I had the strangest thought today that opening up my own shop would be a better idea than working my cushy dealership job... someone, please... make this thought go away!
Import maintenance/repair/performance.what kind of "shop"
as you stated... start up cost is a nightmare...Import maintenance/repair/performance.
There's a gaping void in my old home town for a good, honest, clean technician to work on imports... I just don't often have the desire to spend every ounce of my time working on cars. And, regardless of how many tools I already have, the start-up cost is still staggering.
The only real tempting thing is, the few mechanics around town have more work than they can handle and none of them do import stuff even remotely well... and the only other option is a Toyota dealership run by criminals and staffed by idiots and hacks.
I am no expert but pretty sure a dyno is 40k to 100k and up....I want to buy a dyno and rent out time. Closest one is over 2 hrs away. I just figured I could have it bought and refunded for money put on it in a matter of a year or less.
You are right.I am no expert but pretty sure a dyno is 40k to 100k and up....
You're right. Engine tuning is a very cost prohibitive area for someone to break into... hell, just seeing how much a dealership has to spend on keeping up with the changes in vehicles and engine management systems is scary. I don't have any interest in that.as you stated... start up cost is a nightmare...
the whole performance thing is tough.... are you going to get hardware and software to modify ECUs? a dyno to test cars as you are tuning them? "performance" is everything that the backyard enthusiast can't do...
for example
I had a swapped GSR motor in my EK with nitrous... never had the car to a shop once... I would have tuned to a shop for a piggy back or stand alone ECU to tune the car for a larger shot of nitrous... and that is not something you can guess at... you would need to be able to measure the burn while on juice and make adjustments accordingly...
this is why I say a "performance" shop is cost prohibitive.. all the equipment to properly tune modern imports is going to be really expensive..
It's a really tough gig man.... If you want to do it and your hearts in it... Go for it.... But it's not something as a business proposal I would get involved in unless I had a ton of cash to invest... And even then return on investment would be tough...You're right. Engine tuning is a very cost prohibitive area for someone to break into... hell, just seeing how much a dealership has to spend on keeping up with the changes in vehicles and engine management systems is scary. I don't have any interest in that.
Anything I did would be more on the maintenance and repair side of things on regular cars, which still requires expensive and frequent investment. I would probably have only so much performance stuff going on as to keep my own projects going.
And I don't want to buy, market or sell performance parts, because I already see how I scour the internet for the lowest prices and best deals... that just doesn't seem very lucrative.
You are doing a dandy job of talking me out of opening a shop though!
Yeah, I hear ya.... just every once in a while, even in the best company, sometimes you just think about doing something else or going somewhere else.It's a really tough gig man.... If you want to do it and your hearts in it... Go for it.... But it's not something as a business proposal I would get involved in unless I had a ton of cash to invest... And even then return on investment would be tough...