1988 BMW 325 no-start diagnosis

POLSKA

MEMBER
1988 BMW 325
6 CYL
2WD
MANUAL
120,000 MILES

A mechanic had my car for 2 weeks and finally diagnosed my no-start condition, which turned out to be corroded connectors on the wiring harness to the fuel injectors.
He wants to charge me 400 dollars. Is that a correct amount of money to pay for this repair, generally speaking?

6 Replies

DOCHAGERTY

MECHANIC
9,601 POSTS

$400 might seem a bit high, then when the price of the replacement harness is $712.95, it comes into perspective.
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts.do?model=1113&mospid=47309&btnr=12_0830&hg=12&fg=28

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Friday, January 15th, 2010 AT 9:07 AM

POLSKA

MEMBER
4 POSTS

Following proper no-start diagnosis, how many chargeable hours for a mechanic to diagnosis a no-start condition?
From the start he had the following info: pump operation, new relays, new fuel, cleaned injectors, car started when primed with carb fluid.

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Friday, January 15th, 2010 AT 12:08 PM

DOCHAGERTY

MECHANIC
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Thank you for the clarification, I did not understand. $400 to diagnose a no start is way out of line.

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Saturday, January 16th, 2010 AT 9:37 AM

POLSKA

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4 POSTS

Aaa

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Saturday, January 16th, 2010 AT 2:13 PM

POLSKA

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Well, I'll need to back-track on this one.
The mechanic did more work than he let on. So I guess the message to be learned is "communication". And at the end of the day I felt like I got my money's worth.

It turns out that the mechanic actually found me a used/new working harness and had it installed. Previously, I thought he had just cleaned the connectors of corrosion and reinstalled the old one.

He also changed out the half-sticking thermostat, changed my coolant, installed a missing dowel pin on my timing cover and put on new wipers.

I thought that it might have taken too long to diagnose the no-start, but I should have also mentioned that another ASE mechanic couldn't find it, and said I would need new injectors, which obviously wasn't the problem.