Hi......
4.4 hours to R & R the trans .........no complaints there from me !
I find that every '4.4 hour' job on a whatever year old vanagon takes lots
longer than 'standard time' .......due to things being stuck, rusted, other
nearby things crying out for attention etc.

on that bell housing thing .........I've spend a hour on that, with the
trans out of the car.
flushing the oil cooler...........that's a half hour of messing around
unless it's just a sloppy quick job.

the 95 and hour I can't really agree with, but the 6.5 hours I sure can.
let's see...........6.5 times a more reasonable 70 an hour .....makes it
450ish ..........about right I'd say.
Gettin' up to 600 in labor..........that's pretty fancy rates I think.

my hunch is that it's not a scam deal.
I know for SURE that if someone was in my shop saying they'd only pay say,
5.0 hours and not a penny more.....
I'd say we couldn't work together ............because it is ALWAYS more
.....( more than you initially thought )

*especially* if really good workmanship is preformed. - which is a whole
other issue - so much of prefessional car work is 'slam dunk' .......
get the part on the car, get the car out of there. I hope that's not the
kind of work they're doing........

But for them  to take repsonsibility for the whole thing being right.......
plus it's a non-stock thing, which always scrares regular shops..........
if they do good solid work, it comes out successfully, and they stand behind
their work ..........it's worth 600 clams , easily.

like really IF ONLY a person could get really clean solid work done, by
that people really, really care about doing it right.........
that would be priceless, cuase you can't even normally get that.

So IF it's a really solid clean job, and it 'sticks' .........like it's done
right and will stay that way for a while......... .........it's well worth
it .
Scott
www.turbovans.com

----- Original Message ---
From: "Troy" <colorworks@GCI.NET>
To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
Sent: Wednesday, July 01, 2009 4:50 PM
Subject: automatic transmission replacement

Hi folks:

I'm having a local shop here install a rebuilt transmission with a peloquin
torqued biasing differential that Ken from German transaxle did for me. I
have a Subaru 2.2 engine, and then the small car transmission cooler. I do
know that the bell housing has to be modified to allow for a stud instead of
a bolt in one location. The instructions from Vanaru states the hole must be
enlarged to 25/64" and then some room needs to be made for the nut. I even
went so far as to supply the drill bit to the shop + gave them written
instructions. Now they are claiming the 4.4 hrs listed time does not include
flushing the oil cooler. I just get the feeling these guys are trying to rip
me off. Can any of the more experienced mechanics on the list tell me what
they think is a reasonable amount of time to remove and replace the
transmission and flush the oil cooler + enlarge one bolt hole? Ken told me
he could generally do this in about three hours, and then maybe 30 minutes
going really slow to drill out the bolt hole. He seems to think that four
hours should cover things. The last quote I got from the shop was 6.5, and I
argued with them adamantly about that. At $95 an hour it adds up. They now
claim they will do it by the hour, but again I think they are coming up with
excuses to raise the price. Any help or comments appreciated.

Troy=