Thursday, June 2, 2011

Why was i charged so much for head gasket change?

It was on a 95 firebird and here's how the bill reads: Engine assembly - R%26amp;I = 476$ then cylinder head gasket R%26amp;R = 646$ then the head gasket set = 98.75 then oil and filters and ****, equaling like 50-60$ and somehow this all ends up costing me 1347. Now i was in a vocational school where we took apart engines and i remember doing head gaskets was not that hard so does anyone know if its normal to charge that much for all that crap? It doesn't seem right to me and i think i got ripped off. I had another offer (after the fact) for someone to do it for like 500$ but he is a good friend of mine so i don't know. Only educated answers please.Why was i charged so much for head gasket change?It's about right if they had to pull the motor to do the head gaskets. I hope they did a valve job while it was apart.Why was i charged so much for head gasket change?You got ripped off. Usually shop mechanics have their own little method in seeing if you know anything about cars or not, or they just take a wild guess. If they think that you do not know anything about cars, they'll charge you insane prices for stupid things.



Another assumption is that usually people do head gaskets and oil/filter themselves, so if you go to a shop and do it, they're assuming you're a newbie.Why was i charged so much for head gasket change?Im not sure but I think the heads were cleand and machined likely to the block was machined. and resurfaced. Often when a head gaskette fails its not because of the gaskette itself but because of warpage between the head and the block. If they also rebult the head I would say you got a pretty good deal.Why was i charged so much for head gasket change?It looks about right. If you have a V8 the labor guide shows 15.5 to 16.5 hours (depending on options) to replace. Not sure what labor rate you pay, but here it is $80 an hour. V6 labor is a little less.