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Comment by ambiate | Hacker News Reader

I went to Sears two days ago for a brake inspection. The guy quoted $700. He pulled me off to the side and said, 'buy the parts for $100 and we will charge $300 for labor. Quote around for better prices, or you might be able to do the labor yourself, so, give that a try too and just bring it in if all else fails.' My memorial day weekend is going to consist of attempting these repairs, but thanks to him, I may become a man this weekend.

(No, brakes are not my first repair. Most of my repairs have been in the car, electrical, hoses, injection, dropping the fuel tank, etc. I have always stayed away from tires/suspension and usually paid the hefty fees. Thanks for the _valid_ concern!)

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Your "become a man" quip worries me just a bit. I'm going to assume that this isn't your first automotive repair. If it is, please don't start with brakes. Changing pads and rotors (I assume rotor because of the $700 quote) isn't hard, and there isn't much to screw up. But if you do screw up, there isn't much leeway. In other words, getting it wrong isn't a "oh, I'll have to fix that next weekend" moment. It's a "oh, my, "I only have rear brakes/why is my front wheel locked up/oops, should have tightened those lug nuts" moment.

But if you know a 9/16" box end from a 10mm socket, then have fun and give it the same attention to detail that you would an important piece of coding.

This is kind of off-topic, but if all you're doing is replacing pads and rotors, you can do that yourself pretty easily. If you're doing anything that requires you to remove brake lines (and subsequently bleed them), take it to someone who knows what they're doing. It's easy enough to screw up, and air in the lines is a dangerous thing.

Get a service manual if you can (Haynes is kind of the gold standard here). It'll walk you through, step-by-step, whatever it is you're trying to do.

The cynic in me says that he's hoping you'll screw it up worse so that they can charge more to fix what you broke in the process.

Probably not. He's not likely to go back to the same shop if he screws it up.

Why not? He has a positive impression of them, and if he screws it up he'll know that was his fault, not theirs.

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