CHEAP EBAY PARTS. If you're looking for a place to fix your car, only to have it break 6k miles…read morelater? Then this is the shop for you! What exactly happened you might ask? Let me explain. I Bought this car in Ohio with 141k on the odometer. I was fully aware that the car had just been rebuilt due to failed head gaskets. Anyone who knows anything about Subarus, knows this is a super common repair, but also a tad challenging because it requires a full tear down of the engine to access them.
Anyways I purchased the car, drove it ~250 miles home, and enjoyed it for another 6k miles before tragedy struck. To keep this review short I'll get straight to the point. During the head gasket repair, this shop replaced the timing belt as well, also a very common practice. In doing so however, they decided to install cheap eBay parts. The parts failed, causing my timing to be thrown off and essentially destroying my engine.
Now this is where it gets interesting. I took my car to my local automotive shop, and got it rebuilt for just under 3k. After getting my car back and talking to my mechanic, he gave me the scoop on what had failed and why. It was the timing belt tensioner.
I took this information and with the help of the receipts the previous owner had given me from the initial repair, I was able to track down and contact this shop. "fix all" automotive. I talked to the owner, and knew I was in trouble. The first thing that I heard was denial.
They tried denying that they ever did the timing belt, but I kept telling them that the receipts proved otherwise. Then once they finally admitted to doing it, their next argument was that he doesn't work on Subarus, and that mine was the last one they ever worked on. I tried to tell them that that's not my problem and what they did cost me three THOUSAND dollars (which is a lot of money for someone who is 18), but they kept blaming it on the fact that they don't normally work on Subarus.
Finally, after conversing with them for some time, they stated that my car was scheduled to come in for a "re-tightening" after 5k miles, which was not true but that's not the point. Whoever is reading this, you must know that that is not standard practice for any vehicle as far as I am aware. I have talked around with many mechanics and while thy say it could be helpful, it shouldn't be, and isn't, necessary if the job is done right.
Now, approximately 5 months later and many phone calls, they aren't going to put a dime towards the expensive mess THEY created. This shop might do good work but my experience with them was incredibly costly and irritating. This shop has ZERO integrity and will not take responsibility for their actions. Anyway, if anyone is genuinely curious to actually see the part that broke, I have it but I am unable to upload pics to this website as far as I am aware.