Arable farm, about nine hundred acres
The combine that stopped three times in one week
The machine cut out at random and restarted after ten minutes.
An illustrative composite, not one job
Agricultural contractor
The module the dealer said was no longer available
One self-propelled machine, fourteen years old
What was happening
A control unit had stopped driving one section of the machine. The unit was obsolete, no replacement was available new, and the used ones offered would each have needed programming the machine could no longer receive.
What was done
The supplies and grounds reaching the unit were measured first, on the machine, to establish that the unit was genuinely at fault. Then a bench assessment, then component-level repair. One bench hour plus four.
What it turned out to be
Two of the output driver stages had failed and the board had corrosion at one corner where water had tracked down the harness. Drivers replaced, the corrosion cleaned back and the tracks repaired, and the unit went back with its original programming intact. The harness leak that let the water in was repaired at the same time, which is the half of this that stops it happening again.
Every case study on this site is an illustrative composite assembled from several jobs. No customer is named, no vehicle is identifiable, and there is not a single testimonial on this website attributed to a person — a fabricated one would be the one genuinely dishonest thing a workshop's website can do.
The piece of work
Component-level board repair
Cracked joints, corrosion, a failed regulator or driver stage, swollen capacitors, damaged pins. The unit keeps the programming it already has, which is the part that saves the money.
How that figure is arrived at
- Bench hour× two$250
- The same rate, at the long end× six$750
- Parts, if any are neededcost + 20%separate
- Labour for this jobtwo to six hours$250 to $750
The bench hour is $125 and it is on the rates page. That multiplication is the whole of the labour charge: no callout fee on top of it, no shop supplies percentage and no environmental levy. It is the cost of the work — it is not a quotation for a vehicle nobody has seen.
The first hour: Confirming the fault on the bench under the same conditions that produced it in the vehicle, because a unit that behaves on a bench supply is telling you the fault is somewhere else.
What you are left holding: The repaired unit, bench-tested under load before it goes back, and a written note of what was replaced.
The other three
More of the same kind of thing
Haulage, general freight
The yard that kept flattening batteries over a weekend
Three units in nine would not start on a Monday.
An illustrative composite, not one job
Plumbing and heating, four vans
The van that was booked in for an alternator and did not need one
The battery light came on intermittently and the previous shop had replaced the alternator eleven months earlier for the same symptom.
An illustrative composite, not one job
$145 a workshop hour · $185 on site · agreed before it starts
Describe the symptom, or just telephone
The symptom check takes about three minutes and gives you a written summary of which circuits would be tested first and why, with the hours and the published rate against each. It is an indicative scope and not a diagnosis — nobody has seen the vehicle — but it is a better opening than a blank contact form. If you would rather skip it, the telephone works.