get out to either ASTA or, uh, Vision, I believe, is the other one.

1:29:17Vision was Kansas— was last week in Kansas City. I've never been, so I can't I can't tell you what Vision's like. Um, everybody speaks very highly of it. Um, so I mean, if you could make it, it'd be a— it'd be phenomenal. I think it'd be a phenomenal opportunity for you. Um, if you make it to North Carolina for ASTA, bro, you and I could have a lot of fun.

1:29:38Like, they have never seen somebody like you in that— in, in North Carolina, I guarantee. Oh, probably. No, I, I'd really— I, I think the networking of it though is just— is the crazy part. Like, like Check Engine Chuck, the first time I seen Check Engine Chuck on Facebook, I thought he was a crackhead with a scan tool. Yeah, I, I just— by looks, like, not to insult them or anything, like, that's— that was just my reaction.

1:30:02I was just like, holy fuck, who is this guy? And now I like listen to him, I'm just like, man, he is just like— he's on the spectrum smart. Like, there's— oh yeah, he's— yeah, it's— he's an ADHD guy with a scan tool, which is like, once you start to meet a bunch of them, Riley, they're all like that. That's just what makes them able to, to get through it.

1:30:21Like, their brains are just operating on another level, right? Like, and the coolest people in the world. Like, I have been so fortunate to meet those people. Like, you met Rick White too, didn't you? Yeah, I met— that guy is so, so cool. I, I listened to his 10 Minutes a Day thing. I try to, like, regularly. It's difficult, but man, he's, he's pretty spot on, I gotta say.

1:30:44And what you realize with the coaches thing, like Josh Parnell or Rick White or Cecil, if you sit and spend time with them, you realize that it's like they're numbers people, psychologists, you know what I mean? Like they're, they're, they know how the human brain works and psyche and how to motivate people, especially Josh Parnell. Like you, that guy's just infectious the way his, his attitude and his belief in self can come through and create.

1:31:14It's crazy. Um, Rick is a hoot. Cecil's a hoot. Like, they're all such cool dudes. Paul Danner's like one of the most humblest guys you're ever going to meet. Jack and Chuck, same way. Like, he just— it's gonna be like seeing God walk down the stairs when I first saw— see Paul there. First time— the first time I ever like was stood across from Paul, I was just like— I, I had to pinch myself, you know what I mean?

1:31:36It was a— it was an amazing weekend because it was like it was the first time I'd ever gotten on a plane flew to North Carolina, met Brian Pawlik, who I'd like talked to for 10 years, met Lucas, who I talked to for longer than that. All these people that I'd known like for so long and been friends with and had such an influence on, on me, but I'd never been in the same room with them.

1:31:57And then when you meet Paul and you sit down, you have a beer with him and you eat some chicken wings and stuff, and like Super Mario and all these other people the first time, you're like you're pinching yourself all the time going, I can't really be here, right? Like you're in a room full of people where you don't feel like you deserve to talk because you don't— like, you know, you're not the smartest one there.

1:32:15You just want to listen and take it all in, right? Like, I, I was like— I'm still like that when I go to those shows. I mean, like, I do my thing, I do my interviews, but like, I, I— and I'm still— if I'm in the classroom, I'm probably asking some of the stupidest and the most questions because I'm— they're always smarter than me.

1:32:31I know they You know what I mean? It's just— and, and they look at you funny sometimes, and then it's like they just kind of grin because it's like, yeah, okay, you know? And, and sometimes you'll see it where you'll ask the question— that's always the superpower— and you see other people and their, their, their minds click, or they're like, thank God somebody else asked it, right?

1:32:52Because they want to ask too. So that's the whole thing, like, there's no such thing as a dumb question. I don't care what anybody says. Sometimes it's the wrong time to ask it. That's the other thing we gotta talk about sometimes with these courses is like, you can have a lot of questions and you can really derail the conversation if you start asking a lot of questions over and over and over again.

1:33:10And it doesn't mean that you shouldn't be there. Doesn't mean that you, you know, are dummy. It just means that sometimes it's like, shoot the instructor an email or at break, you know, ask them a couple questions then, 'cause it can really do conversation. And you know, what it ends up being is that they look at sometimes their course material material and they make little tweaks to it so that when they know somebody's going to ask the question, they rewrite the material to address the question.

1:33:38And that's the whole power of like when people go, well, I don't want to take the same class that I already took. I've taken a couple classes now 2, 3 times, and I can tell you that every time I take it, it's better than the time I took it before. And I always get— so that's, that's pretty cool, especially coming from like where, like where if you just did your education through like a college Yeah, it's like it doesn't matter how many fucking people didn't like that course material, it's never going to change.

1:34:03Like, exactly right, because it's appointed down from them as like— Riley, do you take any carburetor questions on yours? Like, when you're— fuck no. We had, uh, uh, TBI questions, or how about injection questions? Like, the— I can't even remember. I, I just, I crammed a little bit of it into my brain, uh, in case it was on the exam, but like Man, you know, you're never gonna see that now, especially not in this province.

1:34:29Vehicles are thrown away within 10 years. So it is what it is. But, uh, no carburetor questions were not on there for sure. But we— EVs were heavy. It was heavy EV questions. So when I came through, they were still doing— they were still doing carburetor questions and they weren't even talking about EVs yet. They were just talking about basic hybrid. Like, I mean, basic hybrid, like no regenerative braking, no nothing, just a basic, like it's got a battery pack on it and, you know, like, uh, it's got a cord and you plug it in and sometimes the engines charge it.

1:35:02That's it, you know. I'll say the EV portion is very— it was very well done, uh, it's very in-depth. And, uh, yeah, I was— it really sparked me to want to know how to do— how to work on EVs and stuff. So I ended up, when I went back, uh, to work at the dealer, I took all the EV courses I could it.

1:35:20Oh, good for you. Yeah, because, well, like, in the long run, even if it— even if, like, the 2030 zero carbon bullshit doesn't happen. Yeah, you know what I mean? It's going to be something that's more relevant in the future and stuff. So, like, if you're the guy that knows how to fix those and knows how to diagnose it, like, you know, you're the guy that's going to be in demand.

1:35:40You're the guy that's going to be getting paid, right? And I wish in my brain I could separate the political motive behind the tech, because right now the political motive for me is the obstacle in me really truly grasping. It turns your fucking stomach to think about it. Yeah, it really does. And I shouldn't, because I should just treat it as like a car and learn how it works.

1:36:02And I know how they work, and I can, you know, if I had to troubleshoot them and fix them and got exposure. And, you know, and that's the other thing too, like, here's the reality. I'm not running out and buying one of the $700, $800, you know, DVOMs right now for the few that I actually come into my, into my bay. Like, I can— I'll pull the codes off of it and then that's it, because I've got none of the other specialized safety equipment or training in my shop to be able to do anything with them.

1:36:29So it's a situation of like— and I understand they're not as like, you know, we've had guys that say like, you know, it's really hard to kill yourself working on and they're right, they are. But I don't need to be the first one, you know, because we don't have any of that. That's just the way I look at it, right? So it's, it's one of those things that people are listening, if you want to get into it, get into it, but realize the investment, realize the, the responsibility you have for the safety equipment and stuff and the training that goes in, and then go in.

1:37:05If you're not gonna do it. Don't do it halfway. Don't half-ass it. Stay the hell out of it. And do it just enough so you know that— so you don't know what you fucked up and now someone got a fucked up vehicle, right? Yeah, that's the whole thing. I personally never— I personally haven't dove into any of them yet, but I, but I wouldn't go and volunteer myself up without more training to say, you know, I'm the guy.

1:37:29Yeah, I don't, I don't have any aspirations of ever being the guy. I think I'll probably be too old and broke down by the time they become super prevalent, um, and I'm okay with that, you know. My, my next generation can, can get all in it and make all kinds of money. But Riley, I want to thank you for coming on, bro.

1:37:47This has been fun. Yes, man, I really appreciate you having me on. It's, uh, I fanboyed out a little bit the first time I got the message, but you know, it was awesome. It's— there's no reason to fanboy about me. I'm just— I'm nothing special. I'm just, just like you, man. Just like you. Um, any closing words? No, man. Uh, I just, uh, got— no, I'm short for words at the moment.

1:38:12I had something in my head for a second. I lost it. I wanna, I wanna say to the young people that are kind of listening to what Riley's been talking about and been through is that, like, be, be understanding that sometimes when the older guy seems, you know, um seems like he's hard to approach or seems like he's grouchy or seems like he's got a bad attitude, just understand that like by the time you get to be the old dude, you, you got a lot that hurts and you got a lot of, um, you got a lot of shit that you're carrying of mistakes that you made because we're really hard on ourselves.

1:38:45So when they seem a little rough around the edges or they seem around, you know, like they— just understand that it's not always a personal thing, it's just a situation of it's like And I'm not excusing— if anybody is a senior and they're telling you to get out of this trade, don't listen to them. That's my point. Don't listen to them because that's the wrong attitude to have.

1:39:08But if they seem like they're rough and they're hard to talk to, just give it some time and do the work and put your effort in and roll your airline up and try to be organized and pay attention and it'll get better for you. It'll come around. It's just what this is, is like we said at the very beginning, this is not easy.

1:39:27If it was, everybody would do it. So the people that are hard to approach, it's not that they don't want you there, man. It's just a situation of it's like they are working really hard every day to make sure that they don't forget and they get everything done and they try to make everything happen when it has to happen the way that it's supposed to happen.

1:39:46There's a lot of plates in the air spinning. So just be patient with everybody, everybody. And like I always said, I love you all. Thank you for all the comments and everything. Riley, thanks for all the fun we've had talking. We'll do this again. And everybody, just try to be 1% better tomorrow than you were today. And that's about all really you can do.

1:40:08And thank you to my family and my friends at Launch Tech USA and Promotive. Tectonic was coming up for TechMetric. So if you're interested in going to Tectonic, reach out to me. I'll give you a, you know, we've got a great discount code for you for that. Um, there's lots of stuff coming up in the near future, guys, that we're going to share with everybody.

1:40:31So it's going to get really exciting. So Riley, thank you, brother. Nice having you. We'll talk to you again, bro. Thanks, everybody. Have a good one. Hey, if you could do me a favor real quick and like, comment on, and share this episode, I'd really appreciate it. And please, most importantly, set the podcast to automatically download every Tuesday morning. As always, I'd like to thank our amazing guests for their perspectives and expertise, and I hope that you'll please join us again next week on this journey of change.

1:41:01Thank you to my partners in the ASAR Group and to the Changing the Industry Podcast. Remember what I always say, in this industry you get what you pay for. Here's hoping everyone finds their missing 10mm, and we'll see you all again next time.