08/26/06

poor body work. ?? part swapping

by dcmckee

Brought my Audi A6 to Mickey for some basic cosmetic work around bumper and to replace the wheels/ tires with a new set I ordered from TireRack. $1800 later the front end work was essentially half finished; I was told that the rest could not be fixed. Ultimately I had the whole job redone at Ogston's... beautiful result and never expressed any difficulty in doing what was needed. Worse yet, when I drove the car home I noticed that it was making a lot of "road noise". Mickey blamed my choice of tire. The noise worsened over the next few thousand miles. It ultimately proved to be due to severely worn wheel bearings. I had them replaced at Foreign Affairs ($600). Now the car is as quiet as it was before bringing it to Mickey's. Might be a coincidence but I suspect my wheel bearing were switched for some wornout ones. The car only had 48,000 miles when it went into the shop; seems unlikely that the bearings would wear out that fast.