£1700 to replace sills and boot floor?!?

After failing my MOT ive been down to my local landy specialist for a quote on replacing both sills and the boot floor and sides. £1700! is this right? I bought it for £2000 in July so dont really fancy spending nearly that again just on patching it up.

Apparently £387 for the parts and then £1,242 for the labour. He has estimated 2 days doing the boot floor and a day for each sill (and that was to replace with box section rather than the proper panel).

Does that price seem right to you guys? If anyone can recommend a cheaper place around Liverpool i would be very grateful. If not then it looks like ill be teaching myself to weld in the near future.

Liverpool.90 said:

After failing my MOT ive been down to my local landy specialist for a quote on replacing both sills and the boot floor and sides. £1700! is this right? I bought it for £2000 in July so dont really fancy spending nearly that again just on patching it up.

Apparently £387 for the parts and then £1,242 for the labour. He has estimated 2 days doing the boot floor and a day for each sill (and that was to replace with box section rather than the proper panel).

Does that price seem right to you guys? If anyone can recommend a cheaper place around Liverpool i would be very grateful. If not then it looks like ill be teaching myself to weld in the near future.

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seems pricey ,especially since replacing with box and not proper panels sounds to me it will be a bodge job, in which case you may as well bodge it yourself

I'd tell him where he can insert his box sections.

I did this myself recently. (No previous welding experience)
New Boot floor £40 - eBay

New sealy mig welder £100 - eBay

Sheet steel sheet off-cuts £20 approx from local fabrications yard

Angle grinder £20 - aldi

6 angle grinder cutting discs £6 - local builders merchant

Tin of hammerite £12 - wickes

Two days radio on lots of tea - done.

Welding is expensive if you can't do it, buy a cheapish mig and practice, it'll pay for itself several times over and you'll be surprised the amount of people asking 'can you just weld this up for me for a few quid?'

buy a welder and do it yourself when i bought mine i never thought i would use it as much as i do it's paid for itself many times over

I actually already have a welder, but its just been sat in the shed. Never used the thing. I got it when i had the 90 but ended up selling it on and not repairing it. Unfortunately any welding i do will be on the drive as i havent got a garage - but id rather that than shelling out £1700.

Thanks guys, I thought that quote seemed a bit high

Yup thats mega bucks

quoted high cause they dont want to do it.

1700 for that.jesus. i would just do it yaself you got welder. N an get panels or sheet steel cheap enough.

And then itl be solid.

Im in crewe and ya welcome to get in touch if you need anything

I got quoted £1750 to do the rear crossmember on a disco

I'll do it for £1500

Have a look how much workshops cost to rent these days how much they cost to kit out how much tax on your earnings plus vat insurance water rates buisiness rates

A small workshop will cost around 50 grand a year to open the door thats not including tax or wages

You can do it lots cheaper yourself But can you do it?

Seriously, as a landy owner you'd be better placed investing that £1700 in a course to learn welding...

wilson294 said:

Have a look how much workshops cost to rent these days how much they cost to kit out how much tax on your earnings plus vat insurance water rates buisiness rates

A small workshop will cost around 50 grand a year to open the door thats not including tax or wages

You can do it lots cheaper yourself But can you do it?

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50k pa for a small unit?.. they must have seen you coming

trax said:

50k pa for a small unit?.. they must have seen you coming

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Yep, that will get you 12,000 sq ft of space in a very good location, in retail.

my regular one man band mechanic has his 2 car unit and yard for 8 cars for 400 quid a month.

depends if you think impressions are important or can work smart as to how much space you need.

his shop looks like **** but he is ALWAYS busy as his labour rate is good and his work is reliable.

he charges loads for welding as he tells me (and i agree) it always takes longer than you think..... by the time the issue is pressed and needs repairing - usually find 10 other bits underneath that are fooked and need sorting.

he doesnt want to go there - it ends with a car that cant be moved , but the owner doesnt want to pay the money to fix - quote high , and if they still want it done then its a bonus.

I'm just in the process of getting my boot floor and sills done as I've managed to hit the heady area of preventative rather than 'oh heck' maintenance.

I've stripped everything out of the boot area and just plopped the carpet back down to make it look nice. Hopefully it'll either be my brother in law actually doing it (he does welding for an aircraft maintenance outfit) or I is gonna learn out the back round the father in laws gaff as he's got the room and a garage.

Just lining SWMBO up with what I want for me birfday at the end of the month - gonna try at least for maybe the boot floor or some heavy metal for the sills!!

So you paid two grand in July for a rotten discovery Guess there is a lesson in there somewhere. The first 300tdi I bought was a lemon too!

nathanglasgow said:

So you paid two grand in July for a rotten discovery Guess there is a lesson in there somewhere. The first 300tdi I bought was a lemon too!

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As was mine

Sadly it was the best one of all that I went to see. Everything else is fine and low mileage too. But this is why I bought one, after selling the 90 I missed having something to tinker with.

Anyway, I will be spending this weekend under it cutting out all of the rust and go from there. If I can just get it through the MOT then I can drive it up to my in laws and use his garage to work in.

I will have to do this little bit of welding in the drive, what do people normally do about shielding passers by from the light? Don't want to go blinding the neighbours. Or is that only a problem if you are really close to it?