Freelander 1 Timing Belt Change

I don't agree when you say that garages are robbing you.
it's a job were many things can go wrong. If the mechanic gets its wrong and trashes you engine, he will have to fix it at his cost.
Also he doesn't know what has been done before, maybe the previous job was badly done and it can have consequences today.

Nowadays, with internet you can get parts with 30-40 % discount, the price that the garage buys his parts. It's normal he makes a profit selling the parts, like any business.

I'm not trying to defend them, I am still looking to find a good one near where I live, no luck so far...

thefrog said:

I don't agree when you say that garages are robbing you.
it's a job were many things can go wrong. If the mechanic gets its wrong and trashes you engine, he will have to fix it at his cost.
Also he doesn't know what has been done before, maybe the previous job was badly done and it can have consequences today.

Nowadays, with internet you can get parts with 30-40 % discount, the price that the garage buys his parts. It's normal he makes a profit selling the parts, like any business.

I'm not trying to defend them, I am still looking to find a good one near where I live, no luck so far...

Click to expand...

Landy garages in France are few and far between.
Near our place in the Tarn there used to be a bloke who was very good, but he has since gone to just selliing parts. He does have a big collection of secondhand ones, mostly Discovery 1 and 2 as far as I can tell. He helped me out a lot when some idiot hit my Discovery 2 and I still see him for bits.

thefrog said:

I don't agree when you say that garages are robbing you.
it's a job were many things can go wrong. If the mechanic gets its wrong and trashes you engine, he will have to fix it at his cost.

Click to expand...

I worked as a PSA technician in a Citroën main dealer for nearly 20 years, and can tell you that the mechanic doesn't get the money the garage charges the customer.
The garage owner gets a huge amount of it, but the mechanic gets his normal hourly rate.
If the mechanic doing the timing belt change screws up, then he shouldn't be doing that kind of work.
It's not rocket science, it's a timing belt, which any good mechanic should be able to do with ease.
There's definitely no way that a 2 hour job should be charged at the rate they are, but garages are turning a timing belt change into a cash cow.