Date: Thu, 9 Mar 2006 01:40:20 -0500
Reply-To: Kim Brennan <kimbrennan@MAC.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Kim Brennan <kimbrennan@MAC.COM>
Subject: Re: Subaru Conversions
In-Reply-To: <2E2A2A1F-1957-4A4C-8A2E-CDE8C69F77F0@mycommunitynet.net>
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You were wondering why the price of the conversion was so high. And
the simple answer is, because you aren't factoring in the LABOR rate
necessary to get it installed by a professional mechanic.
The math is quite clear. $3500 for a kit (say, Tiico) , 40 man hours
of labor. In this area, thats around $85 an hour. In short, close to
$7k for the install.
if you doing the Subaru conversion, there is the price for the
engine. You might get a good one for $500. Or you might have to spend
more. Well, it is a used engine, so it is worthwhile to update a few
things prior to putting it in. That's more man-hours of labor that
you aren't accounting for. Perhaps parts too. Then there is the
wiring. If you do it yourself, that's more man-hours of labor that
you aren't accounting for in the cost. If you pay someone else
(Smallcar for instance), that adds to the overall cost.
In short $7k for getting it installed is not at all unreasonable.
On Mar 9, 2006, at 12:34 AM, Aaron wrote:
> But Kim, If I "charged" myself for every hour that I spent time on
> something, I would either net be able to afford to do anything or be
> extremely poor (but who would I pay?). I consider it paying myself
> instead.
>
> I estimated that it took me around 100 hours of labor. A lot of that
> was figuring out the cooling, making runs to the parts places and
> just sitting around bewildered. Actually the VW engine was out and
> the subaru in with probably 10 hours of labor!
>
> So, if you are taking time out of your job to do the conversion,
> you'll probably lose money. But for those who have some idle time on
> the weekends and evenings or can afford to take some time out of our
> other hobbies, doing it yourself is a great way to not have to spend
> a lot of money. There were actually 2 brothers who did 2 conversion
> in a weekend. I took me around 3 months, so at 100 hours, that's
> around an hour per day. I think of it as an investment in not having
> to an aging VW engine in the future. It's great to connect my palm
> pilot to the OBDII reader and it can lead me to what is wrong. When I
> had a fuel filler line leaking water into the tank, OBDII lead me to
> the problem.
>
> I guess the important thing is that I am happy, I have a 12,000 mile
> subaru engine and I didn't have to spend $3000+ on putting in a
> rebuilt VW engine.
>
>
> On Mar 8, 2006, at 11:27 AM, Kim Brennan wrote:
>
>> How many hours of labor did it take you? Now take those hours and
>> multiply by $60-80 per hour. Say it took you one week of only 40
>> hours. That's an additional $2400-3200 that you did but didn't charge
>> yourself.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mar 8, 2006, at 11:42 AM, Sudhir Desai wrote:
>>
>>> On the subject of price, I really do not understand why the prices
>>> are
>>> so high. :/
>>> I completed my chevy v6 conversion for less than $2500 in parts.
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