Art & Inspiration Shortage of Shops to work on Hot Rods

On another forum someone from another country asked if there is a shortage of shops and talent to work on our old cars. I said Yes! Shops are closing as owners are retiring, young people not really interested in cars, hard to do business in this day and age, etc... There is a school here in Oregon that is trying to teach high school age kids to work on old cars. It is all volunteer teachers, and they do everything from body and paint to upholstery. They can't graduate very many students each year but we need more programs like this one nationwide so we don't loose the talent! Thanks for looking, Mark
http://nwcarandcycle.com/html/speedster_program.html

 

Check out Oregon’s Dayton High School
Taco Coupe: High schoolers unfolded a Ford into this hot rod racer - Hagerty Media

 

I think there are four major reasons why current shops are unlikely to want to work on old cars.

Most shops have highly trained techs trained to work on modern vehicles where most repairs are done by plugging a computer into the car and give out reasons for problems. With an old vehicle a tech has to spend time searching for the problem. New shops want in and out jobs. This goes for both mechanic and body shops. Most, if not all concentrate on swapping in new parts.

Most shop seem to be concentrating on insurance work.

I've seen many times where someone will bring in an old vehicle for a specific repair and after the vehicle is repaired the owner will come back in a week later and complain because the vehicle had a new leak or noise that wasn't present before the car was brought in for the initial repair. It had to be something the shop did, it couldn't be because the vehicle is 50+ years old and had mostly 50+ year old parts that are on the verge of failing, all it took was the vehicle being lifted and moved around.

Most old vehicle owners are old themselves and the cost to have a shop do the repairs is shocking to a person used to having to pay a lot less in the past. A good modern shop doesn't have to contend with someone not willing to pay the going rate, they have more than enough jobs they can do for the going rate.

 

I have a good friend who operates a one man alignment shop in Simi Valley. I've recommend his shop to all the Hot Rod and classic car owners in the area. He's in his early 60s and when he retires I don't know of another shop to send classic cars to. The technicians who train in trade schools are not shown how to align a car with the old rack and bubble. Just a sign of the times.

 

I wonder if Jay Leno and his crew are recruiting and training young folks to maintain his fleet of autos/bikes?

 

Also a shortage of people who can and will pay for quality work.

 

Working on Classic cars and modern cars is certainly two different businesses. I think there is actually a surprising number of hot rod and restoration shops in the Tampa Bay area. I’m sure that varies in other parts of the country. Although recently my buddy was trying to get a front end alignment done on his 64 Impala. He had to call six shops, because the first five didn’t have the “specs” to align such an old car.

 

Yes, and there probably always has been.

Our cars are at least 60 years old and some are 100 years old.
Do you think production shops in the 1950's-'70's wanted to work on pre-1900 cars?

 

Plenty where I live

some very talented high quality craftsmen and shops.

some shops probably shouldn’t exist looking at the work

 

I bought a car last year that was built a few decades ago. The original builder did a good job on it for the time period. The second owner was good friends with the owner of a dealership and that was where he took it to for service/repairs. I have spent the last several months fixing the things screwed up by the "technicians" that have repaired it. Yes, there is a shortage of "old car" qualified shops.

 

Shortage of folks that that want to build and work on their own cars.

 

Yeah, Charlie is an awesome guy and hosts a TROG type dirt drag race at his place every summer that is VERY HAMB friendly. Great teacher too from what his students say as well.

 

There’s a shortage of people driving old cars

 

This !

and this !

somethings that people don’t understand is the bigger the job , the smaller the profit on the job is , most people freak out when you give them a 10-15-20 thousand dollar price tag on doing repairs to an older car .

amd the time that big job ties up the shop can be doing a ton of small job ( brakes , tune up , bumper repairs where the profit margin is 50-100% )

first shop I worked at and did my apprenticeship specialized in German cars . We did restorations on older bmws porches and vw’s

and other then air cooled vw’s they where time consuming mechanical restorations and usually about 1/2 way through one my boss would lose his mind at the time spent on it and usually yell “ hey Daniel how many brake jobs and timing belts could you of done in the time it took to rebuild that car??”

I would answer “ lots and lots “ profit !

he would do the big restos in instalments but realistically he would only get paid on the final instalment , any money the customer gave along the way essentially paid wages and parts , and of course there where always “ extras “ tacked on during the job that did not get billed out correctly either because it was labour overlap with something else we where doing or the boss was just being a nice guy and did not want to over charge .


In Ontario we need a safety inspection done on a car whenever it’s sold , I had to take my mercury to 4 different shops before I found one willing to do it , to much a pain in the ass for most shops to work on “ our cars “ when they can slam a timing belt on a Honda in 45 minutes to a hour and half and bill the book time of 4 to a customer and move onto the next job . Quick easy money .

it only makes financial sense when your running a business .

 

And a shortage of knowledgeable car owners

 

It’s funny you should say this , as again at the first shop I worked at , this was in the mid -late 90’s we would get a lot of “ kids “ guys my age buying older 80’s 3 series bmws and 944 porchas , these cars where cheap back then especially if they had problems .

bring them to the shop to get repaired and have these huge dreams of nice wheels , turbos and fancy steering wheels . Then we would give them an estimate of 10,000 bucks to get the car safe and running correctly and they would shit and usually say “ but I bought the car for 2500 bucks !!!!!

well duh !!! It’s still a luxury car , but now it’s a clapped out wiring nightmare of an oil leak of a luxury car !!!!! What did you think ?


When I worked at Jaguar I was the “ old jag guy “ and lots of my customers would want the underside and engine compartment of there e-types and xjs’s etc cleaned up “ ok”. 3 days of labour , some spray paint hardware , hose clamps etc would easily be 3-4 grand .

was I ripping them off ? No . Was it work they could have done themselves ? Possibly . Most said yes as money was no object and they wanted their jag pristine . Some would say no . Working in a trade your essentially a prostitute , trading your time and skills for money . ask one if they will paint your deck for free

 

We haven't seen anything yet! Wait until the old guys that are still working on this old stuff finally quit doing it. Another 10 years should pretty much prove the point.

There is not enough money around to make working on this old stuff worth the effort. The people that own them don't want to spend the money required to keep it running, and even if all of them were willing to pay, there isn't enough old cars around to provide a steady income for the guy that might be willing to work on them. If the guy likes working on the old cars, I'm betting he wants nothing to do with working on the modern stuff. If there are not enough old cars with owners that are willing to pay someone to keep them running, how is the mechanic suppose to pay the rent and feed a family?

When I retired and closed my shop, I had a lot of people that thought I needed something to do, so they asked me if I would build them an old car or truck. They were shocked with my instant answer of "Absolutely not! I built my truck (less the body work) in 2086 hours (yes I tracked the hours and that was most of them). At a shop rate of $100 an hour (cheap around here), that means $208,600 NOT including the cost of parts, or body and paint work. Still interested?"

Building them is almost easier then fixing them. I no longer really want to fix my stuff, I sure don't want to fix someone else's stuff.

 

These cars are EZ
If one of my students can 2jz swap an E36, the junk we work on shouldn’t be an issue.

 

I’ve got no idea what that means. I’ll just stick to 59AB swapping a ‘32 B.

 

I have worked on old cars for pay and it sucks. The money is not there. It’s a hobby with tools and parts.

 

That’s the equivalent
Sorta kinda for today anyway
But with fuel injection

 

Can most folks pay $200-300/hr for labor, for a vehicle that is a luxury?

 

20 yrs ago there were about 5 shops that mainly work on classic cars in the Austin area, there are now at least 20. This can be said for many metro areas across the state and country. I say there is no shortage of shops or people to do the work. I think the classic car hobby/industry is stronger and more broad than it ever has been.

 

A guy brought a 60 Impala in to my shop for an oil change. It was running like shit... he said he barely drives it because it barely runs & nobody around here would tune it up for him. There are about 10 automotive shops here... not one guy that knows how to set up a carburetor or adjust timing and set points between them? I did it for free... part of the service. He couldn't believe it. I wonder how many other cool old cars that would otherwise be totally drivable are stuck languishing in an older person's garage because they don't know how to do the basic services that regular auto shops don't or won't do anymore.

 

Yep.
Id bet there are many more custom shops now than 50 years ago.
But this place is for folks that build their own crap so most probably wouldn’t notice em

 

The best shop in town here closed after it was sold due to the old owner retiring, the new guys didn't make it a year. One of them opened another shop and it closed after a couple years. Many, many stories of cars going from shop to shop over the span of 5 years and never getting finished. I agree that most of the people here do their own work but I am constantly getting asked if I would work on somebody's car or truck and I can't say NO fast enough. Then I cannot recommend anybody either. If you have an abundance of GOOD guys near you it sure isn't that way here.

 

JHRS, the shop that built the infamous pink roadster is $95 per, is one of these red balloons
Within a couple hour drive from my house you have several
At least 3 if not 5 of those have built Riddler winners.
With west coast labor pricing it’s no surprise to see that in “podunk” Alabama.
2 interior shops in this area have produced multiple major award winning car interiors.
When I visit these shops it’s extremely rare if I see anything I can post here.

 

Most Schools in our aera phased out shop classes years ago. Our local high school has an auto service course so to speak but it is like an extra credit thing, and you have to be like a B plus/ A minus student to get in. The area tech school has been having trouble filling classes for years and they don't keep up with the current technology let alone how to rebuild a carb or a transmission. And in many cases either students don't come back for the second year or when they do graduate, they either never go into the trades or find something that pays better with benefits after a couple years. And the few guys around here like myself who can do the work and have the tools to do it don't want to because most people seem to think we should be charging 1964 prices instead of 2024. If I am going to work for nothing I will work on my stuff or take one of my cars for a cruise. If you think there is money to be made doing this stuff open up a shop, I know lots of people I can send your way. lol Larry

 

That's the going rate or more for a divorce!