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My name is Jeff, and I'd like to welcome you on a journey of reflection and insight into the tolls and triumphs of a career in automotive repair.
After more than 20 years of skinned knuckles and tool debt, I want to share my perspective and hear other people's thoughts about our industry.
So pour yourself a strong coffee or grab a cold Canadian beer and get ready for some great conversation.
[00:00:00] JT the Car Guy: I'm gonna go in with the top quality part, and in my opinion, the part that Mopar suggests, OEM, is what I like to go with. There are customers that demand, "No, I want the aluminum cooler." Okay, I'm never gonna fight anybody on what you want me to put on your car. I'm gonna put an alu- aluminum Derbi cooler on it, but that is my whole beef with that, and I had to- Mm-hmm
[00:00:28] JT the Car Guy: refrain from yelling out, you know, the proper name, so I revised the name to my liking, but it still baffled me how some people don't know why I call it that. We living in a free speech society. You should. Freedom of speech society, where I should be able to say what I want to say, right? Yes. But there are consequences to what you say.
[00:00:46] JT the Car Guy: I don't want to end up in court, you know, for defamation
[00:00:57] Jeff Compton: Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to another exciting episode of the Jaded Mechanic Podcast. Um, it is a s- well, it feels like autumn already up here, but it's not. It's still only September. But, uh, your boy went fishing this morning, and it was the first time that he didn't wear shorts. It's, it's cold.
[00:01:12] Jeff Compton: We're up into the, we're up into the 50s already in the morning, so in your, like, 50s, that's that metric stuff. But yeah, 55 degrees Fahrenheit was what it was this morning when we kicked the boat in. And, uh, we caught some fish, but it was, uh, it's- it's tough. Um- Oh, yeah ... we had some fog still on the water when we launched, and, um, I was thinking about, like, "Wow, this is gonna be gone really fast," so I'm just enjoying it while I can.
[00:01:34] Jeff Compton: Um, we got a new friend of mine on tonight, and, um, s- a lot of people, I think, are gonna recognize the face and the voice and the name. Um, but those who don't, I really wanted to bring him on and highlight because he- he did a shout-out for me almost a year ago, um, with an episode with Eric the Car Guy, and I th- I was watching back again and finally got it around to, you know, 'cause, like, you know me, it's hard to keep up with everybody.
[00:01:58] Jeff Compton: So I finally got into watching a lot of his recent content, and he's a Chrysler technician, um, or I guess you'd say Stellantis now. Uh, for me- ... I'm an old-school cat like him. It's all a mo- part of me. Uh, JT the Car Guy, how are you, bro?
[00:02:13] JT the Car Guy: I'm good, man. I'm good. Thanks for having me on, man.
[00:02:16] Jeff Compton: Oh, dude, this has been, this is overdue, really.
[00:02:18] Jeff Compton: Like, I've been, like I was saying before we got on, I've been a big fan of yours for a long time, and it was, uh, just a situation that, like, I- I was going back through, and I'd saw how you had been... You've got your own YouTube channel. You got two channels, don't you, JT?
[00:02:32] JT the Car Guy: Oh, yeah, man. I had to because some things I can speak about on, it su- it's weird about on my YouTube mechanic channel- Yeah
[00:02:39] JT the Car Guy: they only wanna see assholes and elbows, cars- Yeah ... working on cars. They don't wanna hear nothing about the other side of the industry.
[00:02:46] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:02:46] JT the Car Guy: And best believe there are other sides to the industry- Yeah ... political sides, all kinds of crazy stuff.
[00:02:51] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm. So
[00:02:52] JT the Car Guy: I had no choice but to create a, uh, another channel so I can speak freely in this type of setting.
[00:02:58] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:02:58] JT the Car Guy: You know, I'm not in a shop. I'm not dirty. I'm not working on a wrench, so I can actually put a, a American hat on and, uh, and go with the flow.
[00:03:06] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:03:07] JT the Car Guy: But-
[00:03:07] Jeff Compton: And now how long you been on YouTube?
[00:03:09] JT the Car Guy: Ooh, man. You, you know what's funny? The weird thing about YouTube is I started doing... If you look at my vid- my channel, I started with, uh, music videos.
[00:03:18] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:03:18] JT the Car Guy: Okay? But I've been a mechanic forever, a long time.
[00:03:21] Jeff Compton: Right.
[00:03:21] JT the Car Guy: So it just dawned on me, since this is what I really know and I can regurgitate, you know, as far as teaching this, why didn't I start this channel a long time ago?
[00:03:31] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:03:31] JT the Car Guy: Okay? Especially back in the heyday. So I'm actually knocking myself in the head for not starting my automotive channel a longer time ago- Right
[00:03:40] JT the Car Guy: okay, up until now. But, uh, if I had to guess, it's been solid for the last, I don't know, eight years maybe.
[00:03:46] Jeff Compton: Good for you, bro. Yeah. Good for
[00:03:47] JT the Car Guy: you, man. Yeah. Back when YouTube was really paying. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. You know, they, they going through some changes now, but, uh, I got in when, uh... In fact, my daughter got married off YouTube salary, and my house got...
[00:04:00] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, the money was really flowing at that
[00:04:02] Jeff Compton: time. Good for you, JT. It was lovely. And, and so, and you know me, we were talking before we got on, like, I, I've been, I've been on the social media space for, damn, it feels like 15 years, right? In a sense of sh- you know, sharing. So we get to talking back about the, the, the guest that really reached out, you know, between, and kind of got us together was Eric the Car Guy, one of the old school, the really the OGs of, of that kind of our content- Yeah
[00:04:28] Jeff Compton: on YouTube, right? And you said some really nice things about the interview with, with, um, that I did with him last year at SEMA. Yeah. And I came back around to that, and again, I'm like, "I gotta reach out and get to know JT a little bit better," because I love watching, like, I watch a lot of your content because it's relatable to me, right?
[00:04:44] Jeff Compton: It's in the Chrysler store. And, um- Yeah ... you know, but I don't put up, like you've seen me, I don't do how-to videos. I don't do repair videos. A lot of people, I think- Mm-hmm ... don't even think I'm a mechanic, right? 'Cause it's like I just sit here and talk. Um- But, uh, the reason I tell everybody I don't do that is because, like, I'm not very good with the detractors.
[00:05:04] Jeff Compton: You know what I mean? Or the critics and stuff, and you, you're better at it than me.
[00:05:08] JT the Car Guy: Oof.
[00:05:08] Jeff Compton: Um, but you get a lot of them, don't you?
[00:05:11] JT the Car Guy: Oh, my goodness. The comment section, especially some of my videos. Now, here's a crazy thing. I don't expect everybody to agree with me.
[00:05:18] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:18] JT the Car Guy: But for those that don't, they let it be known that they don't agree with you.
[00:05:21] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. They'll tell you you're wrong, you don't know what the hell you're talking about. And I, I do my best to, to stay cordial in the comments section, but when it start getting out of control, uh- Mm-hmm ... I just start speaking my mind. Yeah. And I've been censored by YouTube telling me, "You can't say that.
[00:05:37] JT the Car Guy: You can't..." Because I get in the comments section to tell you how I feel after you tell me how you feel.
[00:05:42] Jeff Compton: Exactly.
[00:05:43] JT the Car Guy: So my comment is based off, my reply is based off your comment.
[00:05:47] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:47] JT the Car Guy: So if you coming at me foul, I gotta work on that. Yeah. I got to work on that because, yeah.
[00:05:52] Jeff Compton: Now, to kind of start at the beginning, JT, how long you been doing this?
[00:05:55] Jeff Compton: What, how did you kind of get your, dip your toe into the auto repair world?
[00:06:00] JT the Car Guy: Oh, my goodness. What's the backstory there? You know, it's crazy. I went to trade school and, you know, a- as usual, it turned out to be a waste of time and money. Mm-hmm. In other words, I didn't need it to get in the door.
[00:06:11] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:06:11] JT the Car Guy: So I started with, um, National Car Rental as a service agent.
[00:06:15] JT the Car Guy: Uh, that got bored washing cars, so I moved into the shop, and from there I went to Lincoln Tech, a trade school.
[00:06:22] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:06:22] JT the Car Guy: And, uh, uh, got my foot in the door at the shop. And my first dealer was a Chevrolet dealership, but this was a long time ago. But once I got in with Chrysler and the A604, I don't know if you're familiar with that transmission.
[00:06:35] JT the Car Guy: Yeah,
[00:06:36] Jeff Compton: yeah.
[00:06:36] JT the Car Guy: The 41TE transmission now it's called. That thing gave Chrysler hell. Mm. Everybody was making a killing off of repairing it. Once I got into Chrysler dealership and started working on those, building those, uh, I just stu- hung around. Mm-hmm. I just stuck with Chrysler for the last, over two decades now, so.
[00:06:53] Jeff Compton: Wow. Good
[00:06:54] JT the Car Guy: for you. Long. I do not regret it. Yeah.
[00:06:56] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:06:57] JT the Car Guy: I do not regret that decision at all. Chrysler- Oh, you know, it's been good to me as far as- Oh ... the training. Yeah.
[00:07:04] Jeff Compton: Yeah. Bro, I, I say it all the time, like everybody, they get... That, that brand gets so much hate. But I mean- It do ... like, it, it was so good for me when I was in the dealer like, 'cause I'm not the fastest tech in the world, but I mean, even if I could make money working at Chrysler- Yeah
[00:07:17] Jeff Compton: then like, you know, it was, it was a good brand for me. And you can agree, I think, they were, they were predictable failures. You know what I mean? Like, they followed patterns, you know? Oh, yeah. Shared platform, like it was great. Like, we, we got talking before we came on, he says, "Oh, so you hit it when the PT Cruiser..."
[00:07:34] Jeff Compton: And I'm like- Oh, yeah ... "Yeah, I can remember those things." Like-
[00:07:37] JT the Car Guy: Oh ...
[00:07:37] Jeff Compton: I-
[00:07:38] JT the Car Guy: Was it the old- Oh, yeah,
[00:07:39] Jeff Compton: hate 'em ...
[00:07:39] JT the Car Guy: 2001- Yeah ... that thing first showed up. I was there during the launch. When they first launched, they made a big deal out of it.
[00:07:45] Jeff Compton: Oh.
[00:07:46] JT the Car Guy: And, and, and, um, the, it's funny you bring that up. That PT Cruiser had a eight-year run.
[00:07:51] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:07:52] JT the Car Guy: So sales, you know what dictate continued production is sales.
[00:07:57] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
[00:07:58] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. So if you got a eight-year run, that means that car is selling, and it sold a lot of units to have a eight-year run. What is the... What's normal run? Five years and they change up on you?
[00:08:08] Jeff Compton: Yeah. I
[00:08:09] JT the Car Guy: mean- Maybe five, make it four or five
[00:08:11] Jeff Compton: you know, we're not, we're not talking like, um, you're talking models. Like, we're not gonna say the r- the Ram is go- you know, is the legendary, and the Caravan, like, I mean- Yeah ... it built industry and, and will always be a Caravan, I think, as long as there's a, a Mopar badge, there'll always be a Caravan. Yeah.
[00:08:26] Jeff Compton: But yeah- Yeah ... d- when- When I remember they hit, it was one of the few cars that went above sticker. Like you could get into bidding war, people wanted them so bad. You know what I mean? And now you don't see that happening, AJT, other than like- Hmm ... maybe a Hellcat or something like that. Oh, yeah. But it's just people are not coming in and paying above the sticker to have.
[00:08:45] Jeff Compton: But that little car, man, for whatever reason, the, the hype that was around the launch or what the retro styling, people just had to have that little thing.
[00:08:54] JT the Car Guy: Retro style. You
[00:08:55] Jeff Compton: know?
[00:08:55] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. It, yeah, that, that thing, uh, that's, that's when, that's how... I, I'm known, I, I'm in a, a lot of the PT Cruiser forums and the- Mm
[00:09:02] JT the Car Guy: Facebook channels and all that. They call me JT Cruiser over there- ... because they, I'm the go-to guy. That's, that's really what helped my channel, YouTube channel push- Yeah ... uh, during the PT Cruiser era. Now, I don't talk about them much. You know why? Because we don't see them at all.
[00:09:17] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:09:18] JT the Car Guy: Our diagnostic time charge exceed the value of the average PT Cruiser.
[00:09:24] JT the Car Guy: It- we charge $250 to check your car out.
[00:09:26] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:09:27] JT the Car Guy: The average PT Cruiser roll in no more than worth $500. So-
[00:09:31] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[00:09:31] JT the Car Guy: after we charge you one-hour diag to check it out, you totaled, you know, at that point because it's gonna make two hours for whatever your problem is. So, but people seem to, uh, seek me out for the hard-to-repair problems.
[00:09:45] JT the Car Guy: And yeah, I had to work on that because I had to mask where I work. I didn't want nobody knowing where I work because you don't know who to trust and you don't know- Yeah ... yeah, it gets crazy. So I never could tell anybody my location- Mm-hmm ... where I work at. And- Yeah ... Fluffy said he had the same problems.
[00:10:02] JT the Car Guy: He had to- Yep ... keep that under wraps. You can't just walk around with your camera. I don't have the freedom to record like, you know, say, uh, uh, Eric the Car Guy or- Yeah ... not Eric, uh, Rayman, Ray. Yeah. All those guys with their own shop Freedom is some serious issues, some serious things to have. Yeah And I can't just walk around the shop filming 'cause, uh, that's not my shop.
[00:10:24] Jeff Compton: No. And, and- You know? ... the dealers don't like it. I mean, we- Ooh ... we'll get talking about this, uh, I don't know if you've seen that one case yet of that, we'll get talking about him later, the young Toyota technician. Toyota? Yeah. Oh. Toyota guy- Yeah ... on, on TikTok. Um, I was the same. I never, like, I never... Well, by the time I got out of the dealer, and even my last tenures at the other brands, I never wanted to film in the dealership, right?
[00:10:47] Jeff Compton: Like, I mean- Yeah ... I wanted to just kinda talk about what I did, and I didn't want to... Not that I was against putting information out there, but I'm a better person to discuss what I do, the, the, the- Mm-hmm ... the ins and outs of the industry, than to instruct somebody on how to do something. 'Cause I tell everybody all the time, like, if you watched me go down a diag, you would think that I was like a s- like a squirrel, like a, like ADHD is bad with me.
[00:11:14] Jeff Compton: 'Cause it's, but it's so much, and you can relate, JT, for me it's so much intuition and experience and, and, you know, I watch you and it's the same thing. When you've got that level of knowledge on the product, you know, you go so fast, right? With how you decide where you're going that it, to a lot of people as a, as a lesson, it's not that good.
[00:11:32] Jeff Compton: But as somebody- Yeah ... that's trying to, uh, what might be wrong with mine, it's what they wanna see, you know?
[00:11:39] JT the Car Guy: Y- yeah, but I tell people that what I find wrong with a car not necessarily the same thing you gonna find, even if the symptoms are the same.
[00:11:47] Jeff Compton: Sure. But-
[00:11:48] JT the Car Guy: And, and, and that's the advantage I have of working on a brand, so to speak.
[00:11:53] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:11:53] JT the Car Guy: I see it all the time. Yeah. So, you know, don't bring me no Toyota and ask me to quickly find out what's wrong with your Toyota. Bring me what I'm good at. And the good part about this is, uh, what I'm good at, the brand that I work on, specialize in, there's plenty of work to be had.
[00:12:10] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:12:10] JT the Car Guy: You know what I'm saying?
[00:12:11] JT the Car Guy: So I'm always I'm always busy, dude. Uh-huh. So I never, I never had to, "Well, let me, let me go figure out what's going on with this Chevrolet or Nissan-" Yeah ... "or whatever," like that. Yeah, so I'm, I'm okay being called a one-dimensional tech. I hear it all the time. "Man, you don't do nothing but Chrysler. That's all you know."
[00:12:29] JT the Car Guy: I'm cool with that. I'm very busy doing just that, and nothing is freaking my toolbox out. The, the, the crazy thing about working on everything, and, and guys, let me tell you, let me say this, I have mad respect for mechanics that work on everything. Those Ray Man Rays, you know, uh, Eric O, all those guys, they, whatever come in the shop, they, they gonna work on it and figure it out.
[00:12:51] JT the Car Guy: I have mad respect for independent mechanics. It's just I'm not one. It, when I pop that hood, it's gotta be something I- Yeah, I'm, I'm too old to start the learning process over, and I ain't interested in, uh, uh... Now, I know the saying, "A car is a car is a car."
[00:13:08] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
[00:13:08] JT the Car Guy: And that's true to a certain point, a certain extent.
[00:13:11] JT the Car Guy: The basics though, yeah, battery charge and alternator pretty similar, but when you start getting into the bus network and the- Yeah ... modules and all that, yeah, you lose me then. I, if my Scan Tool can't talk to your car, I'm not interested in, you know- Fixing it ... taking on the responsibility-
[00:13:26] Jeff Compton: Now, is- ... trying to figure
[00:13:27] JT the Car Guy: out
[00:13:27] Jeff Compton: as a, as a younger technician or even before, say, you got in the industry, how did, did you have a mentor or somebody in the family that like, or, or neighborhood friend or something like that that, how did you get sick about cars? Like, and I mean sick- ... in a good way, you know what I mean? Like a, where you gotta know it.
[00:13:45] Jeff Compton: Mm. How did you, how did that come about for
[00:13:46] JT the Car Guy: you? It was crazy. Yeah, it was crazy 'cause fresh out of high school, you know, it, like any young 18-year-old, "What do I do now?" You don't wanna go to four-year college, you know? Yeah. You wanna get dirty and get nasty and love what you do and make a lot of money doing it.
[00:14:01] JT the Car Guy: So the trade school. Okay. As bad as I criticize the s- the trade school For not learning anything, I, it got me in the door
[00:14:09] Jeff Compton: Yeah
[00:14:10] JT the Car Guy: You know what I'm saying? So I got that trade school diploma, and I went and took some ASE tests that got me in a Chrysler dealership, and I just managed to stay there and learn everything about that.
[00:14:20] JT the Car Guy: But during that time, see, the, we living in a different era. The young guys now, they, they, it's a lost cause in my opinion, 'cause I've had apprentices all the time, okay- Okay ... but nothing stick with this crew now.
[00:14:33] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:14:34] JT the Car Guy: You know what I'm saying? And there, and it gotta be, it's gotta be one of those situation where you love working on cars so much that you would do it for free.
[00:14:42] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm. That's how I was in the beginning.
[00:14:43] Jeff Compton: Yep.
[00:14:44] JT the Car Guy: Same. But when real world, real life world kick in, you got a kid, your wife, and you got bills kick in, yeah, you know, you, you, you, you interested in making money, making hours. You ain't trying to learn nothing. You wanna make money. So-
[00:14:57] JT the Car Guy: Yeah ...
[00:14:57] JT the Car Guy: if you go for, you know, if you gonna get in it, man, get in it, uh, uh, not under pressure, not under, you know, the microscope, uh, so to speak.
[00:15:06] JT the Car Guy: So- Uh-huh ... you will flow better if you doing it without stress of trying to really, really, really make money.
[00:15:12] Jeff Compton: The
[00:15:13] JT the Car Guy: young- That's gonna come.
[00:15:14] Jeff Compton: Yeah. The young people are different- Yeah ... now, JT, for sure. Yeah. So you've seen the, a lot of the young ones come and go, and it's different now, isn't it? Like they, I don't wanna say it's an attention span, JT, but it's like what you and I used to probably learn a lot just by driving the damn thing.
[00:15:30] Jeff Compton: Like they, they're not, they're not looking that way to learn. They're looking like to either absorb all the knowledge- Mm ... and then go down a pathway that somebody directs them on. You know what I mean? I don't feel that intuition skill is there on the, on the younger people now. Maybe I'm wrong, JT, but what do you think?
[00:15:48] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, for, for, for starters, you, they have to be exposed to everything. There are still some, uh, guys in our shop right now that don't know how to drive a stick transmission- Yeah ... a manual transmission. You know, and I don't cri- I had to educate myself. Look, man, don't criticize him, he hasn't been exposed to it yet, okay?
[00:16:09] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm. That's a daddy job, right? Yeah. I'm gonna teach my son how to drive a stick transmission. But, uh, we had to g- send a guy, porter out to pick a car up, bring a car around. He come back in, said, "I, I can't drive that. It's a stick."
[00:16:21] Jeff Compton: Yeah. "
[00:16:21] JT the Car Guy: Damn, you don't know how to drive a stick?" And they, uh... So yeah, uh, and I told him, "When I get some free time, we're gonna discuss this and we're gonna talk about it," because he a aspiring mechanic.
[00:16:31] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:16:32] JT the Car Guy: You know, but we gotta get that, we gotta get that under the belt. And, uh, uh, but if you're not even, if you haven't been exposed to something- I don't expect you to know it, so I had to stop criticizing young guys for-
[00:16:44] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[00:16:44] JT the Car Guy: stuff like that. They just haven't been exposed to it. Uh-
[00:16:47] Jeff Compton: It's different and-
[00:16:48] Jeff Compton: privacy ... you know, there's not as many, there's not as many high school programs now, uh- Mm-hmm ... secondary school. Uh, you know, there's not as many trade schools, there's not as many- Yeah ... Vo-Techs, there's not as much of that, and it needs to come back, I think. Yeah.
[00:17:01] JT the Car Guy: You know? It, it's a dime, because, uh, there's too much uncertainty in the industry.
[00:17:06] JT the Car Guy: Trade school now don't know whether to train their students on electric vehicles-
[00:17:11] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[00:17:11] JT the Car Guy: or gasoline vehicles. But in my opinion, you gotta know where you come from in order to know where you're headed.
[00:17:18] Jeff Compton: Well, that's-
[00:17:18] JT the Car Guy: So if you, if a, if a 18-year-old getting ready to graduate high school right now, he pondering being a mechanic, and he have an option of going to trade school, what are they gonna teach him?
[00:17:27] JT the Car Guy: The gasoline? That's, that's supposed to be a dying breed, right?
[00:17:30] Jeff Compton: Supposed
[00:17:31] JT the Car Guy: to be. Supposed to be going away. Or they gonna train him on electric? Okay. So it's a weird time to get into the industry right now because of the uncertainty.
[00:17:41] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:17:41] JT the Car Guy: It's way too much uncertainty. Um, you know, and it's all politics play a role in it, so that de- depends on who in the White House would dictate-
[00:17:51] Jeff Compton: That's-
[00:17:51] JT the Car Guy: where- Yeah ...
[00:17:52] Jeff Compton: the
[00:17:52] JT the Car Guy: auto industry goes.
[00:17:53] Jeff Compton: Yeah. Okay. It is 100%, and that's, you know, I don't, we don't, we try not to get into the political stuff here.
[00:17:59] JT the Car Guy: Ooh.
[00:18:00] Jeff Compton: Um-
[00:18:00] JT the Car Guy: Man, I hate that, man.
[00:18:01] Jeff Compton: I, I-
[00:18:02] JT the Car Guy: I can lose half my base by saying the wrong thing about one wrong guy, so I don't en- entertain that stuff at all, especially on my mechanic channel.
[00:18:12] Jeff Compton: But I, I- Yeah ... find that, you know, the, the EV thing right now is still a lot of... It's just like you said, the landscape for that will change depending on, on financial backing incentives and, you know, uh, rebates up here to buy it. You know, you can go down so many rabbit holes, we don't wanna do it. But you're old enough like me that you remember you probably had a car or two come in that still had a carburetor on it, you know?
[00:18:34] Jeff Compton: Like back in the day from the dealership. Like to, you know, we've seen that, uh, I, I mean, so you can remember then the DRB3. You can remember- Oh, yes ... then that rolled away. And, and look at what is topology, right? Like look at how many technicians now, if you didn't have topology, they wouldn't- Yeah ... even begin to understand how to, to figure out if the module's even in the car.
[00:18:57] Jeff Compton: You know what I mean? Whereas- Yeah ... you and I like, "Oh yeah, we just go open the, the old, the old big, you know, Chrysler manuals, the paper manuals and-"
[00:19:05] JT the Car Guy: Oh yeah. We, we chunked all of those. Uh, the guys in the white suit, the bosses, came down and got rid of all the books. I was crying as they was throwing them in the dumpster, trying to hang on to them, because every now and then, you know, paperback, um, uh, paperback, you know, rules.
[00:19:22] JT the Car Guy: But-
[00:19:22] Jeff Compton: Sure,
[00:19:22] JT the Car Guy: yeah ... we living in an era of computers, so he's like, "Get rid of all this stuff."
[00:19:27] Jeff Compton: That's a shame, eh? Because it, it'll be- Yeah ... you know, you, you throw it away and then the next day something will roll in, a customer with some weird, you know- Yeah ... old, old Chrysler LeBaron, let's just say that 'cause I used to own one.
[00:19:42] Jeff Compton: And they come in and they've got a- Convertible? No, I wish. No, no. Oh,
[00:19:45] JT the Car Guy: yours was a convertible.
[00:19:46] Jeff Compton: Turbo 2.5, a 1990. It was red.
[00:19:49] JT the Car Guy: Oh yeah, I remember that too. That was perfect. I had many a head gaskets on those vehicles.
[00:19:53] Jeff Compton: I,
[00:19:54] JT the Car Guy: I- And we would just jack the head up and slide- Mm-hmm ... the gasket in. That's when, that's before multi-layer steel head gasket.
[00:20:00] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:20:00] JT the Car Guy: The sheets. Yeah. That was paper gaskets, so back then those gaskets used to actually blow. Oh, yeah. Blow a head gasket, okay? This stuff we got now, you know, the head gasket's made of different material. They, they lasting longer but every now and then you'll get one that's actually, um-
[00:20:15] Jeff Compton: Yeah ... you
[00:20:15] JT the Car Guy: know, leaky.
[00:20:16] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:20:17] JT the Car Guy: I have yet to see a multi-layered steel head gasket blow.
[00:20:21] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:20:22] JT the Car Guy: You know, from ch- one channel, one hole to the next hole.
[00:20:25] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:20:26] JT the Car Guy: They just better, but they still giving them problems, man, 'cause- Yeah ... en- engines now are, uh, pretty much predominantly going all aluminum and that's gonna give car makers They trying to lighten the vehicle.
[00:20:39] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:20:39] JT the Car Guy: So what better way to do that? They already got rid of the spare tire. They already... The, it started off with, uh, the heads being made of aluminum. Now the blocks are aluminum, so you got a all aluminum engine under your hood. Everything except the Hemi. Hemi still got the cast iron, um-
[00:20:57] Jeff Compton: Yeah ... you know,
[00:20:57] JT the Car Guy: block.
[00:20:58] Jeff Compton: Now-
[00:20:58] JT the Car Guy: But aluminum
[00:20:58] Jeff Compton: heads ... now you're speaking my language. I love those. I love-
[00:21:01] JT the Car Guy: Yeah.
[00:21:01] Jeff Compton: That's, that was where I really fell in love with the brand because, like, I, I'd been a Chevy guy as a kid growing up. That was the family that we had. You didn't park- Yeah ... anything else here. And then my first mentor that really took me under his wing, he was an old school Mopar guy.
[00:21:15] Jeff Compton: So we talk about the, the LeBarons, you know, I can remember him pulling a K car in and, and sliding the head gasket out, you know. Slide the belt off, lift the head, out comes the gasket- No ... in goes the gasket. And I was like, "What magic is this?" Like, 'cause, you know, y- in the service manual, it doesn't tell you to do it like that.
[00:21:33] Jeff Compton: No. No. But everybody- It ain't printed like
[00:21:36] JT the Car Guy: that ...
[00:21:36] Jeff Compton: I think that had ever been in a Chrysler dealer had went, "Wait a tick. There's enough slack there that I can like, you know..." And yeah, he was, he loved the brand. The old three liter Mitsubishis and the Caravans.
[00:21:48] JT the Car Guy: Oh my goodness. Yeah, you know with the-
[00:21:50] Jeff Compton: Yeah
[00:21:51] JT the Car Guy: smoking, the smoking three liter. Oh. Dude, I still got my tool to, to grind the valve guide- Yeah ... and put the snap ring on. Uh huh. I still got my tool in my little-
[00:21:58] Jeff Compton: Yeah. I can
[00:21:59] JT the Car Guy: remember- I still got my... I just, I just did a mass cleanup of my toolbox. I ended up throwing away a timing light, stuff like that.
[00:22:05] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Who still has a timing light? A distributor arm to loosen the distributor. Them young guys don't know what the hell... A timing light? Yeah. And this, this just taking up space in my toolbox.
[00:22:15] Jeff Compton: I- I used to love the three liter for fixing oil leaks on. That was such a money maker. Yeah. Like, they were great.
[00:22:21] Jeff Compton: Oil pan covers. Were always leaking. Up here, like they would freeze up, eh? The, that PCV hose that would run under the intake, it would fill with condensation and then freeze. And that, that poor thing would come in It's like JT would come in and the valve cover would be puking oil, the rear main would be puking oil.
[00:22:38] Jeff Compton: Uh-huh. Every crank seal, cam seal, like it was like, that was an easy 10-hour day right there, you know? Oh,
[00:22:43] JT the Car Guy: my goodness. That black seal in the back- Yeah ... that go to the rear of the head. Yeah. Put, put RTV on it and pop it in, but just get it going.
[00:22:50] Jeff Compton: Yeah. It was, I, I- The engine
[00:22:51] JT the Car Guy: served its time.
[00:22:53] Jeff Compton: Oh, and I, and, you know, other than you'd hear them in the parking lot, they ticked, eh?
[00:22:57] Jeff Compton: The lifters would go, and then people would be like- Yeah ... "Oh, what do I do about that?" "Nothing, just keep driving it. It'll run forever." That three liter was so po- like, so durable, so durable. Yeah. You know? Mm. You could run it out of oil, pour oil back in it, keep right on driving like it was... You know, people back then, like you s- you're talking about, the 604s, they were more worried about the, the transmission in anything they owned if it was a Chrysler than they were ever worried about the engine.
[00:23:23] Jeff Compton: Mm. And then the Neon came along, I was there for that, and all of a sudden- Yeah ... it was like another Neon head gasket, another Neon head gasket- Yeah ... another Neon head gasket leaking oil, right?
[00:23:34] JT the Car Guy: Yeah.
[00:23:35] Jeff Compton: And everybody was like, "I like the car," you know? "It's a cute little car." But it was like they hated, they were so scared of that engine, 'cause, you know, Consumer Report says, "Oh, you're gonna have to do a head gasket if you own a Neon."
[00:23:47] JT the Car Guy: It had the reputation, those transmissions had the reputation of the CVT's reputation now.
[00:23:53] Jeff Compton: Yes.
[00:23:54] JT the Car Guy: Yes. Like, you hear those three letters, "Oh my God, stay away, stay away, stay away." Yeah, so that's a terrible reputation to have for a car maker.
[00:24:02] Jeff Compton: Uh-huh. So- Yeah ... you started as kinda like a technician s- or a transmission specialist?
[00:24:08] JT the Car Guy: No, I had to get in the door. Okay. Once I got in the door, um, and got some training under... But I had to go through the hoops, but, uh, I jumped on my own fairly quick, you know what I'm saying? Because back then we was running a lot of hours. The head guy was running a lot of hours, they ain't have time to train you.
[00:24:26] JT the Car Guy: We was running 100 hours a week.
[00:24:28] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:24:29] JT the Car Guy: Now, the hourly rate wasn't as high as it is now.
[00:24:31] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:24:32] JT the Car Guy: Going rate now is 50 plus. If you, if you a master mechanic in a dealership and you're not making 50, your dealership's getting over okay, so. Yeah. In fact- Yeah ... in fact, it got so bad, we, we so in demand. That, that's why I understand, uh, the shortage.
[00:24:49] JT the Car Guy: I get the shortage of mechanic and the chatter that's going on on the internet. Uh, mechanics not making this, flat rate suck, flat rate this. If you're good and productive-
[00:24:59] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm ...
[00:24:59] JT the Car Guy: your owner or the boss gonna do whatever he can to, to keep you. If I go, if I go to my boss Monday and say, "Look, man, I'm getting ready to leave, man."
[00:25:07] JT the Car Guy: "Why? Why? You ain't going to another shop, is you?" "Yes." "Well, what they paying you?" Blah, blah, this. "We'll match it and give you $2 more."
[00:25:14] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:25:14] JT the Car Guy: They don't want you to leave , number one, okay? So at one point, dude, you have to really commit a crime to get fired there.
[00:25:21] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:25:22] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. I- At, you know, in some shops.
[00:25:25] Jeff Compton: Yeah, I know.
[00:25:25] Jeff Compton: It was, uh, especially back in the Chrysler back in the day, like I can remember lots of big mistakes that happened, you know? Yeah. Uh, and I'm not throwing anybody under the bus. And the, the next day the guy rolled, you know, rolled back in, went right back to work. Like, yeah, he had a talking to. Yeah. But we needed him, you know what I mean?
[00:25:43] Jeff Compton: Oh, yeah. Like he could do, he could do four transmissions a week. We needed him, you know? Yeah. He could get that, that head gasket done, done in two hours. We needed him, you know? He was the only guy that wanted to do PT Cruiser timing belts. We need him. You know? Uh, I was the guy that was like, "You know, I could do the wiring and the diag really well."
[00:26:02] Jeff Compton: Well, they need it. Oh, cool. You know, now- Yeah ... it, it seems like they, they have- I don't know, JT. It seems funny when you see the, the d- at least in my corner of the world, the dealerships are so slow for any, uh, like customer pay work, they don't seem to care. And they've already given up on the, on the, on the idea that the warranty work is all that important because it, it doesn't pay the techs enough, that I think it's just like the, the service level in the dealers around me now is really bad.
[00:26:34] Jeff Compton: You see lots of cars that they just can't fix. They buy them back. Yeah,
[00:26:37] JT the Car Guy: and we implemented, they, uh, most all shops, all dealerships implemented, uh, MPI, where we gotta do videos.
[00:26:45] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:26:45] JT the Car Guy: And at that point, what is the hell is the service advisor for? Yes. That's why I see, you know, they may become extinct or they may disappear.
[00:26:55] JT the Car Guy: I don't know what's gon- I don't know what the future hold for the auto industry, but some of the responsibility that mechanics have makes you wonder why do you need such and such and such and such.
[00:27:05] Jeff Compton: Yeah. 'Cause the traditional way, like you and I remember writing the estimate on a paper and then take- Oh my
[00:27:10] JT the Car Guy: goodness, yes
[00:27:11] Jeff Compton: up to the service advisor and- Yes ... and he would have to then check with parts, where are the parts, 'cause all we said is it needs, you know, a timing belt job, and outside the door. We need head gasket leaking, out the door. Needs brakes, out the door. And then he had to go and do all that. Now they want- Yes
[00:27:28] Jeff Compton: the MPI shot. They want the video filmed. They want you to go and pull all the part numbers so it shows the inventory. Like, you're exactly right. What, what are those roles really need then? Like, it, it shows me the inventory, I can see it. Like, just let me into the back and I'll go get it off the shelf. I don't need the parts guy to bring it to me.
[00:27:49] JT the Car Guy: Now, I'll say this, over the years, the service advisor position has changed.
[00:27:54] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:27:55] JT the Car Guy: I no longer see, you know, older guys. Back then they was paying well because like you just mentioned, they had a bigger responsibility.
[00:28:01] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:28:01] JT the Car Guy: So now that we doing MPIs and stuff like that, I'm seeing kids up there now.
[00:28:06] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:28:06] JT the Car Guy: And you know what? They can get away with paying them 10, $15 an hour or whatever, or s- or lower commission than before.
[00:28:13] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm.
[00:28:14] JT the Car Guy: So the position might not just go away overnight, it's just gon' lower the You know what I'm saying? The pay and the standards for, for that position.
[00:28:22] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:28:23] JT the Car Guy: It's about to get crazy.
[00:28:25] Jeff Compton: Well, because y- you see, and again, in some of the circles I talk w- in, JT, with a lot of the aftermarket shops, like they've got customers and literally that like they wanna drop the car off, and then they wanna get- Uh-huh ... an email or a message to their phone, and they wanna- Yeah ... open it up, and they wanna look at the video, and then they wanna decide do they wanna buy the work or not.
[00:28:43] Jeff Compton: And like they may never come and see the advisor again until it's pickup time, you know? Uh. And then they're gonna look at the car, maybe they're gonna pay their bill. Is it washed? Is it clean? You know, is it whatever it came in for, is it not making that noise anymore, or that warning light's not on. But they don't want to be walked out into the shop necessarily, JT, anymore and shown under the car what's broken.
[00:29:06] Jeff Compton: They don't care. Like, they wanna be- Uh ... at home, you know? COVID was a, a thing here. Like everybody, it, it flipped them. Yeah. They all of a sudden wanted to stay home and not be out in the, in the dealership, you know?
[00:29:18] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. It
[00:29:18] Jeff Compton: was funny.
[00:29:19] JT the Car Guy: It's crazy. Hey, let me interrupt you a second. Uh, I'm looking at the screen on the bottom.
[00:29:23] JT the Car Guy: Um, I can see audio, I can see the, the ziggly lines on the audio on yours, but you can hear me well, right? I don't see no ziggly. Oh, bro, you s-
[00:29:31] Jeff Compton: you sound great. I'm just running through, I'm running through a different setup. I don't know what you're running through. Okay. I mean, you probably, you got some professional stuff there too, but it, I've got mine turned down low because otherwise when I'm, when we record and edit, it's really hot.
[00:29:44] Jeff Compton: So- Yeah ... y- you're hearing me, I'm hearing you. We're good.
[00:29:47] JT the Car Guy: Okay. Okay. Yeah. As long as you, you're picking up. I just don't see the audio ziggly sound on the bottom of- ... on my name, so I'm hoping my audio is being
[00:29:54] Jeff Compton: recorded. No, it's good, 'cause when I'm seeing yours, it's just like looking at an EQ on a, on an eq- Okay
[00:29:58] Jeff Compton: like a old school.
[00:29:59] JT the Car Guy: Yeah,
[00:29:59] Jeff Compton: you're picking me up. What, um... So kinda- Have you had an advisor that you, like was really, that you got along with really good? You, you- Yes ... like they had your back or was it- Yes.
[00:30:13] JT the Car Guy: Yeah? Oh, yeah. You got to. That, that level of relat- that relationship has to be on point. It, it, it came a time where we no- we didn't have a dispatcher, so they left that up to the advisors.
[00:30:25] JT the Car Guy: Okay. Now, you gotta be careful with that in some shops because it can easily become a, a popularity contest.
[00:30:33] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:30:33] JT the Car Guy: Who's the coolest guy in the shop? Who can fix stuff? Who can do this? So the low line guys get starved out. Okay. "I'll give my ticket to JT. Give it to JT, give it to JT." If JT got 20 tickets, uh, because JT the most popular in the shop, and the coolest, and the most knowledgeable, how, how you gonna feed everybody else?
[00:30:51] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Okay? So yeah, you gotta be careful. But the relationship between a tech and a, an advisor is crucial, and I'm cool with all of them. Yeah. Now there are some b- there are some foul relationship between another mechanic and an advisor. I don't want him working on none of my stuff.
[00:31:09] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:31:09] JT the Car Guy: And I think that stems from how you deal with a problem child.
[00:31:13] JT the Car Guy: If a car come back... Like for me, I, I'll use me as an example. If I work on a car and it come back, I'm so in tune with trying to figure out what the hell happened, what'd I do wrong. Let's, let's get it, man. Just- Yeah ... have them buy the part. I'll put it on for free. Yeah. I don't want none of my stuff to blow up.
[00:31:29] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. You know, make it upstairs to the owner. All right? Just, bro, if you could just get them to pay for the part, I'll put it on for free. Yes, I missed that. I didn't get that.
[00:31:37] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm.
[00:31:37] JT the Car Guy: As opposed to another mechanic, "No, I want three hours more labor."
[00:31:41] JT the Car Guy: Yeah.
[00:31:42] JT the Car Guy: You j- you jack that up, you finna cause this, make this out of a big thing 'cause the customer gonna resist, you know, as opposed to him saying, "Well, I'll pay for the part."
[00:31:51] JT the Car Guy: They'll agree to that. Yeah. All you gonna lose is time.
[00:31:55] Jeff Compton: That's
[00:31:55] JT the Car Guy: right. In doing it, of course, you gotta do it, but I'm willing to take that, that, I, I'm willing to take that to keep all of my stuff from blowing up.
[00:32:03] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:32:03] JT the Car Guy: I'm not that... And advisors love me for that If a car come back that I just worked on and I, I drop what I'm doing, let's find out what's going on.
[00:32:11] JT the Car Guy: Maybe I need to ride with her. I jump in the car, "Ma'am, let's go for a ride. Show me what you're talking about," because I didn't hear it the first time.
[00:32:17] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:32:17] JT the Car Guy: They love me for that, and I keep everything under the wraps, no commotion. None of my cases make it to the owner because once you get to the owner, it's free at that point.
[00:32:27] Jeff Compton: Oh,
[00:32:27] JT the Car Guy: yeah. To the customer, that is. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. They, they trying to keep the customer happy at all costs. And then you gonna look at, uh, I don't know if you ever heard of AR. In a lot of dealerships, mechanics can get... A- accounts receivable is where- Yeah ... we pay for stuff.
[00:32:41] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:32:42] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, so hey, well, you gotta pay $50 a week until it's paid off and all that stuff.
[00:32:46] JT the Car Guy: I don't- Yeah, I keep my stuff low-key, and I don't want none of my inst- instances to blow up.
[00:32:52] Jeff Compton: Oh, I had lots of cars. If, if I misdiagged the car, you know- Yeah ... say I, I put a leak detection pump in, you know, and the p- Uh-huh ... and the light pops back on, you know. Uh, I, I, I was going back over that system again, you know.
[00:33:05] Jeff Compton: Find- Yeah ... oh, look, it's, it's not the ESIM this time or the leak detection pump. It's actually- Mm-hmm ... you know, up here, 'cause I'm in Canada, we get like, we get corrosion and wiring problems like you would not believe. Like it is bad. Oh. Really bad. And, um, so there was lots of times it was like you'd throw the, you know, leak detection pump in, you know, and, uh, sure enough, oh, it was the harness just around, you know, just up in there.
[00:33:28] Jeff Compton: Oh, yeah. And it would be an intermittent, and you'd be like, "Damn it," you know. And I'd fix those for free. I had to, you know? Yeah. 'Cause it was like I'd already charged the customer, you know, diag time back in the day. That's what I'm talking
[00:33:41] JT the Car Guy: about.
[00:33:41] Jeff Compton: Yeah. And so- That's what I'm talking about. Whereas the other guys, it was like Well, I talk about this all the time.
[00:33:47] Jeff Compton: You-- We're old enough, JT, we remember when they still were putting EGR valves on cars, right? Oh, yeah. So you'd see, like, customer come in and be like, "Oh, it's not running right." And you didn't have an EGR code yet. "Well, somebody tuned it up." Well, then it'd come back still running like... Or now it's finally stalling, and then you got that damn EGR code that finally popped in, right?
[00:34:07] Jeff Compton: Yeah. That's when you were like, "Okay, I'll, I'll be out in the parking lot putting this EGR valve in," just like, you know. What, what'd it cost then? 50 bucks for the valve? You know- Yeah, low ... we were able to change them. Like the old Caravans, you'd change them- Yeah ... like I said, in the parking lot. You
[00:34:20] JT the Car Guy: didn't- They don't hardly ever use them anymore.
[00:34:22] Jeff Compton: Oh.
[00:34:22] JT the Car Guy: They found new ways, EGR, exhaust gas recirculation. Yeah. They found new ways to recirculate the exhaust gas without an EGR valve.
[00:34:31] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:34:31] JT the Car Guy: We're playing- So variable valve timing done changed a lot of stuff.
[00:34:36] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:34:36] JT the Car Guy: You know what I'm saying? So yeah, it's, it doesn't change the way engines operate. You no longer can live off the vacuum source that the engine produce, uh, even for brake, brake assist.
[00:34:49] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:34:49] JT the Car Guy: So on every variable valve timing engine, there has to be an electric pump-
[00:34:56] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm ...
[00:34:56] JT the Car Guy: assist to help assist because the engine's not producing vacuum anymore like it used to. Yeah. That's right. 18, 19 inches of vacuum, so yeah. D- all the three six Pentastars, they use a, um, a external-
[00:35:09] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[00:35:09] JT the Car Guy: vacuum source to keep constant vacuum on that brake booster or what have you.
[00:35:15] JT the Car Guy: It's just the engine is no longer the way it used to be. It's not producing
[00:35:18] Jeff Compton: vacuum the way it used to. Yeah,
[00:35:19] JT the Car Guy: my--
[00:35:19] Jeff Compton: I got a '15 Wrangler I've had to put the pump in mine
[00:35:22] JT the Car Guy: Oh, for real?
[00:35:23] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:35:23] JT the Car Guy: That vacuum assist pump?
[00:35:25] Jeff Compton: Well, 'cause they put it up under the bumper and up here again, you know, like- Oh, wow ... where like snow and everything is a real thing.
[00:35:31] Jeff Compton: They fill up with water, they short, like they do all kinds of wacky stuff, you know. They don't turn on anymore. They're fun. Um- Ah ... so let me ask you then, um, kinda going back, what, what's the... Like, 'cause I see you, you know, you do some videos sometimes where you go and you're doing some of your own, I wanna say, like your side work hustle customers, and you talk about Cousin Pookie.
[00:35:53] Jeff Compton: You know, that's kinda the first time I ever heard somebody say that- ... was Cousin Pookie, and I'm like, "What's he talking about?" And then of course I meet some other friends and talk to them. They're like, "Oh, that's a thing." But like- ... so when you see some of the diags that, you know, Cousin Pookie gets wrong, like where do you think that, why is that happening, JT, so much now?
[00:36:14] JT the Car Guy: Now, first of all, the Cousin Pookie is a, a, an illusion.
[00:36:17] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:36:17] JT the Car Guy: Okay? I had to create a character to blame that on. I, I got a nasty email. I did a video one time, I blamed Jiffy Lube-
[00:36:26] Jeff Compton: Mm ...
[00:36:26] JT the Car Guy: uh, for something. I got a nasty email. Like in other words, "You gonna tone down that rhetoric," you know, "we could..." So, so yeah.
[00:36:34] JT the Car Guy: And I, I just call everybody a Dorman shop, all the bad shop Dorman, and the mechanic that work on it, um, you know, Cousin Pookie. Yeah. So. But some people don't know how to take that. They actually think... Uh, some people, one guy got in my comment section, "Man, you always dogging on Cousin Pookie, man. You, he trying.
[00:36:51] JT the Car Guy: Give him a break." I'm like, "Who, who is he?" This is a made up character that I have to- Yeah ... I need somebody to take the fall to make my story complete. Mm-hmm. Now my story is real. Don't get it twisted. Yeah. It's just I can't call out names. You know- That's right ... I can't call out... I don't know if you know, uh, uh, uh, the, the doctor, he's another mechanic.
[00:37:14] JT the Car Guy: He, he make videos and he call out, "Firestone suck. Look at Firestone- Oh, yeah. Mm ... look what Firestone did."
[00:37:19] JT the Car Guy: Yeah.
[00:37:19] JT the Car Guy: I ain't, I can't go out the ... Yeah. You know, I don't, I don't call out shops and I don't call out individual mechanics. I call, I dub everybody Cousin Pookie, but- Mm-hmm ... um, I get a little offended, man.
[00:37:30] JT the Car Guy: I get, uh, uh, upset when- Anybody do work and don't follow up on they work. Like a customer call in, "I called him back, he won't answer the phone. He ghosted me." Yeah. You, dude, you just did $2,000 worth of work on her car. 'Cause when I get it, I'm gonna talk about you, but again, ain't nobody gonna know who I'm talking about.
[00:37:48] Jeff Compton: That's
[00:37:48] JT the Car Guy: right. 'Cause I'm dubbing you Cousin Pookie, but it makes for a good storyline for videos, I will say that. But-
[00:37:54] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[00:37:55] JT the Car Guy: uh, and, and I don't know if you know this, I work out of, uh, three or four other shops. Yeah. I'm what they call a troubleshooter.
[00:38:01] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:38:02] JT the Car Guy: So a shop will call me, they can't... A crisis gotta be.
[00:38:05] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. They don't call me about, "Hey, man, I got this Toyota broke, man. Can you come..." No, don't call me for that. Yeah. You know, they call me for their problem child Dodge product.
[00:38:13] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:38:13] JT the Car Guy: And I get out there and I have to figure it out. They have to pay me for that. Now, recording has become trickier and trickier.
[00:38:20] JT the Car Guy: You know they got the meta glasses now.
[00:38:21] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:38:22] JT the Car Guy: Uh- Yeah ... yeah. And s- so, but I, at that time I don't, so I gotta be careful. I'm walking around, I don't want them to think I'm recording. I might have it like right here running. So, but, uh, uh, I find a way to make a video out of it, and those be my biggest videos, because I can-
[00:38:39] Jeff Compton: Yeah
[00:38:39] JT the Car Guy: they, they put me in the corner and say, "Do your thing. Figure out what it is. Tell us what it is." They got to pay me, don't get it twisted. Mm-hmm. And when I leave, I instruct the mechanic that's gonna fix it, you know, "Here's what you need to do. Get this part." Yeah. "Get a OEM part. Make sure they-" That's what I was gonna say.
[00:38:55] JT the Car Guy: Yes, please. Yeah. Oh my goodness. Yeah. The difference between OEM and a regular part is night and day, especially on parts like thermostats.
[00:39:02] Jeff Compton: Oh.
[00:39:03] JT the Car Guy: Stupid parts. Yeah. Gas caps. You'd be surprised how serious a Mopar gas cap is to a car versus an AutoZone gas cap. Oh,
[00:39:11] Jeff Compton: going back to the EVAP testing, that was the first step.
[00:39:14] Jeff Compton: Like, if you walked over and I had a parts store one on, you walked up to the advisor and said, "Where's the old one? I need the old one." You know, or, "I need a new one." You'd go, this is, I gonna let a secret out. You've probably done it too, JT. You just reach to the bay next to you, and you get the gas cap off that car Right?
[00:39:32] Jeff Compton: And you put it on, and you p- you smoke it again, or you run your bay test, and you're like, "Well, that'll be an hour. That's, uh, my diag is done." You know? And, and that's what I'm saying about an... 'Cause you know me, and if you've listened to me, I defend the dealer guys a lot because, like, we get- Yeah ... they get hammered a lot, right?
[00:39:50] Jeff Compton: Ooh. Everybody has a story. Stealer
[00:39:51] JT the Car Guy: ship.
[00:39:52] Jeff Compton: Stealer ship. Oh, that's- Yes ... some people, man, they- Yeah ... they make the, their whole platform is running the dealer down. Yes. "Oh, the dealer did this." I hear it all the time. "The dealer didn't do that." And it's like, man- Yeah ... when we're talking about intermittence under warranty, like you gotta be- Uh-huh
[00:40:08] Jeff Compton: a special kind of guy to be able to have 100% perfection on intermittence under warranty. You must be, like, the guy or girl. Yeah,
[00:40:17] JT the Car Guy: it
[00:40:17] Jeff Compton: don't, it
[00:40:18] JT the Car Guy: don't happen.
[00:40:19] Jeff Compton: It don't happen. It don't happen often. And then they say, so it's like a lot of the time, I'm always like you. I learn to, like, okay, I gotta see the other side of the story because the customer will be bringing it in every three months, "This thing happened, and nobody can find it."
[00:40:31] Jeff Compton: And then finally, it's out of warranty, something breaks, and they go, "That's what it was all along. You owe me my money back." And they're like, "What are you talking about? Like, this is, you know, it's been stalling forever." Well- Yeah ... we finally have a crank sensor fault. Like, this is where we're going here, you know?
[00:40:48] Jeff Compton: Yeah. And people go, "I got ripped off." And then you see the guy going back to it, where he's like He's put one of them parts store brand crank sensors in- Ooh, baby ... and the car be still stalling. Or now the car misfires, but it doesn't stall. They're like, "It ca- it can't be that crank sensor, that's brand new."
[00:41:04] Jeff Compton: You and I know- Mm-hmm ... from Chrysler days way back, Chrysler crank sensor, Chrysler oxygen sensor, Chrysler cam sensor, Chrysler ESIM- OEM ... Chrysler leak detection pump, Chrysler gas ca- Mm. You did not mess around. You didn't play, you know? No. You just-
[00:41:21] JT the Car Guy: I got my three, I got my three that, that those parts must be OEM.
[00:41:24] JT the Car Guy: The, the, the ignition system-
[00:41:27] Jeff Compton: Yes ...
[00:41:27] JT the Car Guy: the ignition sensors, cam and crank, and O2 sensor. Yeah. Those three parts, it, there's no, there's no negotiation with me. It has to be, uh, OEM parts.
[00:41:38] Jeff Compton: Well, 'cause we- Has to ... if you do it long enough, JT, you see how it's got a Bosch oxygen sensor and you just know. Mm. Like, you just, you read the codes and you go look on the thing and you're like, and then, you know, you walk up front.
[00:41:50] Jeff Compton: It doesn't mean that the diag is done per se. Mm. It could still have something else wrong with the car, but it's- Mm ... gotta get that crap out of there- Yeah ... and get back to what it's supposed to be before I can even work on it. You know, that's what people don't like to hear. That's where the dealer guys get so...
[00:42:05] Jeff Compton: It's our, it's our familiarity and our knowledge that- Yeah ... seems like we just shotgun parts all the time at cars. But when we know the product at that level-
[00:42:14] JT the Car Guy: That's it ...
[00:42:15] Jeff Compton: you can get by on that a lot of the time. A lot.
[00:42:18] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. It, it, the hi- and history, history of a vehicle matters. Mm. If you a dealer guy and you see something so much so common-
[00:42:27] Jeff Compton: Yes
[00:42:27] JT the Car Guy: as opposed to a new guy you pulling up, I don't expect a new guy to tell me, you know, to understand the history of failures of this vehicle.
[00:42:38] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:42:38] JT the Car Guy: He just not gonna know. That's why I try to tell people all the time, "Take your car to somebody that's familiar with your car."
[00:42:45] Jeff Compton: That's right.
[00:42:45] JT the Car Guy: Okay? That's an advantage, right?
[00:42:48] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm. Being familiar with a brand, a car or a brand is an advantage, okay? Yes, there are some guys out there that's good or knowledgeable on every car, but if he don't know the history of this, what happens, what's failed, the history, yeah, he gonna start somewhere which could lead to more money, and he doing his job, it's just a learning curve.
[00:43:07] JT the Car Guy: So if I already- Yeah ... know the history, "Oh, those things fail all the time and I've seen them, uh, this, that, and the third. I need one of these and you'll be fine." So that matters. Now,
[00:43:16] Jeff Compton: what's, uh, what's the job that when it comes into the dealership, like, you don't wanna do?
[00:43:23] JT the Car Guy: Oh. Oh, there are some recalls out there I despise of.
[00:43:27] JT the Car Guy: But now, I don't know, back in the day- Oh, I lost you, JT.
[00:43:31] Jeff Compton: There you go. You're
[00:43:31] JT the Car Guy: back ... back in the day... Hmm?
[00:43:33] Jeff Compton: Oh, I lost you for a second, but you're back.
[00:43:35] JT the Car Guy: Okay. Back in the day, uh, the, the shop was specializing. We no longer specialize, so we get a dispatch, a ticket, we gotta do the whole ticket.
[00:43:44] Jeff Compton: Right.
[00:43:44] JT the Car Guy: One line could be a window, one line could be, you know, water leak, one kind of line could be transmission problem, uh, one line could be my engine knocking, line two my transmission's slipping.
[00:43:54] JT the Car Guy: We gotta do the whole ticket. So- Okay ... that, yeah, that helps out a lot. M- that makes you an all-around mechanic actually, but some guys just not good at- Tran- give it to a guy that's familiar with transmission
[00:44:06] Jeff Compton: Right
[00:44:06] JT the Car Guy: You know what I'm saying? Right.
[00:44:07] Jeff Compton: Now how much
[00:44:08] JT the Car Guy: is- Yeah, so those days are over, specializing, you
[00:44:11] Jeff Compton: know?
[00:44:11] Jeff Compton: 'Cause are they still doing a lot of rebuilds in the tranny? Like
[00:44:14] JT the Car Guy: are-
[00:44:14] Jeff Compton: No. No. Oh
[00:44:15] JT the Car Guy: It's all new No, I don't even know. I can't find my rebuild tools no more because I haven't pulled them out in so long. In other words, everybody is a trans man because all we doing is replacing.
[00:44:26] Jeff Compton: Right.
[00:44:27] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. The fault code say slipping in third gear, you get a new transmission.
[00:44:31] JT the Car Guy: You don't go tear it down and fix third gear- Right ... you get a new transmission. Yep. Yeah, so... And I hate that, uh, because I think, you know, they... I don't know if they wasting a lot of money. Maybe the parts, maybe the value of a repair versus replacing it, uh, is pretty even.
[00:44:50] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:44:51] JT the Car Guy: You see what I'm saying? We go off of a 70% rule.
[00:44:54] JT the Car Guy: Yes. If it takes 70% to fix it, you know, compared to replacing it, they want us to just replace it.
[00:45:00] Jeff Compton: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:45:01] JT the Car Guy: I get it from a money standpoint.
[00:45:03] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:45:03] JT the Car Guy: But, uh, it was fun taking them out, overhauling them, 'cause that's what I did. I was the transmission man.
[00:45:09] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:45:09] JT the Car Guy: I had a job. That's all I did all day was pull a transmission, overhaul them, put them back in.
[00:45:13] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:45:14] JT the Car Guy: Hope for the best.
[00:45:15] Jeff Compton: See
[00:45:15] JT the Car Guy: f- All day, every day. For- Now we just swapping them ...
[00:45:17] Jeff Compton: for me, like I, I never got my feet too wet with AC at the dealer because I just- Oh, yeah ... I didn't... We had a guy that loved, loved- Loved it ... to do it, to pull the dashes, to, you know-
[00:45:28] JT the Car Guy: Evaporator coil
[00:45:29] Jeff Compton: Oh, remember the LH cars when the evap was leaking?
[00:45:32] Jeff Compton: That's
[00:45:32] JT the Car Guy: my, that's my very first, uh, evaporator coil.
[00:45:34] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:45:35] JT the Car Guy: On a, on a old ass LH body.
[00:45:37] Jeff Compton: And they'd stink. They'd come in just reeking, eh? Stink, stink, stink. And the people would be like- Smell it ... "What is that?" And it's like, "Oh, we know what it is. It's money, baby." Like, it's, you know- We
[00:45:46] JT the Car Guy: call it money, yep.
[00:45:47] Jeff Compton: Yeah. And it was, uh...
[00:45:49] Jeff Compton: And then same thing, the, you know, the Caravans, the, the blend doors, the, you know, the- The LH ... the Ram trucks when the stops would break off in the box and the, you know, the door would go too far, all that. He loved doing all of that. And I'm like, "I don't wanna be up under the dash of any car. It doesn't matter what it pays.
[00:46:04] Jeff Compton: It hurts me." And I- Yeah ... you know, I, I don't good... I'm not good in small places myself, so if I can avoid- Oh, man ... dash work, I just avoid it. I've heard that, that, um, the curtain airbag recall a lot of guys don't like. Um- Yeah ... Pacificas, Caravans, whatever that is that's- Oh,
[00:46:22] JT the Car Guy: yeah. The Pacificas, that, that... I don't know.
[00:46:25] JT the Car Guy: They, we doing them all, so- Mm-hmm ... w- once, once, once a guy do it and start beating the time, that's when he doing them all.
[00:46:32] Jeff Compton: Yeah. "
[00:46:33] JT the Car Guy: I got it down to such and such," 'cause his tool is laid out for him.
[00:46:36] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:46:37] JT the Car Guy: You know, his, his T30 right there, he just grabs, bz, bz, bz. Now he knocking them out, beating the time. That's why times are low, you know, because they counting on you doing so many to the point where you gonna eventually catch up to the time, and you will eventually start beating the time.
[00:46:53] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:46:54] JT the Car Guy: So, yeah, so And I, I catch a lot of flack for doing, uh, some videos I don't do or show because in the comment section there's, there are always gonna be one guy like, "Why are you telling secrets? Why are you doing this? Why are you showing that?" That's why time drop. Buddy, nothing I show on my videos is under warranty anymore.
[00:47:14] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:47:14] JT the Car Guy: Okay? I, I'm so far ahead of the game, like my brain is now on 2027 models, 2028 models. Okay, so you j- you just can't pile your head up with a, a bunch of stuff, so something have to leave. So out goes the '20 models, '21 models- Right ... '22 models out goes because new stuff coming in. So the stuff I'm doing now not gonna get no traction until five years from now, you know?
[00:47:39] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. So it does me no good to make a video on a, you know, a newer car because none of those, all of those are still warranty.
[00:47:47] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:47:47] JT the Car Guy: Nobody's... There's no DIY guy on a 2026 model vehicle. No. This shit's still under warranty, so you just simply go in and, uh, and get it fixed. So There we-- Okay, you back
[00:48:00] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:48:00] Jeff Compton: You're back.
[00:48:01] JT the Car Guy: But yeah, it gets, it gets crazy, man, so.
[00:48:03] Jeff Compton: Well, and that's, that's my big beef with the, the comment section is there's a lot of those DIY guys. Yeah. And they're just, they're so... How do I say this in the nicest way possible? A lot of them are really, uh, misled with their own abilities. Like, we'll just say that.
[00:48:21] Jeff Compton: Oh. As like they, they not as good as they think they are, for starters. Some of them are talented- Yeah ... I'll, I'll say that. There are some talented people out there, for sure. But like- Yeah ... when they, especially the diag stuff, like they just are convinced, you know, they've been down to the zone and they bought all them, you know, uh, Bosch and Standard and Blue Streak parts and they, Dorman, and they put them in the car and the car is still broken, so it must be something complicated because they, they...
[00:48:46] Jeff Compton: Listen, you know, I met a guy, oh, this is going back a long time ago. He had a '98 Cherokee and it was an oxygen sensor fault, and he had put Bosch O2s in. And I walked out and I told him, I said, "Well, there's your problem, friend. Like it's, they won't work with that." And he goes, "That's not, that's not it at all."
[00:49:03] Jeff Compton: Like he's... And I said, "Well, okay. Like I just fix this stuff all day long. It's, trust me, they won't work." He's like, "It's not hard to spin a wrench. I know what I'm talking about." And I just said, "All the best to you, sir." And I walked back into the back and the service advisor was like, 'cause he'd called me out there to kind of talk to the guy, and, uh, his attitude was like, uh, we're not gonna be friends after this.
[00:49:25] Jeff Compton: And so like I now, when I see the comments in anything and it says- Yeah ... "Well, I was, you know, the dealer couldn't fix it, I had to fix it myself," and I don't know, you know, "They charged $900 for a brake job on a, on a, you know, Ram truck and I went down and bought them, you know, from Rock Auto and put them on myself.
[00:49:41] Jeff Compton: It was $200." And I'm like, we're talking about something completely different here, JT. Like what you do the job for and what s- somebody like in the shop or the dealership has to charge, two completely different things.
[00:49:55] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Overhead matters too. That's, that's a lot of way your co- your, the costs go up. And speaking of videos, I, um, I d- devote...
[00:50:06] JT the Car Guy: Now if you're a video content creator, your, you, your motives are getting views-
[00:50:10] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm ...
[00:50:11] JT the Car Guy: and long time watch and things like that. Because I'm rarely gonna... A mechanic g- not gonna get that from another mechanic All right. I can vouch for that. 'Cause if I, if I don't know something, I wanna know something, I go to Ray Man Ray channel and see.
[00:50:25] JT the Car Guy: I'm going straight to the spot what, to find out what he put on. In other words, you're not gonna get no watch time out of me.
[00:50:31] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:50:32] JT the Car Guy: So I snap on people all the time for telling me, "Man, you taking too long. Get to the point." Bro, I don't make any money off of you. Yeah. You gonna give me 10 seconds of view time on a 12-minute video, dude.
[00:50:45] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:50:45] JT the Car Guy: When an aspiring... Yeah, I get message from people all the time, "Man, I'm not even a mechanic, man. I watch your videos all the time." That's where your long view time come from. Yeah. Not mechanics.
[00:50:56] Jeff Compton: That's
[00:50:56] JT the Car Guy: right. Mechanics gonna give you damn one minute of their view time. You're not gonna make any money off mechanics.
[00:51:01] JT the Car Guy: So if you ever get into the video making process, just make the video long. The hell with mechanics. They gonna always say, "You talk too long. You talk too much. I don't need to hear all of that. I need to know what was wrong with the car." But buddy, you know, that's why YouTube had to censor me, 'cause I was cussing people out.
[00:51:20] JT the Car Guy: Man, I done spent, spent, I done spent 20 minutes up to an hour editing this video to put it up just to get five seconds of watch time out of you. Yeah. I didn't make any money off of you and I don't expect to, 'cause you a mechanic.
[00:51:33] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:51:33] JT the Car Guy: Okay? Again, I, I only know this because I'm the same way. Yeah. If I go to your videos to see what you did, I don't wanna hear all that.
[00:51:41] JT the Car Guy: So that's why I, I understand, you know, the other side. Yeah. I understand the other side. I just wanna see what you did and what was the problem and how do you fix it.
[00:51:50] Jeff Compton: See, but I take- Anyway ... I take it, like, personally disrespecting towards the industry. It is. And maybe I shouldn't be, because I should remember, you know, the saying goes, JT, like you meet them where they are.
[00:52:00] Jeff Compton: Mm. Where they're coming from is they just wanna fix the car. They don't care about me. Yeah. They don't care about what I look like that day, how I smell, none of that. They just want me to show them how to fix their car. Yeah. Right? And, and I walked a fine line, 'cause years ago I used to be in all the forum, forums and talk to people and, "Oh, you got a, you know, a Chrysler.
[00:52:19] Jeff Compton: You did this? Nah, man. Bro, you need that." And then I would start to, the more I got into it, the, the disrespect, and I think it was just the way the keyboard warriors talked. But I, I couldn't do it anymore, JT. I had to get out. It's just like- Oh, yeah ... "Oh, man." Yeah. Because it just found The way they talked was so disrespectful towards me as the industry, because I'm an advocate for the industry, right?
[00:52:40] Jeff Compton: Like, I'm an advocate- Yeah ... for JT, I'm an advocate for Rayman Ray, I'm an advocate for Fluffy. Like, I'm out to show people what their life is like. That's what I want to do. And, and they would just look at that and go, "Oh, that Fluffy, you know, like, that's all he can fix is Nissan." And then, you know, like, uh, "The guy's boring.
[00:52:58] Jeff Compton: Like he's showing me, you know, his... He's got all the wrong brand of tools." And I'm like, "Oh, you're so not getting it. You're so not getting it." And they just wanna know how to, how to change their own CVT and save some money. That's what they wanna know.
[00:53:11] JT the Car Guy: Yeah.
[00:53:12] Jeff Compton: And it's like,
[00:53:12] JT the Car Guy: I'm- You're not gonna make m- Yeah You're definitely not gonna make any money off of mechanics watching your videos.
[00:53:18] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:53:18] JT the Car Guy: So, yeah.
[00:53:19] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:53:19] JT the Car Guy: Any other mechanics that are thinking about doing a channel, uh, yeah, make your video universal because you don't know who's watching.
[00:53:27] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:53:28] JT the Car Guy: All right? It could be some 18-year-old aspiring mechanic- ... that need to know Ohm's law. Mm-hmm. And that's the basics of basics from electrical.
[00:53:36] JT the Car Guy: But if I mention Ohm's law to a mechanic, some mechanics don't even know what the hell... How does that help me fix a car? I don't know, just something you need to know. Well, I don't wanna hear that. I wanna hear what you did to fix the car. I get it. We are, we living in an impatient world now. Nobody has time to...
[00:53:50] JT the Car Guy: Nobody wanna learn anything, they just wanna be shown how to do things.
[00:53:54] Jeff Compton: Give me the answer, don't tell me how you
[00:53:55] JT the Car Guy: did it. Give me the answer.
[00:53:56] Jeff Compton: Yeah. That's what, that's
[00:53:57] JT the Car Guy: all they want.
[00:53:58] Jeff Compton: Now, going back to it, before, who was the first person that you remember seeing on YouTube that you were like, "I should be doing that too"?
[00:54:04] Jeff Compton: Was it Eric?
[00:54:05] JT the Car Guy: Eric, Eric, that-- You notice my name, JT the Car Guy. Yeah. That's not by accident. Eric was one of my... And I found out I'm older than Eric, so he been in the game- Mm-hmm ... longer than me.
[00:54:14] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[00:54:14] JT the Car Guy: And, uh, but I, I used to watch him. And, uh- God, uh, uh, this black guy named Tim, Tim Barnes. I forgot his channel name 'cause he been- Yeah
[00:54:26] JT the Car Guy: changing it all the time. It's- He was the first one that gave me a platform. This is when livestream became popular.
[00:54:32] Jeff Compton: Okay.
[00:54:32] JT the Car Guy: Like we doing now, it wasn't always this popular. So he gave me a platform. He let me get on his channel. I got, went and bought a mic, and I did everything, and I, I returned the favor. I, I don't know if you, you know this, but, uh, I gave Fluffy his first.
[00:54:48] JT the Car Guy: You know what I'm saying? I
[00:54:49] Jeff Compton: did not know
[00:54:49] JT the Car Guy: that. I'm like- I did not know that. Yes, man. I met Fluffy. Uh, he was a, he, he was a dealer guy. I was going through his video. I'm in Fluffy comment section, you know. Yeah. I, "Look, man, this is how you talk to this. Don't let this dude talk to you like this, man." So, I'm in there fighting his battles.
[00:55:05] JT the Car Guy: I'm like, "Look, man, come, jump on my..." 'Cause I was starting doing livestream every week. Yeah. I said, "Jump on my live stream." He didn't have none of this stuff. He said he went out to Best Buy, bought a mic, a stand, this, that, and the third, and, you know, now he ran from there. But yeah, Fluffy was the first one to go livestream, uh, with me when he first, you know- Yeah
[00:55:24] JT the Car Guy: started doing live streaming. Right
[00:55:25] Jeff Compton: on.
[00:55:26] JT the Car Guy: Yes. This is when YouTube was popping. So the same guy, Tim Barnes, that put me on, I was, like, passing out the, uh, passing out. And that's when YouTube was popular about subscribers.
[00:55:37] Jeff Compton: Right.
[00:55:38] JT the Car Guy: All right? So I shot up to, like, almost 300,000 subscribers based off YouTube Shorts.
[00:55:43] JT the Car Guy: But, uh, Fluffy was doing Shorts, and I was like, "Man, just jump on the live stream, man. Let me introduce you, man. You hook up with my core audience." And it's all about networking. When you live stream somebody- Yeah ... you, you getting a, a piece of their audience, they getting a piece of your audience, you know, things like that.
[00:55:57] JT the Car Guy: So I never had a problem with live streaming with somebody or somebody live streaming with me because it was very popular at one time. Yeah. And like podcasting is popular now, you know?
[00:56:09] Jeff Compton: Yes.
[00:56:10] JT the Car Guy: Everything is popular. Everything has its phase, okay? But, uh, you know, the way YouTube changing things now, who knows what's, what's the next big phase, but- Well, it's,
[00:56:19] Jeff Compton: it's all about the TikTok now, right?
[00:56:21] Jeff Compton: Like, it's all about
[00:56:21] JT the Car Guy: six-second videos and what- Man, they trying to, they trying to match. But TikTok monetization program, I get paid on Facebook and YouTube big time. Mm-hmm. I cannot manage to get monetized on TikTok or Instagram.
[00:56:34] Jeff Compton: I'm same.
[00:56:34] JT the Car Guy: So- I,
[00:56:35] Jeff Compton: yeah. TikTok
[00:56:36] JT the Car Guy: isn't even- I basically stopped trying. I don't-
[00:56:38] Jeff Compton: Yeah
[00:56:38] JT the Car Guy: I don't know what it is.
[00:56:39] Jeff Compton: Well, and- You know? ... I, I know from me being a Canadian, there's some, there's some obstacles in the way there because it, it's different. Um, it's harder. The internet
[00:56:47] JT the Car Guy: is the internet. It really matters where you at?
[00:56:49] Jeff Compton: Yeah, bro. There's a lot of- Wow ... stuff in Canada 'cause... Well, like, even there's certain, like, Ratchet and Wrench is a magazine, for instance, right?
[00:56:58] Jeff Compton: The m- the- Oh ... we all in the technician realm and a lot of the aftermarket stuff I've read. I can't share articles on that in my country 'cause it's considered news. So we got some people that, like, they made some legislation you can't share news articles. Damn So, like it's, and it's, it all trickles down.
[00:57:17] Jeff Compton: Canada's different, I'll say that without being political. Um, the guy that you're talking about, JT, is his, was his channel like something old school hip hop or something like that might've been in the title? 'Cause I remember I remember seeing another guy, um, I think he was down south, and he would do repair videos like that.
[00:57:40] Jeff Compton: Kinda similar to when you were going to some of the other shops, he would shoot that kind of stuff. And I remember it, it seemed like his channel changed names a couple times. But I wonder if that was... It's, like, old school hip hop or something was in the, in the, um, in the title. I'll have to look that up.
[00:57:55] Jeff Compton: I'll get back to you on that, T. Yeah. I'll have to find it now 'cause it'll drive me crazy until I remember.
[00:58:01] JT the Car Guy: Just think about it now, it's gonna bother you.
[00:58:03] Jeff Compton: But, like, I- You won't be able to
[00:58:03] JT the Car Guy: sleep ...
[00:58:04] Jeff Compton: I, I kinda found my way 'cause I found Scanner Danner, and then I started sharing- Yeah ... like, a lot of his videos with everybody I ever met.
[00:58:14] Jeff Compton: I'm like, "Oh, you wanna know how this works? Here's this guy." Like, 'cause- Oh, yeah ... when I came out of trade school, like, I knew how to read a wiring diagram, but I didn't really understand what was happening. Oh. And he was the guy that showed me, like, how to, like, you know- Yeah ... how to really take- Oh,
[00:58:28] JT the Car Guy: that dude, that dude is wicked.
[00:58:29] JT the Car Guy: He was a, he's an instructor, so-
[00:58:31] Jeff Compton: Oh,
[00:58:31] JT the Car Guy: yeah ... you go off a different language barrier. That is one thing that's hold me back from being an instructor. Okay. They lowered the standards, right? Okay. You used to have to have some college credit, this, that, and the third, and, you know, be knowledgeable of the product.
[00:58:48] JT the Car Guy: Right. So I qualify from a, to be a Chrysler training technician- Okay ... except for the college part. So they lowered the standard. I can now, I probably can get a job there. But the obstacles that I would have to... Like, I would have to give up so much, okay? Um, especially my freedom.
[00:59:05] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm.
[00:59:06] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. I mean, I would have to get, be at work on time, and- Yeah
[00:59:09] JT the Car Guy: as opposed to being a flat rate tech at a dealership, I have a lot of freedom. I can go record where I where. There are some stipulations where you can't do videos and you're an instructor.
[00:59:20] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[00:59:21] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, so, and on top of that, the pay is not super great.
[00:59:24] Jeff Compton: No.
[00:59:24] JT the Car Guy: You know what I'm saying? I, I... If I had to cut off some of my hustles to be an instructor, what's the incentive behind that?
[00:59:31] JT the Car Guy: You know? Yeah. So it never, it, it never made sense. But, um, they go through a lot of obstacles, and those guy... And, and the language, that's what I was meant to touch on, the language barrier. Uh, I'm not... From time to time my language can be a little ghetto-ish. You know, I might screw a word up. Dude, let me tell you something.
[00:59:49] JT the Car Guy: I did a video on my very, one of my very first video that's still profitable.
[00:59:54] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm.
[00:59:54] JT the Car Guy: I was talking about O2 sensors and cat converter. I accidentally yelled out, "Yeah, Cadillac converter." Boy, they grilled me in the comment section. I mean, I, I was just... I was new at it, and, uh, some of my language was universal from- Yeah
[01:00:10] JT the Car Guy: a ghetto standpoint. Yeah, I would have to clean all that up. I can't clean it up at this point in my life, so, and it's just being an instructor, but that is one of my biggest monetization bringing in money videos out there, the one I screwed up, that I was this close to taking down because I mentioned, I said Cadillac converter, and they was drilling me.
[01:00:30] JT the Car Guy: I'm so glad I did not take that video down 'cause I never would've.
[01:00:34] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[01:00:34] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, that video is still raking in the money because the message is good, what I'm talking about is good, what I was showing is good. I just slipped up on a word and yelled out Cadillac converter.
[01:00:44] Jeff Compton: Yeah. But see, you and I know it's the most authentic guys that are, that are the ones that are really like we- we're tuning in to watch.
[01:00:52] Jeff Compton: You know what I mean? Like, it's the people- Mm-hmm ... that are legit and authentic. You know- Yeah ... I said it a couple weeks ago, it's, it's real recognizes real, right? Like, if, if I see somebody and I know that that's like, they're not playing an act. Like, this would be just like if JT were to debate next to me, this would be exactly how he would sound.
[01:01:09] Jeff Compton: This is exactly how we would converse all day long, just like that. That's what people want when they come online, is somebody relatable. Like this. You know? '
[01:01:17] JT the Car Guy: Cause I, I still get excited. I still yell, yell out, "Yes!" when I figure something out. Yeah. I feel excited. I fe- I get in kid mode when I find a hard problem out that's been kicking my butt all week.
[01:01:28] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[01:01:28] JT the Car Guy: I walk around the whole shop reminding everybody, "What's my name?" Well, you see this patch? I go into full-blown kid mode when I figure out a problem that's been kicking my butt. I can be on- online with, uh, engineers. There are some ca- Remember we work on new cars.
[01:01:48] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[01:01:49] JT the Car Guy: I don't know this stuff. I didn't design this stuff.
[01:01:51] JT the Car Guy: I need to talk to the guy that designed it. Put me on the phone with the engineer himself-
[01:01:55] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm ...
[01:01:55] JT the Car Guy: who designed this product. I was on the phone with a head Chrysler guy one time. You know, he wanted my cell phone number. "Hey, JT, somebody up front wanna talk to you." It was a, a rep, one of the engineers that actually- Yeah
[01:02:08] JT the Car Guy: you know, "What you got? What you find? What you this? What you that?" And I, you know, and we as mechanics, we can become stubborn to the point-
[01:02:16] Jeff Compton: Oh ...
[01:02:17] JT the Car Guy: like after we figure something out, we don't wanna tell somebody, because we took all week to figure it out, and we want other people to go through the same pain. So-
[01:02:26] Jeff Compton: Yeah
[01:02:26] JT the Car Guy: but right after we fix something, that phone is ringing, "What did you find? I see you closed this case. What did you find? What exactly did you find?"
[01:02:34] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[01:02:35] JT the Car Guy: I'm like, "Nah, man, y'all couldn't help me. I had to figure it out on my own." But I had to get out of that, because no sense in somebody else going through that pain.
[01:02:43] JT the Car Guy: But I- that's called selfish, man. Yes. And it's, it's really-
[01:02:47] Jeff Compton: Well- ... bad ... we've heard some people call it gatekeeping, right? And I was the type-
[01:02:50] JT the Car Guy: Gatekeeping.
[01:02:51] Jeff Compton: I can remember when the, when the splices would be bad in the harnesses, and I would find where that known spot was, and I would share it with my, like a, a core group that I worked with.
[01:03:01] Jeff Compton: I'd be like, "Oh, you got a Caravan doing this. This is the weird place that I found the circuit was bad." And I would share it with them.
[01:03:09] JT the Car Guy: Oh.
[01:03:10] Jeff Compton: But I'm the same way. Like when I find it, you can hear me, you know, you can see me strutting across the shop like I'm like all of a sudden, chest puffed out, like the smartest guy ever, you know?
[01:03:20] Jeff Compton: And, and I would show it to them, but like we, I didn't always want to, when you would figure out the little things necessary, share it with everybody in the shop because like for me it became like I was the go-to guy all the time. I had to solve the nightmare cars, and they'd be just standing there doing brakes and tires- Yeah
[01:03:39] Jeff Compton: and, you know, making... And I'd be beating my head against the wall one after another on, on- Oh, yeah ... you know, um, all this diag stuff, and it was like really hard for me to mature and realize it was like, okay, I've gotta share that stuff though because like otherwise it's not good for the customer that the car keeps coming back like a boomerang.
[01:03:59] Jeff Compton: You've seen it. And, and you know what's wrong with it, but you don't go share it. Like that's just selfish- Mm-hmm ... you know. So
[01:04:09] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. I had to, I had to grow. I had to mature on that end 'cause I was definitely, I, I was dodging the engineer call and they was calling me back. I was, I was- Yeah ... only really pissed off because what they was telling me wasn't working, and it wasn't till...
[01:04:22] JT the Car Guy: And God, let me tell you this, you'd be surprised- Mm. Oh ... what you can find out in those forums. The, the, the not, the not tech guy that's doing this crap at home.
[01:04:33] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[01:04:34] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, it turned out it was such and such. I'm, I'm soaking all of that up. Now, those guys that input- Mm-hmm ... that data, uh- No ... kudos to them, because they don't have to input that data.
[01:04:44] JT the Car Guy: But you know what I'm saying? And we, this is the internet, so you have access to those rooms, to those forums. You might have to join a few of them to get in there. Okay. Right on. But I'm a member of every make and model of Chrysler out there forum. Do you
[01:04:55] Jeff Compton: remember- I'm a member,
[01:04:56] JT the Car Guy: you know, so
[01:04:57] Jeff Compton: I can stay up on things
[01:04:57] Jeff Compton: I'll say one, maybe you've heard it, maybe you've not. There was an old, old group, uh, website, web channel, whatever you wanna call it, called Allpar, A-L-L-P-A-R. Do you remember that, allpar.com? I remember that back in the day when they, it was like- Yeah ... flash codes. Uh-huh. And how to- Yeah ... like, get the, you know, on, key on, off, key on, you know, blink, blink, what's 12 mean?
[01:05:20] Jeff Compton: Like, and I can remember, I'm so old, JT, it's like, I'd be like... Remember when they would give you the ECMs and the book, the book would come with the ECM, the little code book, and they were yellow or they were pink, and it was like your flash code's inside and- Mm-hmm ... 'cause you just plugged it in. You didn't have to program nothing, right?
[01:05:37] Jeff Compton: And I would keep all those books for the different ECMs, and then it's like, if I was really stuck- Yeah ... I'd go over to Allpar and be like, "Well, how did they fix that, that OBD1 car," right? And it was all through there. It was a great resource back in the day. I just think it didn't keep up. You know, I think it's, again, as we change, less people got into fixing their own and, and finding that and contributing to that page, right?
[01:06:01] Jeff Compton: And it's, it's gone away. But that was one of my first kicks at using the internet- Mm ... to learn how to fix cars was, was Allpar. God, I'm dating myself now. It's been a long time.
[01:06:12] JT the Car Guy: Yeah.
[01:06:15] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[01:06:16] JT the Car Guy: See, everybody got their go-to source now with the invention- Mm-hmm ... of AI, like ChatGPT, Claude, so now people coming in telling us what they think wrong with it, what ChatGPT- Yeah
[01:06:27] JT the Car Guy: said is this. I was like, we still gotta charge you to diagnose it and tell you what is wrong with it. Yeah, we can't go off of Chat or Claude or whoever the hell you deal with. And-
[01:06:38] Jeff Compton: Well,
[01:06:38] JT the Car Guy: going- ... those places have
[01:06:39] Jeff Compton: to can it out- ... going back to the forums thing, because- ... all
[01:06:41] JT the Car Guy: the time ... you
[01:06:41] Jeff Compton: and I know-
[01:06:42] JT the Car Guy: So- ...
[01:06:42] Jeff Compton: like, everything we see, we're not the first to see it.
[01:06:45] Jeff Compton: Somebody else has already seen it, and it's just if you can spend the time to find- Somebody... Exactly ... the information, check it out- Exactly ... look at it with an open mind. Don't judge them and go, "Oh, well, he wouldn't know what he's doing. He's a..." You know. That guy's been, maybe been working on that PT Cruiser that he owns for 15 years now.
[01:07:03] Jeff Compton: He's tore the whole thing apart, you know. He knows it as well as maybe I know it. Yeah. I shouldn't disregard him, you know what I mean? Like,
[01:07:12] JT the Car Guy: it's- No, you shouldn't. Yeah. And like I say- Mm-hmm ... it takes a level of maturity to input that data because it has to be in- someone has to type in what they actually found, what they saw- Yeah
[01:07:25] JT the Car Guy: and now it can be circulated all over the internet and people can see, okay, well he found this, I'm gonna check that when I get back to work. Check, I check the simplest of stuff- Yeah ... I see in a forum and engineer is way off base, you know what I'm saying? Mm-hmm. And I get it, man, there's only so much you can expect from a guy over the phone, okay?
[01:07:43] JT the Car Guy: There are times they have to- Yeah ... fly engineers out. You've heard of buybacks in lemon law-
[01:07:48] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm ...
[01:07:48] JT the Car Guy: when Chrysler, their last chance to get it right or they gotta buy the car back. Okay, somebody flying to your shop. Yeah. In the morning. He'll be there in the morning. He catching the next flight out.
[01:07:58] Jeff Compton: Uh-huh.
[01:07:58] JT the Car Guy: So I'm like, "Woo." So all the pressure- Yeah ... is on him, uh, to figure out what's wrong. Yes, so at that point, I didn't design the car. And, and if you- I don't know, I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. But w- I can't or I can't utter such... Some mechanics in our shop- Mm-hmm ... we just can't simply go to the boss and say, "I don't know what's wrong with it."
[01:08:18] JT the Car Guy: All right? He go, "Well, how much we pay you again? Get out there and figure out what's wrong with it." So there's level to find that out stuff. Yeah. So we have access to what we call STAR online. We start up a case and sometime it has to be escalated- Yeah ... to the department that built this network, if it's a bus network issue.
[01:08:40] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, that's why I say you can end up- Mm-hmm ... on the phone with some of the highest people out there, and you just a little old bitty screw mechanic on a low totem pole-
[01:08:48] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[01:08:48] JT the Car Guy: that's happened to be the guy that's there with the vehicle. But they don't, they exhausted all- Yeah ... everything to prevent from buying that car back.
[01:08:57] JT the Car Guy: So this is the third time we didn't get it right, man, she gonna want her money back for this
[01:09:00] Jeff Compton: car. Now you're old enough like me, you remember before there was- It, it can get crazy ... uh, STAR cases and whatnot, do you remember phone and tech line? Yeah. Yeah. 1-800-361-2702. Oh,
[01:09:11] JT the Car Guy: yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Big time.
[01:09:13] Jeff Compton: That's what the number was back in the day, 1-800-361-2702.
[01:09:19] Jeff Compton: It, because they used to, um- Yeah,
[01:09:22] JT the Car Guy: they memorized
[01:09:22] Jeff Compton: by heart, huh? I can remember my, JT, my service manager, coming around and he, he made a page up and he put it on the side of everybody's toolbox. And he's like, "If you're stuck and Jeff doesn't know, call them." And I didn't have to call them a ton, but I called them enough in, in my- Yeah
[01:09:37] Jeff Compton: you know, tenure there of like, 'cause it'd be a brand new car, right? And it'd be doing something stupid.
[01:09:42] JT the Car Guy: Right.
[01:09:43] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[01:09:46] JT the Car Guy: Something crazy, man. Well, nowadays they hiring, they, th- it's not, it's not like that anymore because there's so many channels you gotta go to to get to a big head. They might have a $10 an hour- And we-
[01:09:57] JT the Car Guy: person answering the phone and doing the basic stuff with you. It's like, "Look, can I talk to somebody?" Yeah. "No disrespect, but can I talk to somebody that, that-" Yeah.
[01:10:05] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[01:10:05] JT the Car Guy: you know, that made the blueprints on this damn thing, you know?" So you tell me, "I need to talk to somebody bigger." "Well, you gotta go through the channels, sir.
[01:10:13] JT the Car Guy: What did you find? You gotta-
[01:10:14] Jeff Compton: Oh ...
[01:10:14] JT the Car Guy: what's your, what was your own specs right here?" Own specs. Yeah. "What'd you find right there?" That's, that's something like- You gotta go through the proper channels.
[01:10:19] Jeff Compton: Like, are, are we using each other's meter? Yeah. Like, how's that working, you know? Is his Tesla the same as mine?
[01:10:24] Jeff Compton: Like, yeah, that's, that's, yeah.
[01:10:26] JT the Car Guy: That's what I'm saying. My guy, I predict in the future, the way cars are being built now and the- Mm-hmm ... the communication networks, this gonna be that way. We're gonna plug our thing into the data link connector, somebody way across the other side of the world can see such and such it and do testing right from there.
[01:10:50] JT the Car Guy: It's gonna end up that way. Now, I- that's probably before my lifetime, or my lifetime, you know, in the car industry, let me put it like that. But- Well- ... the future- Yeah ... is finna get real crazy, okay? Especially with diagnosing- Mm-hmm ... cars. And the pay, you think- Yeah ... there's a lot of chatter about low pay, like the Toyota guy.
[01:11:09] JT the Car Guy: You think there's chatter about that now? That's finna get worse because assets finna become better to-
[01:11:16] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm.
[01:11:16] JT the Car Guy: In other words, bigger people gonna have more responsibility- Now, you- ... to figure stuff out ... you think that that stuff is gonna be- And that's, that's not a bad thing. Okay? But-
[01:11:23] Jeff Compton: You know, you'll be done before it gets here, but I'll tell you right now Merc- Mercedes-Benz already has their- Eh
[01:11:29] Jeff Compton: their service information system is incorporated into their laptop, which is their scan tool, and now they're running, you're gonna love this, JT, they run a VR helmet. Mm. So a virtual reality helmet, and then you go over to the car, and it's giving you your service information and talking into your headset of what to do, and it's telling where to put your le- meter leads, where to hook up your lab scope.
[01:11:54] Jeff Compton: It's looking at the results and telling you what to do next. And that's... Napa is also building a program- Holy crap ... that they want to market- JT, that part- ... towards the aftermarket shops for that because it's just this, again, JT, with shops where you work on everything that comes in- Right ... like, y- you can't, you could spend two hours looking at the service information before you ever lift the hood just so you learn how does that network work, what does it look like, right?
[01:12:22] Jeff Compton: Everybody we talk about, like, in the aftermarket side- Yeah ... we talk, "Well, I go over to Identifix when I have an iden- a network problem, and it tells me the most common network, like, module to fail, and I go there first." When you work in the aftermarket, you don't know what module is prone. Like we know, okay, you know, these airbag modules on these Chrysler, they get wet, and they short out, and they do funny things, you know.
[01:12:45] Jeff Compton: Or we know that the sunroof leaks here and does this, that kind of stuff. When you're in the aftermarket, you don't know that. You can't know it. And then everybody still only wants to pay an hour diag, whether they go to the dealership or whether they go to Cousin Pookie's shop. They wanna pay no diag, or they only wanna pay an hour tops.
[01:13:02] Jeff Compton: So if you don't have those kind of channels and networking, you're not finding it. You're not finding the cause, you know? And that's where, going back to it, networking comes in. You can- Yeah ... our good friend Fluffy. I've, I've called Fluffy a couple times and said, "Hey bro, I'm out of the dealer network now, and I've got one of these in the shop doing this.
[01:13:23] Jeff Compton: What would you do?" And he goes, "Oh man, I haven't seen that yet." 'Cause I'm, I'm working on some pretty new stuff that's out of the warranty, but it's still really new. Like, it's not. And, um, one of them was, um, it was a module for, uh, power seats. He's like, "Well, I'd probably change that module." I'm like, "Okay then, that's what I'm gonna do."
[01:13:44] Jeff Compton: And it fixed the car, but it was like if I hadn't been able to reach out to Fluffy and say, "Hey, have you seen this?" And he gets on with his Nissan, he's- Oh, yeah ... puts it in a case and he looks through it, and he's like, "Well, there's been, the module's been changed four times in North Amer- in, in America for that complaint.
[01:14:00] Jeff Compton: Four." He's like, "I would probably put that module in." Sure enough, it fixed the car. Yeah. If I didn't have that network that I've been able to build, JT, I would've been, like, on an island by myself. Right. I'd have still fixed the car. Yeah. But I had no confidence. Hmm. You know what I mean? Yeah. I was very lucky.
[01:14:17] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm.
[01:14:18] Jeff Compton: What, um... We're going back to that Toyota guy. Yeah. You've seen the video. Um, he's gonna be an upcoming guest as well. For the people that haven't known, he's called the, the Yoda guy on TikTok. Yes, sir. I don't, I... My apologies, I don't know his first name. Um, but he's- Yes ... gonna come on. He made a comment about how- Yeah
[01:14:37] Jeff Compton: he had to do a fuel pump in a, in a Toyota, and he works at a dealership. He's been there 11 years, so he's a master Toyota technician, and the job is supposed to pay 2.8- Oh ... to do this fuel pump in this Toyota. I think it's in a Tacoma or, you know, a truck. Well, the aftermarket warranty company only wants to pay him .8, and he shot a video showing how essentially that's all- Yeah
[01:15:03] Jeff Compton: he was gonna get paid to do this job. Now, of course, he's got a big following on TikTok, and his employer came to him and said, uh, "We want that video taken down." And he stood on business and said, "I'm not taking that video down." And then there was some things said, and he quit. Yeah. And he rolled his toolbox.
[01:15:24] Jeff Compton: 11 years of master certification on Toyota. Very successful technician. He could produce his hours. He knew his product very well, if you've watched his channel. What, what do you think about that, JT? Do you think... I think it's gonna become more of a common, we're gonna see that happen again- Boy ... I think.
[01:15:48] JT the Car Guy: Well, eh, I, I wanna say this, I wanna say this, and, and I've never been a big fan of anybody knowing where I work. Now, knowing what brand you work on or for is a different thing, but- Yeah ... where you work, like my bosses don't even know, you know what I'm saying? They not followers or subscribers. Hell, hell no.
[01:16:10] JT the Car Guy: If I see- Yeah ... on Facebook, if I get a friend request from my boss, hell no, bitch. You know, I don't need you all in my business and all this stuff. So, uh, from that standpoint alone, everybody know I'm Mopar, but they don't know, and somebody- Yeah ... some guys don't know- I want you to fix my car. Yeah ... where exactly do you work at.
[01:16:28] JT the Car Guy: Some guys ask me that. Yes. I'm like, "No, no." Dude, I would walk through the, through the shop, through the waiting area- Mm ... and I would get funny stares like this. Damn, I feel that. You know what I'm saying? And I take off running, 'cause I know where they finna go with the question or what. That's that JT the Cop.
[01:16:47] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. 'Cause everybody sitting in that waiting room done once tried YouTube, and I guarantee if they punched in Pentastar or Chrysler, my video might come up, you know- Mm-hmm ... sometime my face if they see livestream. Okay. A lot of my videos you don't see my face. That's done intentionally, okay? I don't, yeah, I, I can't do it, man.
[01:17:04] JT the Car Guy: I don't want nobody knowing where I work at. One guy popped up out of nowhere, "Man, I figured you work right here, man. I figured. What's up, man? What's good?" Bro, what are you doing? Dude, and I, I went with the flow because I didn't wanna- Yeah ... piss him off and he get on there and, "Dude, JT work here," and tell the world.
[01:17:21] JT the Car Guy: So, and we was, I was walking him out to the exit. Like I promise you, he grabbed his cellph- cell phone and said, "All right, man." What's this dude thinking? "Let's do a selfie, man. Hold on, hold on. Let's do..." He grabbed his phone, wanna take a picture, and I- I was like, "No." And I went up front and told everybody, "Anybody call up here or come by- Mm-hmm
[01:17:41] JT the Car Guy: trying to find some JT the car guy, I don't work here. I don't- I can't do that." So Buddy was bold from that standpoint of people even knowing where and-
[01:17:50] JT the Car Guy: Yeah ...
[01:17:51] JT the Car Guy: like I said, you can't dodge- Yeah ... the company Yoda. Yeah, that's Toyota. Okay? I, I wear a Mopar shirt, but you don't see my job right here. And, you know, I sometimes have my name right here.
[01:18:02] JT the Car Guy: You don't even see... This is a YouTube ASE patch. Yeah. I accidentally wear this to work sometimes. My boss was like, "What you doing with that shirt on, man? You gotta put a uniform on." So I had to come out here- Yeah ... and put a uniform on. When I got a uniform on, I don't film, because I don't want you knowing-
[01:18:17] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm
[01:18:17] JT the Car Guy: yeah, calling my job, coming up to my job. Yeah, so that's why I work at a- Yeah ... you know, I work at a full shop, so it's hard to find. We gonna communicate. And my videos, they so edit from a pan standpoint. You're not gonna see- Mm-hmm ... the buildings that gives off the name of the freaking dealership. My, my edit is on point.
[01:18:39] JT the Car Guy: My panning- Yeah ... my cropping and cropping and panning is A1. Yeah, I'm very careful what you see-
[01:18:46] Jeff Compton: Now- ... you know, about me ... so what do you think about his motivation for doing that? What do you think about his kind of, was he right to do it? Would you have done it? Those kind of questions, JT.
[01:19:00] JT the Car Guy: No, he, he, it was risky. It's risky business. And, and again, it depends on your motives. I told you, content creators have a different... Content creators are different. Okay. Okay. Video mechanics are different than shop mechanics. On video, on YouTube, on TikTok, Facebook, we're interested in views. Okay? In the shop, we're a totally different technician.
[01:19:25] JT the Car Guy: You're not gonna see me-- Only time you're gonna see me talking wheel lugs down like I'm supposed to is on video. The camera off, I'm a everybody. And, and I'm not just saying that's not a bad thing, it's just some things-
[01:19:37] Jeff Compton: Right ...
[01:19:37] JT the Car Guy: don't look good on camera.
[01:19:38] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[01:19:39] JT the Car Guy: Some things are not meant for the camera, and I know the difference.
[01:19:42] JT the Car Guy: Okay? But yeah, there's a difference between a YouTube mechanic and a shop mechanic. Those are two different people with two different motives. Okay? So on video, we're interested in views. That video went viral. I mean- Mm-hmm ... if he monetized on TikTok, he getting paid. But, uh, at the cost of the commotion you're gonna stir up, yeah, I, I probably wouldn't have done that.
[01:20:06] JT the Car Guy: That's why I say you don't see the the Wagoneer. Have you heard of the Jeep Wagoneer, the brand new vehicle- I've heard of it ... with the two, uh, three liter, uh, engine? You see- Mm-hmm ... no bad videos from me on that vehicle, and that's done by design. Yes, they got- Yeah ... problems, but you ain't gonna see no, "This v- this car sucks."
[01:20:26] JT the Car Guy: Y- yeah, you're not gonna- Mm-hmm. So I, I, I'm very careful of what I film, okay? And what I show and what I say. I think he- I
[01:20:35] Jeff Compton: am not gonna make the product look bad ... with what he's done, JT, I think he's kind of s- put his foot down and said, "I'm not gonna be hireable by any other dealership." Like, I don't think another, I don't think another dealer is gonna touch him.
[01:20:46] JT the Car Guy: You don't think so? That- Wow. He tainted, uh, scarred. Oh my goodness. The, the good news about that is- Yeah ... um, I mean, there is enough Toyotas- That's right. Yeah ... used Toyotas out there that still need fixing that ain't gonna go, you know. And people will come visit you out of pity. Like, "You the Toyota guy, I want you to work on my cars."
[01:21:09] JT the Car Guy: So, but was it- Yeah ... I mean, he felt it was worth, 'cause he could've easily just pulled it down, "Okay. My bad, I won't do that again." But he's, like you say, he stood on his ground, so- But he says- I hope it was all for a good cause, but- Like he says he wants to
[01:21:20] Jeff Compton: change the industry. Like he wants to see- That's risky stuff
[01:21:23] Jeff Compton: that... Well, yeah- Oh ... that's the thing, right? Think with everybody doing- A lot of... JT, there's gonna be a lot of us that are gonna fall on the sword for- Yeah ... a long time before we're gonna see change. But I think you're gonna see change, 'cause like his point was the aftermarket warranty company shouldn't dictate that I don't get paid the retail time for that job.
[01:21:43] Jeff Compton: That was his point. Now... Yeah. Like, 'cause- Yeah ... you know what warranty time pays you- That was his whole point ... to do your jobs, and then you know what it pays when it comes in the shop, you know. You've talked about, like these, you know, you talked about one video doing an oil cooler and something else at the same time.
[01:21:58] Jeff Compton: There's overlap, so you're not gonna beat the customer up on it, but you know, this could essentially in some places be like a 10-hour job. What he was saying is like, "I'm not against the Toyota warranty. It's bad enough that they cut the time right down, but they can probably make the time." But when the car is not under warranty technically, but it's the aftermarket warranty- Right
[01:22:18] Jeff Compton: and they're cutting his time to .8 when it should be 2.8, um, he'd had enough, and he said it's not happening anymore for him. So, you know. And I see both, like- Oh, man.
[01:22:32] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, what... I'm
[01:22:33] Jeff Compton: actually gonna catch that video. Yeah. Well, I think he really wants to break down why- You gonna, y'all gonna discuss all that?
[01:22:36] Jeff Compton: and where he's go- like I don't think he's gonna s- name names and say, "This is where I'm going." Yeah. I don't know if he's maybe starting his own business. Maybe he's gonna jump out there and be-
[01:22:44] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm ...
[01:22:45] Jeff Compton: a Toyota specialty shop. You know, maybe he's gonna do that. I don't know. But I know that's what he was standing on, was the fact that he was tired of watching his labor dollars not get paid because of aftermarket warranty.
[01:23:00] JT the Car Guy: All those imports are- Sure ... all those imports- Yeah ... are, are fairly similar, aren't they? Toyota, Acura- Mm-hmm ... and so you got a, a window, you know what I'm saying? You know, a- a- again, guy, the term- Yeah ... a car is a car is a car no longer apply. I mean, it's just, it's just not the same, man. A general line mechanic- Mm-hmm
[01:23:23] JT the Car Guy: gonna go crazy trying to keep up with every freaking car, so. But, uh, because of the imports are similar across the board-
[01:23:30] Jeff Compton: And you said something earlier
[01:23:31] JT the Car Guy: how- ... that was a top shape,
[01:23:32] Jeff Compton: you should be fine ... you get your reps in, you do enough of the same repair over and over again, hitting the time ain't hard
[01:23:40] Jeff Compton: Yeah
[01:23:41] JT the Car Guy: No, it ain't. And that's what they counting on. I see a recall that says two hour, I'm going, "Oh, this must be real." Mm-hmm. It must gonna take me three the first time around. All right? Second time around, you know what you can get away with, what you can't get away with. Yep. Third time around- Yeah ... give me all of them.
[01:23:58] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. That's how I go. That's what they counting on, so.
[01:24:01] Jeff Compton: Right. But we
[01:24:02] JT the Car Guy: all gonna
[01:24:02] Jeff Compton: fuss on that very first one. Now how do you... But see, and that was always my thing, like-
[01:24:06] JT the Car Guy: Yeah ...
[01:24:07] Jeff Compton: steering rack in a Caravan, I, I, I make that reference all the time. You know, the other gen- the previous generation of Caravan, like we all could do that rack and pinion, that steering rack, 'cause it all leak.
[01:24:17] Jeff Compton: We could do all of that so fast, make your head spin. It's a great paying job, right?
[01:24:23] JT the Car Guy: Yes.
[01:24:24] Jeff Compton: Oh, sh-
[01:24:25] JT the Car Guy: Have you ever had
[01:24:26] Jeff Compton: to add
[01:24:26] JT the Car Guy: that curve-
[01:24:27] Jeff Compton: When- ... add
[01:24:28] JT the Car Guy: that hose to it?
[01:24:29] Jeff Compton: That- You can thank the Canadians for that because- ... loop around or, uh, cut out that buzz and- ... up here it wasn't just making noise. It would, they would freeze up, like, 'cause again, we're driving through snow here, like lots of snow.
[01:24:40] Jeff Compton: That cooler would freeze up, JT, and the lines would split and blow apart. So all those Caravans would come in with no power steering. Oh. Yeah, that's so... Then they made this big loop- Oh, wow ... that was supposed to stop that from happening. Yeah. My theory always was it was like they were using, when they switched to using ATF 4- Yeah
[01:24:59] Jeff Compton: as a power steering fluid, it's not a traditional power steering fluid, right? ATF 4. And it's because we used to have- Yeah ... the older steel pumps that always rotted out. You know, they had power steering fluid in them and they were, like, they lasted. When we went to the aluminum pumps, they went to an ATF 4- Yeah
[01:25:16] Jeff Compton: and a different type of system and, and, you know, and I think it was till they were tweaking how to get the pressures right, and it not error rate when it was cold, and temperature changes and all that kind of stuff. I think there was some learning curves there. Yeah, I can remember- Yeah ... 'cause you only saw that little cooler on the Caravans for, like, two years and then it was gone.
[01:25:33] Jeff Compton: We fixed it. Yeah. Did they ever fix
[01:25:39] JT the Car Guy: it? Remember that. So that, the re- the cool-
[01:25:42] Jeff Compton: Yeah, it did. But up here- ... the adding the hose and the new reservoir always shake the van though, so. Oh, man, I can remember they were coming in. They had, they had like 10,000 miles on it, and they'd, first cold morning, JT, they'd all come in.
[01:25:52] Jeff Compton: There'd be five of them waiting in the parking lot for you. Yeah. All towed in or drove in, no power steering. Yeah. And you got the, you order the two little hoses and you'd put it on again, and it would freeze up again and blow out again. You know, and then they came in, "Okay, put the lig- line of hose there, and put the big line of hose.
[01:26:09] Jeff Compton: It'd still be noisy. Okay, get a reservoir." Okay. Like, it was, it was, customers were trading those vans because- That's right ... it's been in five times for power steering. Like, I don't understand what's happening. I wish I could fix it for you, man, but I can't order the parts for 2020, you know- Right ... 2006. I can't order them in 2004 yet.
[01:26:30] Jeff Compton: Like, they don't have them. Yeah. It was fun. Um- Discontinued, but- What, uh- Yeah. So going forward for JT, what's... Like, we, you kinda talked about EV. Is that something that's got you excited?
[01:26:47] JT the Car Guy: Uh, no. Okay. Because I don't plan on being around when it's fully implemented, okay? Fully implemented, okay? Now they teasing us right now.
[01:26:56] Jeff Compton: Yeah.
[01:26:56] JT the Car Guy: Uh, they teasing us because the cars are both ways, you- hybrid. Yeah, gasoline on one side, EV on the side. So, you know, the, the projection is-
[01:27:07] Jeff Compton: Mm-hmm ...
[01:27:07] JT the Car Guy: being fully EV, uh, in the future, okay?
[01:27:12] JT the Car Guy: I- if I had to guess, I'd say I got a good... I don't wanna, I don't, I don't wanna think that I'll still be doing this at 65, but I base it on my health- Okay ... and how I move around. Good call. Okay? I get, I go to the gym, I work out, I stay healthy, all right? Take a physical every year. If y'all not taking physicals, please get...
[01:27:32] JT the Car Guy: Early detection is the key to any illness, so please go get your yearly physical. All right? So whatever I'm lacking in, you low on vitamin D, okay, let's fix that. So I try to stay on point of that. So as long as I'm healthy, I'ma be doing it- Mm-hmm ... just because I can't just sit down and do nothing. So I, if I'm healthy as 60, 62, 63, you know, I'ma still be working on cars.
[01:27:56] JT the Car Guy: Like, I, I don't, I don't know what... That's just how it is. Bodybuilders, they never stop wanting to work out. They can retire, they still going to the freaking gym every day. But EV, uh, by the time it's fully implemented, I... So it makes no sense for me to... I guess I have to because I'm in the industry now. I, I have training on it, you know?
[01:28:19] JT the Car Guy: I can't say, "No- Right ... I'm not going to training- Yeah ... because I don't plan on being here five years from now." I can't say that, so I have to soak it up. Now, I can sit around in class and literally not learn nothing and get paid to go to school, but- And
[01:28:30] Jeff Compton: Chris-
[01:28:30] JT the Car Guy: Yeah, that, that's redu- that does nothing, so. But by the time
[01:28:34] Jeff Compton: it's fully implemented, I see myself, uh, in the game.
[01:28:36] Jeff Compton: And Stellantis and Chrysler and Mopar, whatever you wanna call it, they've always kinda drug their feet, right, on the EV thing. Like, they don't go into it full bore the way Toyota did- Yeah ... or, you know, like, y- you've seen the EV Challenger, you know, uh, hot, yeah
[01:28:53] JT the Car Guy: One year. One, one year production Okay? That car stayed...
[01:28:59] JT the Car Guy: See, that's, that's a, that's- Yeah ... that's one of those where I was saying about I gotta be careful what I say and what I do. I can't... That's why I don't have Chrysler. Now, I got Mopar, but that's, that you can't really- Yeah ... do, where he, where this guy work at? You don't see none of that. So I'm free to say, you know, some things, but I'm very careful what I say.
[01:29:17] JT the Car Guy: But that, that was a one-year production experiment. And I, like I said earlier, it's all dependent on- Yeah ... what wind- Yeah ... what way the political winds are blowing- Have you got- ... at the time ...
[01:29:27] Jeff Compton: have you got young people- Who's, who's in office ... that you see- Yeah ... in your dealership that there's a good future there?
[01:29:38] JT the Car Guy: Th- like I said earlier, man, none of that, stuff don't stick. It's not sticking with them.
[01:29:42] Jeff Compton: They don't
[01:29:42] JT the Car Guy: go all the way. They need a shocker Leave that car stuff. Yeah, they don't take none of it home with... And I'm not, I'm not suggesting that they do. I'm saying if they had a genuine love for it, they would alway- they would eat, shit, and breathe car repairs.
[01:29:58] JT the Car Guy: Car, man, man, man, man, man. "No, I can't wait to get to work tomorrow-" Yeah. "... and try to figure out why that car won't start." That was me, but like I say, that was a different era, all right? But at that time I didn't- Mm-hmm ... have wife, kids, this, the responsibility. I would do it for free at one point, but-
[01:30:15] JT the Car Guy: Yeah ...
[01:30:15] JT the Car Guy: th- th- this generation now, nothing sticks with them, okay?
[01:30:19] JT the Car Guy: I felt bad, I was criticizing myself earlier today. A guy asked me about, uh, Freon, the machine, AC machine, putting Freon, should he go in on the low side or the high side while the car running? Like, dude, you was my- Yeah ... apprentice for a year, and I know damn well we discussed this. You know, we talked about it.
[01:30:37] JT the Car Guy: Did none of that stick, okay? I got to the point where, damn, maybe I suck. Yeah. 'Cause no, it ain't me. Yeah. It's just none of... the stuff not sticking with, with these guys, okay? 'Cause he asked the very same question we talked about a million times. Now, I can't discourage him from asking-
[01:30:53] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[01:30:53] JT the Car Guy: because that's what you want to encourage them to do.
[01:30:56] JT the Car Guy: If you don't know, ask. But... And I don't want him to say, "Damn, I ain't gonna ask JT 'cause, you know, he taught me this, so he may think I'm a dumbass or something. No, I'm not gonna..." I don't want you to get to that point. Ask, it's just I'm... this is something I'm handling within. Yeah. I can't believe, uh, I'm questioning myself, you know.
[01:31:14] JT the Car Guy: I've had three apprent- Okay. That, that's the thing. They giving, uh, senior techs apprentices now, okay? Yeah, and you know what's crazy? At one point we would flag everything they do. So we was running, they pay them hour, but they essentially worked for us. So you become, the relationship between- Yeah ... you and him become real great- Right
[01:31:33] JT the Car Guy: because he basically working for you, but he working for the company, that you both work for the company. So they trying to- Mm ... figure out a balance. Like, we can't let you just flag everything he do. So, well, take... He's no good to me because I'm not gonna let him- Oh, yeah. Same ... work on the cars I diagnose- Yeah
[01:31:50] JT the Car Guy: and he flag himself, you know. Yeah, that's not fair. So tho- that, that time is winding down, that era, because they invested. It's called an investment. Let's call it what it is. They invest, they hired a guy, put, teamed him up with me, paying whatever he do, and he gotta use my tools, okay? So he don't start...
[01:32:11] JT the Car Guy: Nobody start off with tools, and that's one of the discouraging things about- Yeah ... to new mechanics. They gotta invest in a shit ton of tools. And by the end-
[01:32:20] Jeff Compton: Uh-huh ...
[01:32:20] JT the Car Guy: I got
[01:32:21] Jeff Compton: no money for the tools- Now let me ask you about the tool brands- ... so I can't be a mechanic. I won't have- ... because, like, do you have... Are you one of these guys- Yes
[01:32:25] Jeff Compton: that's very brand loyal? Like, we see Fluffy a lot, you know, he loves the Matco stuff, right? But are you one of those guys that's very brand loyal or will you buy whatever will get the job done?
[01:32:39] JT the Car Guy: Listen, man, let me say this. You won't believe this. We a huge shop, big shop. Wow. There's not a single tool truck that come to our shop anymore.
[01:32:49] JT the Car Guy: There is- Yeah ... there's no more Snap-on guy, no more Matco, MAC, all of them gone. You know why? Because Harbor Freight, five minutes from the shop. Right. Lowe's, two minutes up the street. Home Depot even closer.
[01:33:02] Jeff Compton: Yep.
[01:33:03] JT the Car Guy: Yep. And they all... Northern. I don't know if you heard of Northern. That's a tool place. They all sell tools.
[01:33:09] JT the Car Guy: So the Snap-on man like, "Why the hell am I coming here?" And not to mention the online, Amazon, places where you can get your tools the very next day. So the Snap-on man, I feel bad for the dude, you know? Only time I'm on his truck, look- ... it's with this. Uh, y'all take a look. Welcome back to the channel. Making videos, and I feel so bad that I buy a tool.
[01:33:34] JT the Car Guy: I'm like, "Where's your smallest price tools, man?" Do you need a... Yeah. I can't go out like this. This is- I need a pocket knife and a- I can't just come on your truck shooting videos ... and a pocket screwdriver.
[01:33:43] Jeff Compton: Yeah. Yeah.
[01:33:44] JT the Car Guy: Give me something, man, so I can say I bought something, man. I appreciate you letting me film, but... And I'm on, I'm, um, the video is about pumping up the tool brand, but-
[01:33:53] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[01:33:53] JT the Car Guy: you know, it don't help. Th- this stuff is just high, expensive. And, and like I say, Harbor Freight right up the street. So no, I'm not a brand guy at all.
[01:34:01] JT the Car Guy: My toolbox is full of Craftsman, Harbor Freight- Mm-hmm ... Northern, a- and even Home Depot. All right? I've never been that only Snap-on guy. Are you, are you- I'm an Snap-on nothing ...
[01:34:12] Jeff Compton: kinda converting to electric-
[01:34:14] JT the Car Guy: Mm-hmm ... like
[01:34:14] Jeff Compton: a lot of the young... Or are you still an old school, you still... Yeah.
[01:34:19] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Oh, yes. No, man.
[01:34:21] JT the Car Guy: Our compressor went out today, okay? The guys that's using air tools, only air tools, they, they can't work. I pull out my M- Milwaukee, I pull out my w- Milwaukee gun- Okay. Yeah ... taking tires off. Saturday we do oil change, rotate tires, so I can still, you know, function 'cause I got a Milwaukee impact. Milwaukee.
[01:34:40] JT the Car Guy: I can't remember the last time I reached up there, pull the air hose down. What am I finna do with this? Everything.
[01:34:48] Jeff Compton: Yeah. I
[01:34:48] JT the Car Guy: know. Dude, they now make
[01:34:49] Jeff Compton: electric air hammers. I, I demoed one on Friday. I almost bought it. Damn. It's over 1,000 bucks though up here, JT, so I, yeah, no.
[01:34:56] JT the Car Guy: Literally?
[01:34:57] Jeff Compton: Yeah. Yeah. Our, our money's not...
[01:35:02] Jeff Compton: Yeah, our money's not worth what Trump's money is. Yeah. No, I'm, I'm, I got- It's not, it's not as good. Everything, we got a major, major difference in, in- It's about 40% less, so yeah. Everything up out here. But yeah, I demoed it. It's quiet. Oh, good. It's not that loud. But, uh- Good ... uh, do you know my buddy Chris Enright, Enright Auto?
[01:35:23] Jeff Compton: He's in California. He's down there. You seen him anywhere? He's on YouTube. He does a lot of tool reviews. He does, uh, he's a Honda Acura specialist. Um, works out of his own, like he's got his own shop. Uh, he does a lot of tool reviews, and he did one showing how to knock an air b- a wheel bearing out of a something with it, 'cause he was, got one of the first demos, you know, one of the first.
[01:35:46] Jeff Compton: He was like a, you could call it a beta tester I guess you could say. So he got one of the first rollouts. It knocks the wheel bearing out, I'll tell you that. Um- Yeah ... I, uh, Royalty, Sherwood- Ooh ... Royalty Auto Service, they were doing a comparison w- a couple weeks back. I don't know if you know them or not, uh, Royalty Auto Service.
[01:36:04] Jeff Compton: Sherwood's got the, an older gentleman, white hair, ponytail. Uh-
[01:36:09] JT the Car Guy: They're
[01:36:09] JT the Car Guy: down
[01:36:09] JT the Car Guy: in
[01:36:10] JT the Car Guy: Florida.
[01:36:11] Jeff Compton: Yeah. They're down in-
[01:36:12] JT the Car Guy: Sherwood. Yeah, his son bring it.
[01:36:14] Jeff Compton: Yeah, he's been on- Yeah ... twice. Great guy. Yeah. I know that dude. Yeah. Um- You had him on a
[01:36:17] JT the Car Guy: while back
[01:36:17] Jeff Compton: then ... they, they demoed one, and, um- Yeah, that's a
[01:36:20] JT the Car Guy: cool
[01:36:20] Jeff Compton: dude. I like him
[01:36:21] Jeff Compton: they ended up having to still get the air hammer out of the, the toolbox to be able to- Okay ... they were knocking out a ball joint I think, which is pretty good test for a, for an air hammer, right? Like-
[01:36:30] JT the Car Guy: Oh, wow ... you know.
[01:36:31] Jeff Compton: Um, but I, I will buy one eventually, I just- Yeah ... the $1,000 thing is like, you know. I can still remember buying...
[01:36:38] Jeff Compton: Well, I didn't pay 1,000 bucks for my LeBaron.
[01:36:40] JT the Car Guy: Oh,
[01:36:40] Jeff Compton: right. So it's really hard for me now to like, I'm buying a tool for 1,000 bucks or I could buy a car. You know what I mean? Like, that's how old I am. I
[01:36:51] JT the Car Guy: know, right? Some, some riding lawnmowers are $2,000 at Lowe's. I'm like, riding lawnmower $2,000? I could buy a PT Cruiser,
[01:37:01] Jeff Compton: boy.
[01:37:01] Jeff Compton: It's $800, man. Um, I won't keep you, JT. It's pretty good. So what, one word of advice for the young people that are coming in, JT, about this industry. Should they? Should they not? If they're coming in, JT, what do you gotta tell them, man?
[01:37:19] JT the Car Guy: I, I wanna say this to the, 'cause I get asked this all the time. You gotta make sure this something you want to do. First of all, you can't just wake up one morning, yawn, "You know, I think I wanna be a mechanic." Okay. You gotta already... It's already gotta be in your blood. I mean, you gotta already not have a problem getting your hands dirty.
[01:37:38] JT the Car Guy: Okay? You gotta already not have a problem being dirty. Let me say that. So it starts right there. If it's already in your blood and you have a passion for it, uh, go for it. Okay? But if you got a problem with getting dirty or, like I say, you can't just wake up and say you wanna be a mechanic. You have to already been thinking about that and dreaming about that, and this is what I want.
[01:38:00] JT the Car Guy: Now, some cars will turn, uh, younger guys into- Yeah ... aspiring mechanic. The Hellcat, "Man, I want one of those Hellcat. I wanna be a Hellcat mechanic." So if you can get in the door or you wanna get in the door that way- Mm-hmm ... and once you get in, you find out-
[01:38:15] JT the Car Guy: Yeah ...
[01:38:15] JT the Car Guy: this is what I do for a living, so now I gotta make this work.
[01:38:19] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. So you actually need something to push you into Fulfilling your... 'Cause it, to some people it's a dream. "Uh, I wanna be a mechanic when I grow up." I get it, but when life hit, life's problems hit, the tool bill hit, you need tools for this, that, and the third, then yeah, that's when you start changing your mind.
[01:38:38] JT the Car Guy: But it's gotta already be in you. So ask yourself, "Uh, is this in me? Is this in my blood? Does this... Is this something I really..." Because quit looking on YouTube at these mechanics and going, "That guy's good. I wanna be..." I had one guy in the comment section literally ask me- ... how long it take for me to get as good as you.
[01:38:58] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Like,
[01:38:58] JT the Car Guy: there's, there's, there's no way you can answer such a question. You know? But yeah, you can start off, you know, in the trenches like me. That's what I did. I went to school, and I'm not gonna recommend you go to-
[01:39:10] JT the Car Guy: Yeah ...
[01:39:10] JT the Car Guy: school. I mean, YouTube University works just fine, but it has to start from within.
[01:39:16] JT the Car Guy: So once you figure out if it's- Yeah ... in, inside of you, then I say go for it. D- sit down and analyze yourself. Mm-hmm. Right? Because this is a brutal industry. Yeah. I mean brutal. Brutal, brutal, brutal, okay? You can easily get knocked out of this industry for the... And you, you know, the repairs you do- Yes ... are life.
[01:39:40] JT the Car Guy: Yep. You know, people, lives depend on it. You rotate somebody tire and you don't put something on right or you don't do, you can eventually, you know, somebody could get hurt by the work that you do. So you ha- there have to be a level of- Yeah ... careness in everything you do automotive related because somebody could end up hurt by something you do.
[01:39:59] JT the Car Guy: So ask yourself, is this something you really wanna do before you... I mean, when I say really wanna do it- You gotta be set with it ... I'm talking really, really. Like I said- Yeah ... it has to be inside of you, inside your blood, so. Oh my goodness, man. Yes. Wake up, man. What I'ma fix today, huh? Figure out what's going on today, and be excited to go to work.
[01:40:17] JT the Car Guy: All in the beginning. Like I said, once real world life kick in, it, it's gonna, it's gonna even out, and then you already in by the time the real problems hit you, so. That's right. This is what you do for a living- Now- ... so now you gotta make it work ...
[01:40:30] Jeff Compton: I gotta ask, um-
[01:40:32] JT the Car Guy: So yeah ...
[01:40:32] Jeff Compton: being that you're-
[01:40:32] JT the Car Guy: Ask yourself those serious questions
[01:40:33] JT the Car Guy: like a
[01:40:33] Jeff Compton: Chrysler guy and you're kinda into the, you mentioned the Hellcat, you ever been to, uh, SEMA? SEMA's the big show in Las Vegas they do every year Yeah No? I have not. It'd be nice if you could get there- Yeah ... sometime. I have not. 'Cause I know I keep talking all the time, you hear me talk about the different training events and stuff, such, but I mean, I don't think I'm gonna, ever gonna see you there because, like, you get all the training that you, you wanna get, you know, on your brand right through the shop.
[01:41:01] Jeff Compton: But it'd be pretty cool
[01:41:06] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Th- th- there are, there are- Mm-hmm ... tax credits that you can use. Like if you got a YouTube channel and it's, you use it as a business, like you can carry those- Okay ... expenses, travel expenses through channels, you know, and, and, and make it worth your while, okay? But just coming out of my pocket to pay you to go to the event-
[01:41:27] Jeff Compton: Yeah
[01:41:27] JT the Car Guy: you gotta find a, a, a right channel to bill that stuff to and, uh, make it make sense from a business standpoint, you know. But there are, there are channels, like my YouTube channel is like a L- Mm-hmm ... it was a LLC. I haven't renewed- Yeah ... it but I gotta get that back because it was huge at one time, bringing in serious money to where- Mm-hmm
[01:41:45] JT the Car Guy: I can't hide it from the IRS 'cause YouTube telling them what, what they- Yeah ... paying me and yeah. So I had to make it a business and when it became LLC, I became free. I can really- That's right ... say what I wanna say, but I'm still not gonna yell out Jiffy Lube name anymore, you know? Yeah. You can't sue me, you can sue Online Mechanic Tips LLC.
[01:42:05] JT the Car Guy: So I'm excluded from any of your crazy lawsuits. Yeah. Dorman. Uh, Dorman, you hear some of my videos be I gotta be careful. I never say, I never mention the word, and it's funny how people don't understand, "Bro, why can't you get that word right?" It really frustrate people. I don't say Dorman. That's right.
[01:42:23] JT the Car Guy: Like, bro, I'm trying to prevent lawsuits here. What are you, kidding me? Like, I'm not gonna yell out, keep yelling at... You know what was weird? I had a rep call me, or email me from Dorman-
[01:42:33] Jeff Compton: Yeah ...
[01:42:33] JT the Car Guy: wanted to invite me to, uh, some of their launch, product launches. Yeah. I did a video on that 'cause one guy came in- Mm
[01:42:42] JT the Car Guy: on my Dorman video, I was dogging out the aluminum cooler. Okay? And I wanna go on record on your show- Okay ... explaining my problems with that cooler, okay? There's nothing... Let me be the first to say aluminum is better than plastic, okay? I've never disputed that. I've never said plastic is better than aluminum.
[01:43:01] JT the Car Guy: Now, as it relates to the cooler, my whole beef with the Dorman, I'm still gonna say Dorman, the Dorman cooler is, uh, um, the insides, not the outsides. To me, JT the Car Guy, the insides matter. The flow rate, how much oil is going through that cooler, how much coolant is going through that cool- cooler, okay?
[01:43:24] JT the Car Guy: All of that matters, all right? Uh, there are times we would install one of those aluminum cooler and the customer would come back with overheating issues. I go in with a Mopar factory- Right ... cooler. Like everybody- That's right ... don't know your recipe. That's right. Yep. Like the Colonel don't tell his recipe to Church's Chicken, you know?
[01:43:43] JT the Car Guy: So yeah, he can mimic it to the best of his ability- So, but people don't look at that. They only looking at the outside, and in their mind, aluminum is superior over plastic. That part is true, but my issue is with the insides. And now that because that cooler has been revised, uh, there's no more outside issues, okay?
[01:44:05] JT the Car Guy: Every cooler, all of those coolers- Sure, yeah ... is gonna eventually leak on the bottom. The seals is gonna compress, and they're gonna leak from there, okay? So I just have a different... Uh, I wanna go in with the top quality part, and in my opinion, the, the part that Mopar suggests, OEM, is what I like to go with.
[01:44:26] JT the Car Guy: There are customers that demand, "No, I want the aluminum cooler." That's right. Okay. I'm never gonna fight anybody on what you want me to put on your car. I'm gonna put an al- aluminum Derma cooler on it, but that is my whole beef with that. And I had- Mm-hmm ... to refrain from yelling out, you know, the proper name, so I revised the name to my liking.
[01:44:45] JT the Car Guy: But it still- Yeah ... baffled me how some people don't know why I call it that. You know, we living in a free speech society. You should. Freedom of speech society, where I should be able to say what I want to say, right? Yes. But there are consequences to what you say. I don't wanna end up in court, you know, for defamation.
[01:45:01] JT the Car Guy: "Oh, he, he dogging us out. He, every video he put out- That's right ... he dogging..." Y'all know I never mentioned their names. That's my, my fir- first line- Yeah ... of defense. I never mentioned the word, their name. I always mention... And I had to explain to that Derma rep, uh, I had to explain to him the same thing. A YouTube content creator have views in mind.
[01:45:22] JT the Car Guy: Yeah. Okay? I'm not, I'm not dogging y'all out. People gonna correlate what I'm saying to whatever they want to, but I just gotta be careful what I'm saying. I'm not gonna call- Yeah.
[01:45:31] Jeff Compton: Yeah ... you
[01:45:31] JT the Car Guy: know. E- everybody's smart enough to know what I'm talking about, but I, I don't have a beef, I don't have a problem with their coolers.
[01:45:38] JT the Car Guy: Uh, that, but one of the issues is the way they came about. They made it seem like- Chrysler don't have a handle on their cooler. You know, they waited till, yes- Yeah ... where everybody in the world found out that plastic cooler was garbage. But that's only on the original cooler. Yeah. The Pentastar came out in 2011, I think, 2011.
[01:46:00] JT the Car Guy: So '11, '12, '13, the first five years, all of those coolers are garbage. And w- with any part, you have to find out- Yeah ... what failed on those and advance on the other, revise. So they revised all of those coolers. So the cooler I go to the parts department- That's right ... and get now- Yeah ... is not the freaking same cooler on a 2011 cooler.
[01:46:21] JT the Car Guy: It's been enhanced, revised, everything. So people think, literally think I'm replacing the same cooler with the same cooler. No. That's the difference between night and day- Yeah ... between this updated, advanced, still plastic, but everything is so much better plastic. But- Mm-hmm ... I've never been the one- Of course
[01:46:42] JT the Car Guy: to say plastic is better than aluminum. And, and a lot of them- That's not my argument ... JT, they got a bum rap because a lot of people- That's never been my argument. So I hope
[01:46:47] Jeff Compton: people- The leak comes from the fact that people, like, crank those things in so tight, you know, that you get a leak that way. It cracks it or whatever, but-
[01:46:54] JT the Car Guy: Overtorque.
[01:46:54] JT the Car Guy: Yeah ...
[01:46:54] Jeff Compton: I won't keep any more of your time, my friend. Overtorque. I, uh, I just really- All right ... this was overdue having you on here, and I really wanted to have you on. Man. I watch your stuff almost every day, and I really enjoy it. Oh, it was fun. And I think it's, um- It was fun ... I think you're doing a really good thing by showing people, you know, uh, a dealer technician that's not throwing things across the shop or is not running down, you know, um, everybody and everything.
[01:47:20] Jeff Compton: You're just, you know, like I said, you, you handle it very professional while still getting your message across, and I think that's important 'cause, like, I, I want, I wanna highlight good technicians regardless of where they work. It doesn't matter to me. If you're a good technician- Yeah ... I wanna showcase you.
[01:47:34] Jeff Compton: And that's why I wanted to have you on, because- Oh ... you were nice enough to give me a shout-out, say some really nice things about me, and I thought the least I can do is show people- Oh, yeah ... that have not seen JT, which I think it's getting a pretty small audience that hasn't seen you. I wanted to show you to them.
[01:47:50] Jeff Compton: So JT, thank you for being with me tonight, man. Yeah. I really appreciate you spending the time with me. All right. And, um, everybody, if you haven't seen him, uh, it's- What? Give us your two channels again, JT
[01:48:05] JT the Car Guy: Okay. Uh, I got a YouTube channel. Uh, it's called Online Mechanic Tips, okay? So it's pretty big following over there, and on that channel alone is where I indulge in auto repairs, right? You may find several videos of me yapping and talking, but that's to get a message across. Uh, in the other videos you may actually see me working.
[01:48:26] JT the Car Guy: But because I'm limited, I don't have the freedom of recording, you know, in my own shop. That, that takes a level of freedom, okay? I don't have my own shop, so I gotta... I can't just walk around with a tripod on my head or, you know what I'm saying? I gotta be careful how I film wherever I'm at. You may find videos of me in other shops, uh, doing what I call troubleshooting, okay?
[01:48:48] JT the Car Guy: I would try to sneak footage there and get you footage because I think it should be highlighted. Uh, but yeah, on that mechanic channel. Now, the other channel is- Mm-hmm ... uh, the political side of the automotive industry, okay? It's called Red Line News Channel. Red Line News Channel. So that one's another one of my channel.
[01:49:06] JT the Car Guy: I get to sit down in a chair in a, you know, in a podcast format and discuss issues, and I may have a commentator on the side, news commentator, uh-
[01:49:16] Jeff Compton: Yeah. Yeah ...
[01:49:16] JT the Car Guy: you know, what they call in today's society, uh, interacting or, you know, um, yeah, arranging off their footage. But that's on the other end. So it depends on how you wanna watch.
[01:49:26] JT the Car Guy: You wanna watch, uh, from an automotive political side of things- Yeah ... because their politics play a role in every industry, and the automotive industry is no exception. Or the mechanic hands-on side. So that's two different channels. But- Yeah ... man, I appreciate you having me on. Uh, like I said, uh- ... it was fun.
[01:49:42] JT the Car Guy: I could wait to get home after you reminded me that we scheduled it for that day. Uh, let me get
[01:49:47] Jeff Compton: home
[01:49:47] JT the Car Guy: and let's get this done '
[01:49:48] Jeff Compton: cause- I, I appreciate you, man ... I already want to get this done And as always- But I appreciate you having me on, brother ... I appreciate my, uh, my family at Techmetric for sponsoring this podcast and making me, you know, giving me the means to be able to do what I do.
[01:49:58] Jeff Compton: And our friends at LaunchTech USA, if you're thinking about, you know, getting a scan tool, uh, I suggest you strongly check out LaunchTech USA. Um, I have one of theirs and it's all I pick up anymore. It's my go-to tool. So, you know, reach out to people, reach out to me. You wanna know anything about those two, I can help you.
[01:50:19] Jeff Compton: I'm your hookup guy. Um, JT, my brother, thank you for being on here tonight. Everybody, as always, for tuning in, I thank you, I love you. And, uh, we'll see everybody. ASTA is one week away. By the time this drops we'll already be at ASTA, so, uh, I'm looking forward to seeing all my friends there. JT, I hope, man, at some point I can meet you in person, shake your hand.
[01:50:40] Jeff Compton: So be nice to do Yeah. So, um- Oh yeah, that would be fun ... and JT, as always, you hear me say- That would be fun ... you know, we might have you back again. Hey, man. I'd love to hear, you know, how it's going and if you see something or I say something, see you, I might just say, "Hey, what do you think about this, JT?"
[01:50:57] Jeff Compton: And we'll have a conversation about it. So everybody, as always, thank you for tuning in, and I'll see you all next time. Peace.
[01:51:07] JT the Car Guy: All right Hey, if you could do me a favor real quick and
[01:51:13] Jeff Compton: like, comment on, and share this episode, I'd really appreciate it. And please, most importantly, set the podcast to automatically download every Tuesday morning. As always, I'd like to thank our amazing guests for their perspectives and expertise, and I hope that you'll please join us again next week on this journey of change.
[01:51:30] Jeff Compton: Thank you to my partners in the ASAP group and to the Changing the Industry podcast. Remember what I always say, in this industry, you get what you pay for. Here's hoping everyone finds their missing 10 millimeter, and we'll see you all again next time