On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy goes in depth on the pros and cons of being an auto mechanic. Despite some of our previous episodes, there are many pros to being an auto mechanic. The cars have gotten safer, the shops in many cases have gotten better, and more often than not the shops have come a long way from some of their humble roots. Not to mention that as mechanics, there are tons of ways that we can keep our own cars on the road longer and even occasionally (or constantly...
Aug 14, 2025•1 hr 38 min•Ep. 323
On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy goes down the rabbit hole of toxic management. We go into some of the specifics for what makes a manager or boss toxic: such as unrealistic expectations, nepotism, and much, much more! The good news is that skilled tradesmen of all types, and especially auto mechanics and technicians have ample opportunity to jump ship, because the demand far outweighs the supply. We also go over some of the possible remedies to these conflicts, which mostly revo...
Jul 31, 2025•1 hr 17 min•Ep. 322
On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy is back in the OG Rock and Roll Garage after a Homeric odyssey to get to New York from Texas. As a result, Erik the Producer is in studio to talk about some of the digital tools that we have been working on to help make your lives easier, and make you more money! We are talking Video MPI Training, a fully flushed out K-Plan with some help from our friends in academia, ASE Test Prep, and so much more! We also talk about the brands that we work for...
Jul 10, 2025•1 hr 37 min•Ep. 321
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy rounds out the “you’re e’ffed” saga with part four. As it turns out there are tons of portents of doom when cars roll into your shop. Some vehicle’s even have multiple of these automotive red flags, while others can be false flags. We hit the ever favorite, “gimp mask in the trunk” and raise it with tons of other examples that we have seen throughout the years. What is your favorite? What is one that we didn’t hit on the podcast (editor’s ...
Jun 18, 2025•59 min•Ep. 320
On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy goes into some of the backend programming of our customers in regards to what the media has made our profession out to be for the last 50+ years. As a profession, few trades have been maligned to the extent of the automotive trades, and this is especially true in media depictions. Let’s be clear, we have seen some criminals in this trade -- but it is actually a lot more rare than you would think. However, more often than not the line is a lot mor...
Jun 11, 2025•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 319
On this much delayed episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy takes a look at the entire strata of the typical dealership and informs them of at least one major thing that they should take into consideration in order to make the process seamless. For ownership and boards of directors, it is very hard to get an accurate picture of a dealership’s overall functionality just by the numbers. The numbers can tell you a lot, but it is sometimes hard to put toxic shops or bad processes into numbers. Wo...
May 22, 2025•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 318
On this fairly-sporadic episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy wades into the terminally unhinged forum of LinkedIn to find a concept that everyone deals with in this industry. The term “Emotional Waste” is the concept of negative emotions creating undue stress and occupying an inordinate amount of someone’s time. We all see this, and some of the best people in the industry have the exact opposite going on - Emotional Intelligence. This is the ability to regulate and utilize your emotional st...
Apr 07, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 317
On this week’s Episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy takes a look at some of the real world ramifications of Texas discontinuing their state vehicle safety inspections. The first thing that stood out to us was that it was in fact similar to those in New York, and in fact throughout most of the Rust Belt where we know they are a really good idea. Entropy is the name of the game here, and if something is too rotten to be safe, or tires are too bald to provide adequate traction — they need to g...
Mar 21, 2025•47 min•Ep. 316
On this episode of Grease The Wheels, Uncle Jimmy goes for the trilogy of things that you see roll into your shop that spell doom, because you know you’re eff’d. From poorly done wraps, to harlequin models of cars that are not 90s Golf’s, and underbody lights, there are a lot of things that we see that spell doom and gloom for our profit margin. Seeing an old car that is still being daily driven darkening your door is somehow more of an omen of impending doom than the banshee’s howl, while seein...
Feb 27, 2025•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 315
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy comes up with a list of interview questions for mechanics to observe and take into account when they are looking to move to a new shop. Is there enough parking, are there enough bathrooms, and where exactly did all of these dead and abandoned cars come from? There are tons of criteria that we use when evaluating where we are going to work, but this episode brings a lot of them to life with some of the most insane examples you’ve ever heard...
Feb 14, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 314
On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy goes to practical goal building mode for 2025. Getting better isn’t going to be negotiable in 2025, as the pace of technological change in the cars is continuing at break-neck speed. Look at the year end total for your W-2, divide it by your hourly rate and that gets you near how many hours you worked. This of course isn’t taking into effect all of the house that you turned but didn’t get paid for! It also doesn’t get into the amount of hours tha...
Jan 30, 2025•52 min•Ep. 313
On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy revisits some of the common signs and portents of things that you know are going to result in a rough day in the shop. From bullet holes and hypodermic needles, to an entire goodwill inventory of clothes in a trunk where you need to replace a battery, there is little limit to the chaos and carnage that customer roll in on a daily basis. We also go into a scientific breakdown for an answer to every single complaint about a sunroof. Also Uncle Jimm...
Jan 17, 2025•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 312
On this episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy lifts the cover off of one of the truly weird and genuinely innovative technician/mechanic development programs: The K-Plan. Developed with the help of people way smarter than us, the K-Plan lays out all of the areas of knowledge that someone will need to be successful as a mechanic, with tailored resources for that particular shop. It utilizes technician development bonuses to encourage institutional and brand specific knowledge in order to lead...
Dec 12, 2024•59 min•Ep. 311
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy gets back to proper form and takes customers to task. Every area has that one shop that when you see a car roll in with their plate frames, you know you’re (more specifically the customer) are eff’d. Dozens of bumperstickers, turning your interior into a series of various claymore landmines and much, much more! This series literally wrote itself, but if you have some specific examples please let us know over on the Facebook page. Also Uncl...
Nov 27, 2024•58 min•Ep. 310
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy unveils the K-Plan. This is a system that shops and dealerships can use to basically build a farm system for their new technicians while rewarding the technicians that train them to a level of autonomous productivity. It benchmarks what people know against what the new people have to learn, providing clear expectations for knowledge and how a shop wants things done. We also get into the Master-Apprentice relationship and what that needs to...
Nov 14, 2024•58 min•Ep. 309
On this weeks episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy gets into how to get along with your coworkers better. As the weather begins to cool, yes even in Texas, the doors of the shop are going to stay closed more often and you’ll be working in closer quarters. The better that you all get along determines the overall vibe in the back of the house as well, so try to be helpful and courteous. Creating a cohesive atmosphere in the shop is important to getting along, which can make you more money in ...
Oct 30, 2024•1 hr 14 min•Ep. 308
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy wades into the foggy, brutal game that is internet reviews. In many ways reviews are one of the most important parts of your business, often taking massive precedence in the way that your company appears through search results. This allows customers to quickly form an opinion on your company, with huge potential upsides when you treat customers right. However, in the situation of many auto repair shops, the customer comes with preloaded an...
Oct 17, 2024•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 307
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy takes a serious look at mental health with way more F-Bombs than Dr. Phil could ever muster. Due to the potentially disturbing nature of this show, we are actually going to put up a content warning for marked discussions on Suicide, while putting a link to the relevant people below. This is a big deal in this industry, worldwide and since the pandemic specifically. We as an industry don’t talk about mental health very often, and when we do...
Oct 09, 2024•59 min•Ep. 306
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy weaves between the extremely specific and the bigger picture when it comes to diagnosis. Having the right tools, being able to read things like wiring diagrams, and having an understanding of suspension components are all going to aid your diagnosis of vehicles - but one of the most overlooked ones is the new systems training. As the products that the manufacturers turn out become more and more complex, the people who need to fix these sys...
Oct 03, 2024•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 305
On this week’s episode of Grease the wheels, Uncle Jimmy enters the nebulous and often fantastical realm of warranty labor times. There are a host of problems with this system, mainly that no one can agree EXACTLY how the labor time is produced. The secondary problem with this is that the manufacturer is trying to pay their dealerships as little as humanly possible for what is often an error in quality control or a third party vendor. Then we get to aftermarket warranties - and Uncle Jimmy absol...
Sep 27, 2024•1 hr 12 min
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, we talk about the absolute basics that people should know about their cars in a revisit on the concept of “Automotive Kindergarten” . We exist because the vast majority of people who own a car today have no idea how they work. They just know that when they dont - it is going to cost them time and money. Where the misconception comes in is that we as the technicians are not ripping them off, but we have covered that one before. We get into the nitty gr...
Sep 19, 2024•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 303
On this week’s episode of Grease the wheels, we apply some “yang” to last week’s “ying” of putting Service Advisors and Service Managers to the rack. The episode title comes from the customers in this case, which we make readily apparent. We go over some of the dumbest, most out of line, and most dramatically overblown customer reactions as well as some of their less than reasonable moments for calling a shop. From using quarter clutch and getting mad at the technician, to calling the manufactur...
Sep 12, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 302
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy comes off of summer break and gets medieval on Service Advisors. If you can see the cords hanging out of a set of tires, you really don’t need a tire gauge to tell you they are smoked. All we are asking for is that you ask for the sale, don’t avoid customers, and make sense with the repair order. That’s it! We get into some of the ways that a service advisor can be great, but a lot of them should not be in the business in the first place! ...
Sep 06, 2024•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 301
On this week’s (on time!) episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy takes a look at last week’s episode through a new set of parameters with a little more of a preservation minded end. There are a lot of reasons why people do not want to become automotive technicians, but the ones who do need to be properly developed. We can’t be chasing them out of the building with massive tool debts and little to no professional development. The rear rub here is with management trying to keep wages stagnant a...
Aug 22, 2024•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 300
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy makes some of his own lists as to why people are not joining the automotive trades, although the current slate of youngsters is picking it up more than the millennials and Gen X did. There are tons of reasons both internal to the shop and external that cause people to leave the automotive profession. Societal pressures for 4 year degrees, lack of access, and even a lack of passion for vehicles have caused the ranks to dwindle - but the rea...
Aug 14, 2024•1 hr 26 min•Ep. 299
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy goes into what the internet thinks is the top 10 causes of cars breaking down. Some of these haven’t been relevant in almost 30 years, while some of these we have never seen once in our wrenching careers - this is a bit dated so we have a fair bit of fun with it. In a weird semantic sort of argument, a lot of these are more “reasons why your car isn’t working in the first place” rather than the cause of mid-trip breakdowns. We also get int...
Aug 01, 2024•1 hr 57 min•Ep. 298
In this week’s heavily delayed episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy talks about the people who think the world revolves around them. We also do a seriously deep dive on the differences between being confident and being arrogant - turns out it's a pretty fine line dictated entirely by how you treat people! You can have tons of knowledge and use it for all the right reasons, but the minute you can’t back it up, or problems are suddenly not you daily - you’ve made the switch. Confidence isn’t ...
Jul 22, 2024•1 hr 27 min•Ep. 297
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, Uncle Jimmy takes aim at the divide that exists in many dealerships between the sales and fixed ops departments. It has been noted by several sources that while many techs could sell a car in a pinch - almost no one in your sales department could do anything if they needed to prep a car for delivery, or fix something that was going wrong with it. With the way that the internet is going they really shouldn’t act too big for their britches, but we are a...
Jul 04, 2024•56 min
On this week’s episode of Grease the wheels, Uncle Jimmy ventures into pseudo actual journalism talking about the recent cyber attack and ransomware woes of CDK. This one was a big one- big ransome and big outage. This has completely crippled thousands of shops and dealerships across the country being locked out of the software that they use to run the business both front and back, as the articles seemed to have forgotten about the back of the house. Being a solutions oriented person like all of...
Jun 27, 2024•50 min•Ep. 295
On this week’s episode of Grease the Wheels, we go into some easy ways to avoid a coronary - taking your vacation! Studies have proven that people who actually take their vacation tend to experience a myriad of positive effects when they are out of the office, and this is especially true when your office is a shop. Too many techs take their days off in the form of a check, and this isn’t always the best thing. Taking a day off here and a day off there is a good way to break up the monotony and a...
Jun 20, 2024•58 min•Ep. 294
