🚀 go-pugleaf

Ok, first I'd like to thank everyone for all the advice, and I'll 
certainly follow some of the leads. But, since I posted yesterday
I've gotten even more aggravated with the place I took the car to,
namely the Citgo at the corner of Greenbelt Road and Cherrywood Lane,
in front of the Giant near Beltway Plaza. The Greenbelt Citgo.

They failed my '65 Ford Falcon for 4 things:

The muffler was 'too close to the gas tank'. It was 3 inches, I moved
it to 5 inches. It passes

I needed new ball joints, which I got and did myself (showing SOMEWHAT
that I know what I'm doing). That passed.

They ridiculously failed me because my turn signal wouldn't return to
OFF from a right turn, but worked on a left turn. I fixed that though.

Now, the bones of contention: I failed finally because 'the manifold
was not torqued good enough to the exhaust'. I bought good, grade 8
bolts on my way to the station for the reinspect (from True Value at
Beltway Plaza). Then I goofily tried to put them on before continuing
on 200 yds to the Garage. Of course, the manifold was pretty hot, but
I managed to remove both jury-rigged old bolts and put one of the two
new bolts on. I decided not to put the other one on, but took it to the
garage and said 'I fixed everything I failed on, but I'd like you to
put this second bolt on the manifold, since it's too hot now, and I
can't get to it myself good enough anyway'. 

Well, they kept the car SIX days. I also told them to do a front-end
alignment (a good idea after new ball joints). I called them and they
said they hadn't touched the car after six days. I told them NOT to 
do anything except put the bolt on and re-inspect. They called me 
later that day to say they were done with the re-inspect, but that
I'd failed again. This time because now the exhaust pipe hanging too
low, caused by my moving the muffler away from the gas tank. I measured
it at 8 inches from the ground, probably more than about 90% of cars on
the road today. They charged me $25 for the reinspect and 'labor' for
the bolt. I said 'I thought the first re-inspect was FREE'. They said,
'no, we usually charge $6-$10'. I said, 'So, then, you charged me $19
to put ONE BOLT on my car?!?'. The guy said, 'I didn't, you'll have to
talk to the mechanic, I don't know nothin' about it'.

AND, when I asked for the inspection in the first place, I asked them
to perform a tune-up and engine check (because I wanted the timing
set 'professionally', and for all the belts and hoses to be checked).
I drove the car from my house in Greenbelt to the place, about 3 miles,
without incident. Now, I find the car stalls constantly and seems 
grossly out of tune, but I haven't checked everything myself. Should
they warranty a tune-up for 2 weeks?!?

So, what can I do? I don't think they even tuned the car, but charged
me $29 for a tune-up, then they charged me $19 for a bolt, and I'm
afraid they are going to keep nit-picking and failing me for things
I'd already PASSED on, like the exhaust. I want to report them to the
BBB, but I don't think it'll help. I also don't think they'd be convinced
they are doing a lousy job if I told them I and all my friends won't even
buy GAS from them again. This is all from a person who rebuilt this car
myself. I KNOW what goes where on the car. I want satisfaction, recourse,
and a new mechanic that can do a good, honest job on a well running,
unbelievably simple car (with a vanilla 6-cylinder engine). All I ever
NEED is check-ups and things I can't do myself (like alignments and
valve-jobs). God, if they do this to ME, and I KNOW what my engine is
like, what do they do to other people?


thanks,

Brendan