Alan, or someone else with a shop, do you test drive the cars when your done? Is there usually some issues to fix when your clients get their cars?
Interesting question.
Few facts first...
I'm not a big shop, only a small one man operation.
I have business insurance that covers my shop and inventory, etc...Not driving cars.
I do not have a dealer's plate which would allow me to drive uninsured customer's vehicles.
I'm not a licensed mechanic so I can not preform a safety inspection in order to legally drive the cars.
Out of the 25-26 cars that I've restored for other people, there's only about 4 that I've driven at all. That was only after the owner had the car inspected and licensed and insured. I'm not taking ANY chances driving some one's car illegally.
For the most part, all of my customers took there car to their own mechanic and had an inspection of my work done and a safety certificate written. If they have any issues, I hope I can deal with them before they leave. If something comes up after, I try my best to help get it fixed.
Before leaving, I make sure all the electrical works, make sure the brake are decent, then I trailer it to my mechanic for a front end alignment and have them double check the brakes. Then off she goes, again on a trailer.
I recently had a long distance customer insist that his car get driven to get the bugs out. I had my mechanic drive the car (with his dealer plate) and it was a good thing because the engine developed a tick and the transmission was having difficulty shifting. So now that the car is here, I can get these items solved, and the car will be 100% when the customer gets it. Otherwise I guess the car would have to come back once properly insured so I could test drive it.
Either way....I'm glad GYC is standing behind their work, I had no doubt they would...The internet is a power source of information, good and bad. One tiny match can start a huge forest fire
