Companies that don’t want money

[NotoriousREV]

I replaced the track rods on my Porsche and wanted to get the alignment checked. I also want the ride heights sorting out as they’re all over the place and I figured it’d be good to get everything done at once. Normally I’d find a local Hunter Rig and go there, but after a quick Google, it turns out there’s a local company that does motorsport stuff and offers all the services I’m after.

So today, as I was passing the place, I thought I’d pop in for a chat. It’s in a dodgy part of town so I was hugely surprised to see a bunch of Porsche Cup cars, a Caterham and a GT racing Lambo being prepared for a race in Dubai. I thought this would be an awesome place to get my car sorted.

“Sorry mate, I don’t do road cars any more, I can’t be arsed”.

FFS.

[Jobbo]

I spy a niche in the market...

[NotoriousREV]

Hunter Rigs aren’t that expensive and how much can a set of c-spanners and a tape measure be?

[Jobbo]

How much more profit can you make just working on race cars, though? Maybe you'd go the same way...

[NotoriousREV]

I assume most race teams would prefer to deal with someone who knows what they’re doing

[Orange Cola]

He probably doesn’t miss the shitty horrible undersides of a road car with knackered bushes and seized bolts. I bet he can get through more race cars because they’re well maintained and everything is accessible and adjustable.

Plus serious trace teams have money to burn.

[NotoriousREV]

Yeah, his race transporter looks like it’s worth more than my house so he can’t be doing badly.

[John]

My friend only works on rally cars with his business. I get the impression from him that the general public are more trouble than it's worth where car maintenance is concerned, Rev the exception obviously

[Rich B]

Did you leave a deposit? (Or think you did?)

[duncs500]

I had the same thing with the 7, was looking for someone local, and the specialists I found around me either didn't bother to reply to an email or said they were fully booked for months on end and were not really interested.

Fair play to them if they have enough work that they can pick and choose I suppose.

[McSwede]

I went to Gregg's to buy some lunch for a couple of people today and amongst other things ordered a pizza (who knew??) I was informed that they'd be 7 mins in the oven and if I was happy to wait they give us two free cappuccino's for the inconvenience. We drank the coffees and upon collecting the pizza was told they wouldn't charge as I'd had to wait.

Can't give money away today!

[duncs500]

Well we're in Italy right now, and the total apathy* of the waiting staff means they sell way less drinks than they could . They are far more interested in their cigarette breaks than getting fresh drinks for us.

* - and inefficiency... in one place the waiter could either carry his notepad to take orders (one table at a time and then back to the bar) or carry drinks (one table at a time then back to the bar). I feel like writing to the manager and explaining the concept of pockets to him, it could double turnover! #becauseItalians

[mik]

Please change the Fred title to "Companies that don't want Rev's money".

[scotta]

I bought some stuff from eliseparts today - the utter bastards took my money.

[mik]

Only cos you passed the RevCheck (tm)

[Mito Man]

Well we're in Italy right now, and the total apathy* of the waiting staff means they sell way less drinks than they could . They are far more interested in their cigarette breaks than getting fresh drinks for us.

* - and inefficiency... in one place the waiter could either carry his notepad to take orders (one table at a time and then back to the bar) or carry drinks (one table at a time then back to the bar). I feel like writing to the manager and explaining the concept of pockets to him, it could double turnover! #becauseItalians

The shit slow service in all of Europe is crazy isn’t it? They take 20 minutes to come take your order. Delivering food is fine but then to ask for dessert is another 20-30 minute wait and paying the bill is another 30 minute wait. I only tipped 2 places as they were all so bad. I resorted to having to be a rude tourist and keep waving them over
I guess it’s the norm over there where people seem to take 5 hours to have a meal out.

[Simon]

Well we're in Italy right now, and the total apathy* of the waiting staff means they sell way less drinks than they could . They are far more interested in their cigarette breaks than getting fresh drinks for us.

* - and inefficiency... in one place the waiter could either carry his notepad to take orders (one table at a time and then back to the bar) or carry drinks (one table at a time then back to the bar). I feel like writing to the manager and explaining the concept of pockets to him, it could double turnover! #becauseItalians

The shit slow service in all of Europe is crazy isn’t it? They take 20 minutes to come take your order. Delivering food is fine but then to ask for dessert is another 20-30 minute wait and paying the bill is another 30 minute wait. I only tipped 2 places as they were all so bad. I resorted to having to be a rude tourist and keep waving them over
I guess it’s the norm over there where people seem to take 5 hours to have a meal out.

Different pace of life isn't it? They're probably more used to just chilling out for a couple of hours in a restaurant. I think UK'ians are more likely to want to eat and go.

Did you take your BF with you or were you travelling alone'?

[Mito Man]

Yep people there tend to go out at 8pm and stay till 1am! This also means restaurants are fully booked a lot of the time as they book one table for one customer for the whole evening and once they are full it’s not like here where they can tell you to wait for 10 minutes for a table to become free.
Just me, although Italy and Switzerland are a lot more dog friendly than the UK in terms of letting dogs into restaurants and shops.

[Nefarious]

I replaced the track rods on my Porsche and wanted to get the alignment checked. I also want the ride heights sorting out as they’re all over the place and I figured it’d be good to get everything done at once. Normally I’d find a local Hunter Rig and go there, but after a quick Google, it turns out there’s a local company that does motorsport stuff and offers all the services I’m after.

So today, as I was passing the place, I thought I’d pop in for a chat. It’s in a dodgy part of town so I was hugely surprised to see a bunch of Porsche Cup cars, a Caterham and a GT racing Lambo being prepared for a race in Dubai. I thought this would be an awesome place to get my car sorted.

“Sorry mate, I don’t do road cars any more, I can’t be arsed”.

FFS.

There just isn't that much money in doing geo services alone, even for racecars only. You want to be offering full support packages.
Doing roadcars (and I've done a few) is a massive pain in the arse - all the adjustments take three times as long, and you need to keep resetting whatever measuring equipment you're using after every change (most roadcars require taking off the scale platforms/alignment jig, putting on the working ramp, adjusting, then putting back and everything recalibrating - rinse and repeat a million fucking times). And that's before anything snaps, seizes, or turned out to be too shagged to reliably useful.
OK, I'm not the fastest, and my set-up is pretty rudimentary (cornerweight scales, string, and a variety of measuring sticks ) , but a full geo on a roadcar is a whole day, and a long day at that (as opposed to 2.5-3 hours for the racecar). And what could I charge? £200? £250 at a push? Just not worth it when race support packages are £1000 per day plus.

[duncs500]

Take it to that place Marv gets his 968 done Rev.