5 /5 Joseph Morris: I had Douglas replace the clutch and front brakes on my car. While the transmission was out, had him send it to be rebuilt had a transmission shop (Craig at Calif. Standard Transmissions in Hayward; also highly recommended). The prices were reasonable, I just did a five hundred mile road trip on it including some rather rocky high-clearance roads in the Sierras; everything seems great.
In addition to the prices, the great thing about this shop is that youre always talking to an owner-mechanic, Douglas. Theres one other mechanic who is probably actually turning the wrenches, but Douglas is there talking to him and looking over his shoulder. When I first brought the car in, before Id even left, theyd both hopped in to take it for a test drive first. Whenever I would call for a status report or ask for explanations, Douglas is the person picking up the phone, and he knows whats going on. He did forget one thing that was on the list of things I gave to him to repair ( something was dragging on the brake rotor and making noise), but when my wife brought it back he immediately put it on the rack and fixed it within half an hour, for free, which is about as much as you can reasonable expect. He also fixed the clutch linkage spring (the thing that makes the stick go to center when in neutral), which has been broken forever; no extra charge other than the part, very thoughtful.
The other good thing about this shop that seems oddly difficult to find is that Douglas is perfectly happy working on an older car. My car is a 1996 Subaru outback, and I like it. The engine is one of the most reliable in Subarus history (EJ22), the body and paint are in good shape, and is what I need it to be, and its not full of screens and computers like a modern car. Nevertheless, I had one shop (Arts Auto in Berkeley) tell me straight up that they would not work on it, sight unseen, just because its old; Ive had another shop (AMA) where the mechanic said I probably wanted to skip some work "because youre probably going to junk this car soon anyway" (like can you just work on my car without insulting it?). None of that with Douglas; he just worked on the car like it was as important as any other car.
