OkieGene wrote:
There are just getting to be very very VERY few places that repair starters, alternators, radiators, things of that nature. Those repair shops are few and far between, as well as the availability of parts to repair such things.
It's a changing world. Buy cheap ****, throw it away.
It was bound to happen.
When I first got into the workforce in the mid 1980s, I spent the first 4 yrs repairing pretty much any and all consumer electronics like TVs, Stereos, VCRS, DVD players.. The last shop I worked for closed when I got a real hourly paying job repairing computerized POS equipment..
Cheap electronics killed the TV repairman. If you couldn't charge $50 per unit and repair a lot of them you were going to go broke.
No one wanted to pay $50 to have a 4 yr old 19" TV when for $100 they could buy a newer and much larger screen.
Every type of repair requires specialized tools and training and some like automotive work requires considerable retraining and new tools on a yearly basis.
Granted, alternator, starter and even radiator repairs are not rocket science but with the Internet and the flood of lower cost imported parts you are going to have a difficult time making enough profit to keep the lights on..
And yes, I watched my Dad refurb starters, alternators and even repair a old few radiators with pin holes..
But, I don't have the lathe he had to turn down the commutator, getting brushes now days requires ordering them from the Internet, even bearings get be a drag to get, alternators now days has regulators built in and radiators, well are not a DIY repair due to them being aluminum cores with a plastic tank with a gasket crimped together..
Most likely you will have more than $50 in parts along in a starter and more than $70 in parts in an alternator if you really were to fully rebuild them and I highly doubt anyone would be successful and recrimping a used aluminum radiator core to a nice new plastic tank without a lot of leaks (aluminum doesn't take well to be bent more than once).