I've posted here before on my experience with mechanics in the area who have worked on my TDI. Here's a recap and update:
Bugaid
Finetuning
Union Bay Garage (u-village)
The short version is I actually better trust Bugaid now for TDI specific jobs. Union Bay Garage was closer to where I lived and I had them do some non-TDI specific jobs, such as brakes. Union Bay also did a stellar if not dirty job of cleaning out my windshield cowl that was causing water to leak into my cabin when it rained.
I had Fine Tuning do some work and while I think they did good work, it did take longer than at Bug Aid and they gave me a very long list of "recommended work", which totaled over $5000. About $3500 of the work was not necessary and it took a while to sort out the frass from the essential. My hunch is that they treat every car as if it is a high-end race car. I don't want the BEST for my car, I just want essential work done well at a fair price. Fine Tuning didn't seem to understand me as a customer, where Bug Aid did.
To be fair, Fine Tuning found a problem with a job that Bugaid had done previously. FT suggested that I go to Bugaid and see if they would make good on the repair rather than offering to do the job themselves. It involved the rebuild of my injector pump ($700+ job at Bugaid) that BA had done not quite 12 months prior. One of the main seals was leaking and it was pretty obvious. I went to BA and told them what was going on and they looked at it and said, "we don't usually replace that seal because it doesn't usually need it unless you run a lot of biodiesel". Somehow they missed the fact that I had told them I run bio or the giant "powered by biodiesel" vinyl on the rear bumper. They said to replace that seal basically involved the same amount of labor to replace the one seal as it does to rebuild the entire IP again. They cut me a very good deal to fix the problem and he said, while we're at it, we could put a new timing belt on there for you for just the cost of the belt (he said he checked the rollers, etc and they were fine), so this made it an especially good deal. It showed they cared for me as a customer and helped smooth over the ill feelings I had previously. I wasn't quite due for a timing belt...I think I had another 15k or so to go, but this saved me a chunk of money. In any case, Bugaid won my trust back...they seemed to understand me as a customer and did good work for a fair price. If I go back again (I no longer live in Seattle) I'll be sure to emphasize that I do use biodiesel and to not cut corners on things like seals.
I originally lost faith in Bugaid because I thought the owner was trying to screw me (he said I needed a new timing belt 6 months after he had replaced it!) and I now wonder if his head just wasn't right because he had apparently been in a pretty bad car accident. I didn't see the owner (or maybe he no longer is) last time I was there (for said IP seal fix) and one of the main employees seemed to be running the shop, or at least that was my impression.
I would go back to Fine Tuning if it came that I needed my Instrument Cluster replaced. I've been having sporadic weird spasm of my IC panel where lots of beepers go off and the RPM guage goes haywire and lots of lights flash but the car drives just fine. No one seems to have an answer as to why this was happening based upon any codes, including Fine Tuning. But Chris there gave the best answer so far, which was possibly the ECU or the IC was failing. I do get some occasional "IC intermittment" codes. Chris also mentioned that the tool required to program the IC to the car is only in possession by the dealers and him, which I don't know is true or not. But if it is, I'd rather go to him than a dealer.
Back to Union Bay Garage...they have done minor work on my TDI as well as more serious work on my wife's Subaru. They've been pretty good for us and more convenient. They said they do work on TDIs all the time, but so far I've yet to hear a TDI testimonial from a customer of theirs.
