I need some advice/help.

I brought my car into my mechanic because I felt like I needed struts or something to that nature. They take if for a test drive and say yeah struts and mounts. He quotes me a price I set up an appt and when they look at the car they now say well it now will need ball joints and some sensors......Grand total $3,200 plus tax and he tells me he didn't charge me hardly any labor.

I didn't have him do the work because I hear I can get it done cheaper.

Here is what he "said" I needed:

L&R upper ball joints
Stablizer links all around
Struts & mounts and a wheel alignment

Can anyone tell me if that's even remotely right??

Thanks
Claud

 

even with a set of tein flex coilovers + edfc, trd blue sways, daizen control arm bushings, steering rack bushings, ball joints and tie rods wouldn't even come close to $3000.

take it to another shop.

 

-Lower balljoints are $130 a pair.

-Our upper balljoints hardly ever break. And if they do, you have to replace the upper control arms, which will be $800-900 total. I highly doubt your upper balljoints are bad.

-Stabilizer links (endlinks) are $300 for all 4 corners.

-Struts are $300 all around, plus another $80 for alignment.


Without seeing your car, I have not heard of endlinks failing, especially on a stock car. Your sway bar will bend before making a dent on the endlinks. The guys on here who bend their endlinks are guys who drive their cars hard with very stiff aftermarket sway bars. It's going to take more than OEM sway bar to bend/break these suckers.


Get a second opinion.

 

The dealer cost for just parts were: Upper ball joints at $457 per side, Strut mounting brackets at $135 per side. I have ZERO clue about this stuff so I don't know. I am probably going to have another mechanic look at it and hopefully not charge me an arm and a leg. I'm more upset because I believed that my mechanic was looking out for my best interest (after 6 years). I had issues with him before unfortunately. Lesson learned!!

 

Order the parts from Carson and then cash in on the "little" bit of labor.