"What you have with your  brakes for instance means that you had less than 2mm of pad/shoe material  remaining."

David,
With all due respect to the professionals doing their best to protect me from myself, I just now replaced the front brake pads with the ones I had ready for just such an occasion and found the right pair of pads to have about 4.5/5.5 mm and the lefts to have about 5.0/6.0 mm.  That is a margin considerably greater than what you specify as the minimum.  I'm also doing the rest of the work that will be "necessary" for the van to pass inspection.

Now, I had inquired about having the tires rotated when I made the appointment and he quoted $37.50.  When I showed up for inspection I told him I would forego the rotation (planning to do it myself); just the inspection, please.  Think what you will of the coincident repairs required after he had a chance to inspect.

I do appreciate your thoughtful and informed response to my original post and I do not automatically suspect the worst of everyone I do business with whether as vendor or customer, but I'm sure you can forgive me for letting this fellow drop more than somewhat in my esteem.

Stephen

--- On Thu, 8/14/08, David Clarkson <Dvdclarksn@AOL.COM> wrote:

> From: David Clarkson <Dvdclarksn@AOL.COM>
> Subject: Inspection bummer
> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
> Date: Thursday, August 14, 2008, 9:00 PM
> I see the Virginia inspection as being a necessary evil and
> as Big  Brother's