Clean Is Better

So I went last weekend to do some more hours at the Bavarian Garage and we got busy! We had a car waiting for us right when we walked in. I worked with Nick, one of the mechanics and we did work on few different cars. We first changed the "halo ring" part of the headlights on a early 2000's BMW, which required us to take the entire bumper off, which was ridiculous but had to be done. We also did an oil change and a brake flush on that same car. Then we moved on the to the next car and replaced the radiator, water pump, and thermostat which took us around an hour. The I worked with Jojo, the "Big Dog" around the shop who has had over thirty years experience working on BMW's at the dealership. He showed me how to change the brakes and rotors on the last car and he did in amazingly fast, he did the rear wheels in about 15 minutes. What I learned that day from Nick the mechanic was that the main goal of the shop is to keep everything clean, he says "clean is better!". The main goal for the shop is to keep there customers cars running cleanly and effectively, to do all of the work for the owners. It was a great experience meeting and working with Jojo and I'm looking forward to my next visit.

Blog 6: Second Interview Preparation

1. My mentor is Pedro Miranda and he is the owner of the Bavarian Garage. A BMW maintenance and repair shop.

2. My five questions I will ask:

      1. What made you want to work on BMW's and open up your own shop?
      2. Where did you start your journey to becoming a BMW specialist?
      3. What was the most challenging part of getting where you are now?
      4. How did you open up your own shop?
      5. What was the biggest factor that helped you to succeed in opening your own shop? 

Blog 5 - Mentorship Reflection

1. My experience getting a mentor was not very difficult for me. One reason is that contributed to an easy search for me was the seemingly never ending supply of mechanics shops to ask around my house and at one point I even considered making my own grandpa my mentor since he has had plenty of experience and know-how to teach me lots about auto repair. I have always loved cars and motorcycles, it's in the blood of my whole family, which also made it easier because many of my uncles and cousins are mechanics themselves, and know plenty of other mechanics for me to try and ask. But before I made my final decision to make my grandpa my mentor, I had came up on a great opportunity. My step dad is a barber and cuts peoples hair from all over the place, he happened to be cutting our friend Nick the mechanic's hair and told him about it and he told me to speak to PJ or Pedro, the owner of the BMW shop he worked at and to ask him about it. So I asked him and he was willing to let me come in a and learn, and things went on since then and he has been great so far. 

2. I would say that the most important article I have read so far has been, "What That Car Really Costs To Own" because it answered a lot of the questions I had about BMW's and there cost to own. It gave good statistics on many different cars which gave good insight on how much it would be. For example, they gave a table that showed the ratio of an assortment of cars' costs in the time of five years, the ratio was comparing operating costs with carrying costs, carrying costs consisting of depreciation, interest, and tax while operating costs consists of fuel, insurance, maintenance and repair costs. This gave a great look on how each cars expenses change over time, and really showed me how much a really nice car costs to own over a good amount of time.