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Re: TR Brake Question - The Answer

To: "'TR Mailing List'" <triumphs@autox.team.net>
Subject: Re: TR Brake Question - The Answer
From: Hoyt <hoyt@cavtel.net>
Date: Sun, 30 Oct 2005 22:55:19 -0500
On Sunday 30 October 2005 05:40 pm, JB@comcast wrote:
> That my friend.........
>
> <<Whoops, I forgot to add the seal.>>
>
> Is EXACTLY why folks should NOT re-build BRAKE components!!!
>
> It is not just YOUR life but other folks on the road!!!
>

I don't see how the facts support your implied assertion that non-professional 
mechanics should not do their own brake work.

Guy tested his work and found the fault before he drove the car. What's wrong 
with that? He certainly would have found the problem when he tried to bleed 
the brakes. If Guy were the kind of mechanic who would have forgotten to 
bleed the brakes, that would be a serious problem, but he just doesn't strike 
me that way. 

While auto mechanics is not as difficult to understand as, say, quantum 
mechanics, basic skills and knowledge can handle simple systems such as those 
found on our beloved Triumphs, especially if we can re-assemble in reverse 
order. For modern vehicles, expert training is mandatory for all but the 
simplest tasks.

>
> PS:  As an example, I do not spend $2475 (last year) by signing a document
> that is an attachment to my Shop Keeppers Insurence!!!  Must mean
> something<G>?!?

Not necessarily, at least not in the way you intend.

I applaud your personal professional commitment, but I have encountered shoddy 
work performed by licensed and insured mechanics, so the document itself is 
no guarantee of competency. Insurance is just a means to shift the risk of 
your potential financial loss to the insurance carrier; it is in no way a 
guarantee or warranty of your performance. 

Nor is a professional license for that matter, because competency rests on the 
application of skills by the individual, not a piece of paper. Yet that's not 
foolproof, since even the best amongst us have the occasional bad day. If you 
doubt that, why would any shopkeeper even bother with insurance?

The real risk (other than random chance) is that the amateur mechanic will not 
hire out the work at the appropriate time because he or she lacks the 
experience to make that decision. That's unfortunate, but there's little that 
can be done short of making the shade tree mechanic a criminal because human 
beings will certainly do stupid things all the time, occasionally with fatal 
consequence.

If criminalization were a serious consideration, I would first prefer to 
prosecute all the amateur body and fender mechanics. Many of them should burn 
in some special, Bondo-encrusted Hell . . .

-- 
Hoyt
1954 TR2    TS561L
1959 TR3A  TS33111L
1960 TR3A  TS43923L
1960 TR3A  TS74076L
1961 TR3A  TS63304L


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