Grease The Wheels Podcast

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels, we are going back to our meat and potatoes of doing angry diatribes about service managers. As a disclaimer, if you have a good one thank them because this is a bit like finding a virgin on a maternity ward. Or if you have one that has potential to be good, please help to steer them into doing things the right way. We run through the job descripti...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we make you think of the Beastie Boy’s with the title while actively testing the limits on the definition of satire. How would you sabotage where you work without ever causing any physical destruction? You choke off the supply of people who are willing to work there. Breaking stuff, swearing at folks, stealing, and being a nuisance will only get yo...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels, we are talking some used car horror stories so this is a good one. Why do people buy cars online without looking at them first? As mechanics we understand the level of carnage that can be going on with a seemingly normal looking car, but a lot of people don't. Even worse is when they call you for a used car pre-purchase inspection that is in-...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, you get to hear a podcast from a host who hasn’t had power or running water for 7 days prior to recording! We’re not going to get into it this week (it'll probably have to be a two parter), but these few upcoming episode’s are going to be a special brand of insane that only your beloved Uncle Jimmy can provide. This week’s dive is...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we are talking about some of the things that make us happy as automotive technicians. We come up with several metrics to figure out if you should stay with your current shop based on how happy it makes you. There are a million things working in any shop that can make you unhappy, so it really is surprising when places get it mostly right! We also t...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, we are going over some of the general things that happen to mechanics and technicians all over the world. Spells where you can't fix anything, coming in to a mess you didn’t make, and having to put up with incompetence like missing labor hours; we want to know, is it just me? We go over some practical suggestions when it comes to g...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we talk about some format changes that we are going to try with the podcast: where you guys send us in clips and we turn them into a show! We’re using an app called Speakpipe where you guys send us voicemails and we can download, edit and respond to you on the show.  Erik the Producer’s Notes for Callers:  The time limit on the voicemails is 5 minu...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels, we expand the idea of the flat rate system and ask, “what would happen if other occupations were paid flat rate?” In order to make flat rate work for you as a mechanic, you need to do the repairs well, and then do them fast. This is mostly because of the fact that you aren’t going to get paid for doing it the second time, and that learning curve i...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we are diving head first into the deep end of video multi-point inspections. Right off the bat a lot of places are not paying for this service that they are expecting of their technicians, so they are going to get what they pay for a lot of the time. However, we can’t ignore the massive upside that this newfound “techs-eye-view” tool has given us i...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels, we are talking about evolution: both as technicians individually and in regards to the cars we work on. When it comes to the cars, the amount of technological change from the first cars Uncle Jimmy was working on as a lad to where we are now is staggering and because of this, we have all had to learn a lot of things and hone some extra skills to b...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we are talking about one of the things that can single you out the fastest in a shop: the can’t do attitude. As we have stated before, trying to have a good attitude in your shop is always a good thing, but we also implore you to have a “can do” attitude over a “can’t do” attitude. This will open a lot of doors professionally and will prevent your...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s GTW we are a week late to the Christmas party, but that’s ok because we kinda can’t stand the music- at least the poppy remakes! We take a look at some of the craziness of 2020 and use that to set our sights on 2021, by taking a look at some of the most common new years resolutions through the eyes of an Automotive Technician. We also talk about that lovely Hallmark...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we take a deep dive into what you should expect from your employers, the job, and your fellow technicians. We take a look at new guys, and how attitude can sometimes take you further in this industry than skill alone when getting over being “the new guy.” One of the things that is expected out of all of us is that when the cars we work on get more...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy completely destroys communism faster than the apprentice who forgot to put the drain plug back in his waiter oil change. While our notion that workers should get paid more does smack of some of Marx’s more heavily Sparknoted works, we know the simple market fact that all workers are NOT created equal. We all know different t...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we are actually dispensing useful information when it comes to getting you paid: we are talking about how to write a job story. For the purpose of this episode we are mostly talking about how to get paid the absolute most when it comes to warranty repairs. Now obviously you are going to want to document everything you do to the car in order to get...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, we are taking a look at your favorite department that doesn’t have any of the stuff you need in stock: parts! No, we kid, we actually do a fairly good dive on why your parts department doesn't have the parts that you need. The meat of it comes when it comes to the type of personnel that shops are getting to apply for parts jobs in...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s interactive episode of Grease the Wheels we are getting into the remote learning racket by creating a test for technicians. No need to study, this is entirely about how you approach and do your job. From being good about helping other techs, to showing up and getting right to work: there are many different ways to be a good technician. In this simple 10 question qui...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels, we are asking a simple question: what are your priorities? When it comes to work, for most of us in general, it's to make as much money as possible. Other days it is getting out of the building as fast as possible. We have personal priorities in addition to our career priorities, and often the two can cause conflict. Everyone in the building...

Send us Fan Mail On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy completely Tarantino’s Henry Ford’s rapid expansion of the middle class by introducing the $5 a day minimum wage to his factory workers. First off, right around half of that was a wage from the work they did in the factory. The other half came from living in accordance with Ford’s own personal standards, in a move that would make t...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s Grease the Wheels we take a look at the job at the top of the shop food chain: the general manager. The Boss. In some cases their name is on the building, in others they are the long arm of a very large corporate entity. Either way, the buck stops and starts with them. In brand new dealerships and shops the learning curve can be seriously steep and finding the right...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, we talk about one of the unseen factors that keeps us going: pride. Right off the bat, we are proud of every one of you wrench turning guys and gals who is keeping the world moving by fixing what's broken. We’re also deeply proud that you listen to this podcast and the rate at which you tell your friends about us. No matter what ki...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, we are paying homage and telling a hell of a lot of epic stories about one of our all time favorites: the Blazer. Weather it is ripping through an apple orchard, crawling down ATV trails, or rummaging through pick-and-pulls for extra bits we loved this simple and capable truck for what it was. A truck. The new one is just a Equinox on s...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels we admit this world is kinda f***ing dangerous! As mechanics this is compounded on a daily basis just because of the sheer number of things that you work with that can seriously mess you up. Some of this stuff can mess you up instantly: wires from a wire wheel turning into shrapnel, presses turning things into projectiles, cars falling,...

Send us Fan Mail On this week’s (slightly delayed, sorry love!) episode of Grease the Wheels, we take a deep dive into the role of the Service Manager. What is their job, what should be their job, and what should you expect out of them are all on the docket in this slightly longer episode. When you don't get what you expect, this causes friction. This is compounded when you actually take a lo...

Send us Fan Mail On this week's episode of Grease the Wheels, we are talking about some of the untapped potential that lies with the video multi point inspection. Some shops have them, some don't, but we feel like more shops are going to have it sooner rather than later. This is really a good thing for us, we just wish we would get paid for doing them. First off, Uncle Jimmy goes over hi...