Quote:
Originally Posted by banditvxl1911
Ive been recommended Cars & Concepts, Rennen Imports, and Tuning Dynamics. Any suggestions? i'd like to get the rod bearings done at some point, and fix a couple broken parts on the interior. Thanks
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I've had multiple people recommend European Performance in St. Pete just down the street from me (right off the 175/Tropicana Field exit) — brought my car in for a full inspection since I'd recently purchased. I had a PPI but I wanted to double down.
Anyway- I worked with one of the owners and he was super knowledgeable. I enjoyed chatting with him about mods and general maintenance. My car was there for about 26 hours and we spoke on the phone twice for 15 minutes, and spoke for about 20 minutes when I picked the car up. We discussed everything from rod bearings to paint correction to tires to brake upgrades to forced induction.
They've got a lot of Porches in the shop, couple Ferraris, I've seen Lamborghinis there. They've been in business for 30 years and are family owned. Most things about the shop made me feel pretty good, they had one non-european car in the shop, an Infiniti M45, and they someone had made a BMW logo with marker on a little piece of cardboard and taped it over the Infiniti logo. Gave me a good overall vibe that the people that worked there are not just punching a clock, but actual enthusiasts.
They made a handful of quotes for me outlining things i should do to make the car perfect in a couple chunks- this helped break up over $6k in maintenance across 4 invoices, and they outlined most important to least important.
Really good operation where I felt like I'm going to be their long-term client not just some customer.
Few things I didn't like.... prices on parts. I EASILY took a $1200 quote, of which $500 of was parts, went on FCP Euro and bought everything, genuine BMW or OEM for about $280. My feeling is, if you're going to charge me $110/hr for labor (which is more than fair for a solid euro shop), don't mark up the parts 75%. The prices are probably dealership prices, but, still, knock it off.
They did tell me they'd work with aftermarket parts I purchase, but wouldn't work with OEM parts they didn't supply. That's standard, understood, no problem, aside from the prices.
Luckily, I'm mechanically inclined and my brother, who just moved down here, is a master mechanic and I just turned the first $1290 invoice into $280 and a Saturday.
I fully intend to bring my car to them for rod bearings. I have no doubt these guys know their stuff. I've got a quote sitting here for rod bearings and motor mounts and it's the going rate in the area. They also said they'd let me bring my own aftermarket bearings in.
While the visit to the shop was a real wake up call as to the cost of M ownership, I did inspire me to get my hands dirty. I expect I'll be working with European Performance a lot in the future though.