Raleigh North Carolina and surrounding areas

Not to downplay the shesity welding job of the muffler shop, but I am honestly curious.. do the welds on the muffler matter that much? I don’t think I’ve ever expected them to be top notch.. just as long as they were solid and not leaking, it was fine with me.

Is it a show truck?

Again, not trying to sound like a dick. I’m just genuinely curious.

 

I don't need show-truck quality tig welds, but I do want someone who takes a little more pride in their work. I mean, the current welds are just plain terrible IMO.

 

shit looks backwards to me... mufflers are engineered to go one way,, In and Out

 

but you are a dick

 

I did confirm that the inlet was clearly marked and facing the correct direction. The "Jones" branding wouldn't be upside-down if the welder had simply twisted the entire muffler around to face the other side. The muffler is stainless, but I'm not sure about the factory pipe it's welded to...?

Finally, it would be awesome to find someone local who just takes more pride in their work to fix this. Any leads are much appreciated!

 

Ultimately, as with most things, functionality does trump vanity. The muffler does function just fine in this case, but...

While it's definitely not a show truck, the shit welds still trigger my OCD a little bit. Nobody else knows they're under there, but I do, and it is driving me nuts. I paid $100 to have the muffler installed because I personally don't know how to weld, so it also bothers me that the shop and welder didn't take much pride in their work.

I am willing to pay to have them cleaned up if/when I find a talented enough welder in the area. It may be pointless to some, but worth it to me -- my OCD will stop triggering and all will be right with my world again.

 

That’s what I figured, an OCD thing

 

That’s definitely not untrue

 

Looks like a $100 job to me. I paid like $180 for my truck, and something like $190 for my Rover. New mufflers that I brought in and a little bit of new tube over the axles. Again not show Tig welds but they don't leak and the mufflers are installed correctly with the writing around right. Pics in my build threads.

@Dangerdave I am a dick #ownit

 

I wasn’t aware of the $100 price until after my original post. For a hundred bucks, you don’t have to be a good welder

 

WORD

 

I'd gladly pay $180 to have it done correctly by someone who actually takes pride in their work.

That said, the entire install took just 35 minutes. Is almost $200/hour really considered low for welding?

 

I think you need to consider it is a bit more than welding. You pulled into a shop, that has insurance, overhead etc. they put your truck up on lift to do the job. Everything has costs. I think you got a functional $100 value for the $100 you paid. As you mentioned the rest is your hang up on how it looks. I would say given that you should be making your expectations clear when you are shopping around for work. Functionally you got done what you asked as long as it is attached and not leaking I would say 35 mins in a shop for ANYTHING repair related for $100is pretty typical price.

 

I thought test-tube babies didn't have those

 

I agree that it's a typical labor rate for mechanical work on vehicles in this area (if we're generous and round it up to 1 full hour instead of 35 minutes).

However, others in this thread are implying that I received ugly welds because $100 is actually really low for this particular project.

So, which is it? Was the cost typical, or was it extremely low and therefore justifiably shoddy?

The bottom line is that the welds are complete garbage and I'd like to pay to have them fixed. The welder quite obviously didn't care how any of it looked when he was finished. He failed at attention to detail and he took zero pride in his work.

Any help in finding a quality welder in/around Raleigh would be much appreciated.

 

Most shops work off of a flat-rate chart. Techs get paid being for faster than the allotted time the chart calls for. My buddy is a mechanic and sometimes a particular job will pay/charge 3hrs and he can do them in 45 min. He still gets paid for the 3hrs....so he "works" like 100 hrs / wk. He's good at what he does but should the customer get a discount for efficient work? All that being said, the logo being wrong side round would irk the shit out of me as well

 

Based on my experience, yea that median range. But you also consider the price for parts in that and the hourly rate drops. Unless you bought the muffler separately

 

If the muffler is stainless and the pipes aren't you are going to have a tough time getting pretty welds 2 different types of filler are used.

 

I supplied the parts, so the cost was 100% labor.

Oh well... I just need to find a better welder.

 

shhhhh said to telly