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Big Iron Doctor from TikTok Talks About Issues in the Heavy Equipment Industry
Big Iron Doctor from TikTok Talks About Issues in the Heavy Equipment Industry
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About this episode
Josiah Myring, known as the Big Iron Doctor on TikTok, joins the Jaded Mechanic Podcast to discuss the heavy equipment industry, focusing on the challenges mechanics face, particularly with Caterpillar machinery. The conversation dives into the profitability of service work, the importance of proper training, and the impact of technology on diagnostics. Josiah shares his journey from working in heavy equipment to starting his own business, emphasizing the need for skilled technicians and the complexities of modern machinery. The episode also touches on the future of the industry and the potential for emerging technologies.
Topics:
heavy equipment mechanics
Caterpillar machinery
profit margins
service work
training and certification
diagnostics
emerging technologies
business challenges
mechanic skills
industry future
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Today's guest is Josiah Meiring, the Big Iron Doctor on TikTok. Josiah talks about the issues in the heavy equipment servicing industry, particularly how technicians are severely underpaid. He talks about when he worked at a John Deere dealership and why he left to be a mechanic, saying his diagnostic skills needed to improve. Josiah also shares advice on starting a business, saying it's really important to have proper training and certification.
00:00 Pipeline Equipment Experience
08:33 Working in Extreme Heat: Strategies
11:28 Pipeline Mechanic Opportunity: Higher Pay
18:44 Freelance Mechanic's Journey
22:04 Curiosity and Learning Mindset
30:53 Helping in Hurricane Aftermath
36:39 "Navigating Bootleg Software Challenges"
40:37 Understanding System Technology Reluctance
44:22 Applied Failure Analysis Explained
50:12 Exorbitant Repair Quotes Dispute
54:24 Equipment Maintenance: Big vs. Small Contractors
01:02:51 Minimum Tech Education Demand
01:07:51 Lack of Industry Standard Certification
01:12:56 Not a Truck Mechanic
01:14:19 Complex Truck Systems Challenges
01:19:43 Celebrating Everyday Fixers
Follow/Subscribe to the show on social media!
TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jeffcompton7
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@TheJadedMechanic
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100091347564232
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Ford F150
"...And like, I can remember parking my. My stepdad's F150 in the bucket of this, like, you know, big cat ha..."
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Subaru Outback
"... be driving out to, to get something to eat, like Outback Steakhouse or, you know, wherever, wherever you'r..."
Pipeline Equipment Experience
Working in Extreme Heat: Strategies
Pipeline Mechanic Opportunity: Higher Pay
Freelance Mechanic's Journey
Curiosity and Learning Mindset
Helping in Hurricane Aftermath
"Navigating Bootleg Software Challenges"
Understanding System Technology Reluctance
Applied Failure Analysis Explained
Exorbitant Repair Quotes Dispute
Equipment Maintenance: Big vs. Small Contractors
Minimum Tech Education Demand
Lack of Industry Standard Certification
Not a Truck Mechanic
Complex Truck Systems Challenges
Celebrating Everyday Fixers
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25 of the profit margin for Caterpillar Corporation was strictly from service. Their service rates 180 an hour and their technician caps out of 40 an hour. Figure in his benefits, he's probably at 60. So.
Yeah.
What, there's something wrong there. You know what I mean?
I'm sitting here with a new friend of mine from Tick Tock. I know, I know. Tick Tock is so bad. Steal my data from China.
Right.
His gentleman's name is the Big Iron Doctor on Tick Tock. And he'll introduce himself.
Thanks, Jeff. My name's Josiah Myring. I said again, Jeff said Big Iron Doctor on Tick Tock. Yeah, and like, I like what you said there about the, about the Chinese data. That, that is steel there. That's.
Yeah, yeah.
But yeah, it's good to be here, Jeff. So thanks for having me.
Very. You're very welcome. I'm. I'm excited to have this kind of conversation because some people listen to me know that like, I started out in the heavy equipment side of this industry. I, I got a degree in college in it. I worked for Caterpillar Torment up here for a very short go and then we were talking this morning on a sound check. Melro Bobcat for a short go and then did the highway truck and coach thing. But you, you, you're, you're always kind of been like, this has been your one, you know, thing is that you're, you work on, Don't.
Do you work on mostly cats. You kind of talked about your pipeline experience.
So that was, you know, as far as like, you know, heavy equipment goes. We do all makes all models now. Right. But yeah, the, the start was definitely Caterpillar. And I think Caterpillar gets a lot of light, you know, just because it's not necessarily. Well, how do you say that? It's, it's not necessarily that Caterpillar machinery is the best equipment. It's the most, you know, readily available for parts. I mean, you can call, you know, Caterpillar and whole or in California, you know, if you're on the east coast and you're closed, they can get your parts in a Dropbox by the next morning.
Yeah, that's pretty cool. It is. And, and that's why pipelines use them. You know, I worked, had the opportunity of starting out working in my professional side on the heavy equipment for a company called Precision Pipeline out of Eau Claire, Wisconsin. Big outfit, you know, we had. Each spread would have three or four hundred pieces of brand new cat machinery. So it's insane when you actually see that equipment, you know, and I heard all the stories about pipelines when I was back in high school and, and just to actually see all of those D8 dozers lined up in a row, you know, you'd have, you have 100 of them in a row and just getting them prepped for, for the jobs and stuff like that, at the overhauls, it was, it was insane. So I guess that's, you know, I, I started out way back as, when I started out working at a John Deere dealership in my hometown.
And that, that was where I got my start. Shadowed a older technician for a long time and he showed me a lot of the ropes. And then he ended up leaving to go work for a bigger outfit, Cozing Construction.
Right.
He was, and he was with, he's with them for a long time. He actually went independent himself as well. So I got a lot of hands on experience that way. In the summertime I would go do tech training either you know, online or hands on. You know, they'd have, John Deere would come out and they teach us how to integrate systems like topcon, GPS or Trimble, stuff like that. Set those up. But the, the fundamentals, you know, for this were really something that I, I gained from, from my dad. I have three generations of mechanics.
My grandfather retired from UPS as a shop foreman for 30 years. My dad was an airframe and power plant technician and an industrial electrician. So he, he taught me a lot where the electrical was concerned, which is, you know, every, which is your bread and butter essentially.
Yeah.
You know, you can't, I don't, you can't do anything without having that skill set anymore.
Yeah. So we talked earlier this morning about Cozing. We had a former guest on that had started there too. And you. I didn't realize the, the scope of the size of the company. Like you, you call them Big Orange.
Yeah, yeah, that's, that's their, that's their nickname. Right. They call, they've been called Big Orange for, for a long time because Cozing, every piece of equipment that cacosing gets, they paint like okay, burnt neon orange. It's really cool, it's really distinctive and you can tell them apart anywhere. It doesn't matter exactly, you know, where, where they're at on a job and it's just simple. There's cacosing painted on the equipment somewhere, you know.
So yeah, when, when you talked about the D, when you Talked about the D8s. When I graduated college, I went to Hamilton, Ontario, which is kind of like, Steel Town. And remember seeing my first D10 up close. And then the big. We had the big mine haul trucks as well. Right. And like, I can remember parking my. My stepdad's F150 in the bucket of this, like, you know, big cat haul.
Like, literally could drive it into the, like, a parking spot. And somewhere there's still a picture of that from, I don't know, B97 or something like that. Like, that's going back a long ways. But yeah, when I. We go down to. Stoko, was one of the biggest companies around for steel.
Okay.
And. Okay, you'd go down and see them and it was just like. It was like the whole world was yellow. You know what I mean? Like, it was all cat that yellow and. And intimidating. Like, just. Yeah, the scope of those kind of that machinery. Right.
Like, it was incredible. But like I was saying this morning, I wasn't ready for it, but. So that was like John Deere farm equipment, right?
No, it's all John John Deere construction equipment. There was, you know, I worked on a little bit of ag equipment. But that's. That's honestly, you know, as a mechanic. Right. And you work on all makes, all models. You want to work on all that stuff, but you really have to focus on one area to be valuable to the market. Right? So, yeah, I mean, not to say that you can't go out and fix that stuff, but yeah, we didn't do too much of the ag equipment.
I mean, I might have put a couple grain boxes in some combines and stuff like that. But, you know, as far as that, that stuff's. It's like Chinese to me when I get into it.
So, yeah, I can remember coming through on the construction side. That seemed to be the two big things back in the late 90s. It was Cat and John Deere. And then there was a few. Komatsu was starting to come in, but it wasn't big yet, not like they are now. Right. Like, Kamato is huge now. Incredible.
They've come up. So I can still remember a teacher talking to me about saying way back in the day, Komatsu got their start because some tourists came through the plant, started a cat plant, and started taking a bunch of pictures of the assembly line and stuff like that. And that's how they were able to go back. Because, I don't know, maybe it's before your time, but you used to be able to take some of them out and that you swore that you were working on a cat. Like, the parts all looked the Same, like it was, it was eerie, you know what I mean?
Yeah.
And he said it was like. Yeah, that's what he said it was like. Well, way back in the day, you know, they used to have plant tours and guys would go through with cameras and just start be snapping this and snapping that and you know, nobody thought anything of it.
And yeah, fast forward. You can't even go into, you know, you can't even go into Peoria, Illinois's freaking, you know, warehouse camera on you.
Yeah. So what's that like working outside on that stuff?
You know, that's, that's the one thing I, I guess that's different. You said, you know, you got a lot of guys that started heavy equipment and go back to automotive. You know, I, my, my granddad and my dad, they always worked in four walls. And I can remember being a little kid, you know, I never minded the weather. I had a lot. So it's not bad, you know, South Florida here, it's, I'm lying when I say it's not bad. It gets rough. July, August, it's pretty, it's pretty rough.
You know, you're, you're dealing with 9,505 degrees, which is, you know, if it's dry. But here it's all humid. It's, you know, you have 100% index. You walk out your front door and you're sweating before you get to the truck to fire it up. So it's, it's really just a lot more about planning the work at that point. You know, you get up a little bit earlier in the morning and start earlier, finish earlier. Peak heat is about 2:30 in the afternoon, so get out before the sun comes up and then work until, you know, you've had enough for the day. And, and a lot of the contractors down here get that too.
You know, they're, they're like, they're not working their guys to death when it's hot out like that because you can't, you won't have a work for it, you know, so it's.
So after the, the John Deere thing, kind of give us how you got started doing where you, where you started and how you ended up where you are.
Yeah, okay. So after the John Deere thing, you know, I had this teenage inclination that I was like, I'm not going to be a mechanic. I don't want to do that. You know. So I pursued a couple other avenues. I, I ran equipment for a little bit. I worked as an iron worker on cell phone towers, traveling around a Little bit. I, I kind of hit the road when I was 18 and started working for a bunch of different outfits and about, I was, I was 19 or 20, 30 now.
So this is 10 years ago. That's when I started working for pipeline outfit. Right. And I remember one day I was running a Bulldozer and a D7E E model to be exact, an electric model, integrated model. They're garbage. But yeah, it quit steering. And I was like, that's weird. You know.
So oddly enough, and this is a whole nother topic, but it was for a union contractor, so I wasn't even allowed to like do anything past check the oil or do the basic daily inspection. Right.
Yeah.
So I didn't know that at the time. I had a basic set of tools in my pickup truck, which was about a quarter mile back behind me. So I walked back, got the truck, brought it over, jacked the cab up and isolated the steering motor because it was, I, it was evident that the seal had gone out of the pump. The pump had fit, steering motor had failed, you know, so.
Right.
I got the lines pulled off of it, which, what? The ones that weren't constantly flowing, you know, nothing from the tank obviously you could pull off because I didn't have caps and stuff like that. But I got that pulled off the mount bolts. And along came this technician, his name was Bill Fisher, he's from pa. And he got, there he goes, another mechanic been here? No sir, you know, I'm not trying to step on your toes. I said, I just said, I recognize the failure in the steering motor. So I jacked the cab up and got it ready for you. I know you guys are busy, you know, said I've. He said, well what are you doing running the equipment? And you know, in the back of my mind I'm going, I've been wearing this same pair of jeans for three days.
You know, I'm like, you're head to toe covered in dirt, grease. And you know, at the time, I guess what drove me away from being a mechanic was the John Deere shop. You know, it just didn't, it didn't pay. I remember the guys were capped out at 25 an hour and you know, they'd have a hundred thousand dollars in tools, you know, in their three bay toolboxes. And I'm like, you know, I, I was young at that time and I'm like, man, it just doesn't seem like that, that seems like a good investment of your time. You know, you're out here laboring at working extremely Hard for their low return. Well, long story short, this Bill Fisher guy, he's like, you know, he goes, well, he goes, why don't you come wrench for us? And said, you know, like, I don't know, talk to me about the pay, you know what I mean? And he was telling me all about the benefits they were getting on Pipeline. As a heavy equipment mechanic.
We have a joke, we call it hide and seek for five grand a week because you're there until this stuff breaks down, right? And so that's, that's really what got me wrapped into it. I got to work for, for, for Precision Pipeline and I went to work for one of the best master mechanics in the trade. There were 14, we call them rig mechanics. That's where you have your own truck, your own tools and everything. And then the company rents, rents your truck from you for the job and pays you hourly for the truck and at your hourly wage. And then he said, he'll, he'll never start you out as a mechanic. He goes, you're gonna have to build the truck, you know, and, but he will bring you in as a lube tech and if you're good as a lube tech doing the PM services, he'll move you up. So fast forward there.
I spent three, three seasons doing that. And then I went ahead and got, got to a position where I was managing all the maintenance on our entire spread. I knew I made an Excel spreadsheet that had, it had a timer in it. So we were working 712 hour days, 714 hour days. And I had all that, all that data, right? So I could pretty well guess when each crew was going to need service again. And I tried to get them to where they were on intervals. And it was especially important when we got to West Virginia when we were working in the Appalachian Mountains, because you didn't have access to them everywhere. You were only four, four or five spots on the entire job.
You could get to them. So I did that and then I ended up going and getting my own service truck and I went to work for them on the same project. The one cool thing about the size of Precision was they had Caterpillar's ET and CIS programs at dealer level, you know. So along with that came all of Caterpillar's training protocols and all their training courses. I think there's like 50 or some odd rig mechanics at Precision over the over three spreads. And there were only two of us that were using the training protocols. And you would get certificates through that and so on and so forth. And it was just like, you know, to me, I couldn't understand why anybody wasn't dealing with it, because I'd see these, you know, these guys that are 50s, 60s and everything, and they're still over there doing the bowl work, you know, changing track pads out and.
And I'm like, you know, they. They can't stand up straight anymore. And. And it's, you know, it's like, man, you know, what. What's the difference there? And then you walk. You walk around to the one when. When they would have to call Caterpillar out sometimes, right, for warranty stuff. And it was always the young guy with the laptop standing straight up and down.
You get in the cab, say, yep. You know, the brakes are going out of it. You're gonna have to get those changed out. You know, I'd be in there splitting the tracks and changing the brakes out, doing all that heavy bull work. And I went, no. I said, I got to learn how to. I got to learn how to understand these diagnostic systems. Right? So that's really what I put a lot of my time and effort into.
And then I expanded that, you know, across all makes and all models and. And carrying with me what I learned from my dad as an amp. If. If you don't have. This is what. This is how he would always say it. I was a little kid, and he used to make me read manuals. I remember when I got an RC car, it had little tracks on it.
I got it for Christmas. He used to read. Make me read the manual. He's like, you can't play with this thing until you know everything about it. And I would. Yeah. And. And I.
I thank him for that because it's the same deal. You know, I'd go to work on a car in the garage if I didn't have the Chilton's manual sitting right next to me or the. The dealer manual, service manual. I. I wasn't touching it. Yeah. And I think that that standard is. Has really carried me forward to where we're at now.
Fast forward again. I spent. Let's see, I started. I'm 30 now, so I spent 10 years doing pipeline. In the layoff time, I would work for myself. And then I got to the point that was. I started my business four years ago, and I got to the point in business where I was just tired of traveling around. And with the last administration we had, everybody was amped up for that Keystone XL project, Right?
Yeah.
So when the Biden administration got in, they put the kibosh to that. And not only did it kibosh that line, but a myriad of other ones.
So we. We felt the ripple effect in Canada that, like, honestly, like, it was. We were all hoping that that was going to run through too. Right. Because we've got a big, big problem. It's not. Listen, there's more oil sitting out on Western Canada than we'll probably ever use. Right.
Like, we don't have. We have storage there that we don't even need to be buying foreign oil. But like you said, it was all, you know, a political decision to not run Keystone, but we were all hoping it would come through because it would definitely shift the, you know, the. The price, I guess, is what I'm trying to say, of a lot of it. Right. And that's. Yeah, it's just a stupid, stupid reason for. For.
For not bringing it, you know?
Exactly. That's. That's, you know, that was kind of. It was all. It's all been a political battle, and it's. And it's. Till the right people's pockets get padded. Right.
Um, and it's sad that it's that way, but that's. That's kind of why I strayed. Strayed away from the pipeline work, you know, more money than I should have been making probably at that. At that age. So, you know, it's like, it was really good. A lot of really long hours.
Yeah.
You could guarantee the day. The only days you could guarantee you were going to have off were 4th of July, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year's Eve, and New Year's Day. If you got with. If you got with a good outfit, they would let you have off from Christmas Eve to New Year's Day, you know, but anymore. And other than that, it was seven days a week, as many hours a day as you could. You could handle, you know, And. Yeah, I. I just.
It just, you know, it sucks. It sucked a lot for everybody. Like you said for Canada. It sucked for us. And then, you know, you'd spend so much in moving around these. These. These smaller pipeline jobs because you'd always have laterals, right? You have the big main lines like the Keystone, and then they'd have all the. All the lateral lines that would run off that to the supply stations where they go into distribution to hit your house.
Right? So, yep, those were. Those were always smaller jobs. They'd last five, six weeks, you know, and you're moving around and getting settled in and moving around and getting settled in, and it just became more of a headache than it was worth for me. So I said, you know what? I've. I've got people. Every time I'd go somewhere, you'd pull up, you know, to the yard, and you'd be driving out to, to get something to eat, like Outback Steakhouse or, you know, wherever, wherever you're going to eat. And you'd run into a contractor, you know, and I didn't realize how, I didn't realize a deficit of mechanics until I was sitting one day, you know, and this, this guy's coming up, he's like, man, is that your truck out there? Like, yeah. He goes, do you think I could get you to do abc? You know, I'm like, sure.
You know, I go over and, you know, I charge him for what, what I thought my time was worth. And, you know, he's like, man, I got more for you and more for you. More for you. Well, I, I ended up hanging around to this town in West Virginia long after the job had ended, just because there was so much work. And I went, this is, this is great, you know, oh, my goodness, you know what? I should, I should figure out how to do this for myself. And that's, that's what I started trying to do. And what a train wreck that's been or started out being anyway. It's good now, but, man, so why.
Do you say that was a train wreck? Like, you're not valuing yourself or you were overextending or.
So I, What I mean by a train wreck is like starting out in business for myself was. I had absolutely no, no idea, you know, what to do. I thought, I thought, like, as soon as you file the paperwork for the llc, it's like, that's it, you know, you're, you're ready to go. And then my. I set it up QuickBooks account and, you know, I didn't know anything about setting that up. I didn't know anything about business coaching or anybody or that did stuff like that. You know, I've, I've always had the preconceived notion that when somebody knows how to do something better than you, and this is, this is how I grew up, unfortunately, which is, which is very sad. And it also adds to the deficit of mechanics.
When someone knows how to do something better than you, they won't teach you how to do it. Right.
Right.
Because they don't want you to take. Take their, their skill set and their work away. But it's like the overabundance of. Overabundance of work that's here now. I Mean, you have, you almost have to because you're going to get buried alive, you know.
Yeah, that, that gatekeeping thing, right. It's a, it's a funny topic because I mean, I've, I've done it to, to protect what I've earned, you know, what I've learned. And then I've also been the back side of it too, right? Where it's like you weren't gonna be. So I don't. It. It's a funny thing, man. It really is. Because I can.
Look going back to the whole Caterpillar and Komatsu kind of thing, right? I can understand intellectual property really well. Like, it really is, you know, it's why I rip sometimes on guys that just make a content video. To make a content video, right? To show somebody how to do that. Because it's like, okay, cool. You sweated to learn how to do it, right? But, yep, who are we? Who are we really empowering when we start to share that information around, right? Like there's somebody did a video there a couple weeks ago how to do a shortcut on a recall on a Honda. I mean, this is out of your wheelhouse, but there they go. They put it on YouTube and tick tock. And it's just like, cool, man.
Watch the labor times get hacked for that now, right? Like, you got to be smart with this kind of stuff, you know? And it's.
Yeah, I have to agree with you there, 100. Because like, I, I've put up some videos and stuff. What, what I find is. And I got, I guess where we're probably the same in this, this mindset is we are a sponge, right? And we ask questions versus versus, make statements, right? So like, yeah, how does that work versus I don't know how that works, you know, right. When you ask how something works, you give your, your brain the opportunity to formulate an answer for it. Correct. You know what I mean? So I put those videos out there knowing that 1% of the people might apply it. And then the other guys are just going to get out there, turn their music on in the truck and, and go back to doing things the way they've always, always done them, you know? But it's because you can show somebody, right? You can show somebody how to do the practice one time, but you know, they try to do it themselves one time and then they're like, oh, I'm no good at this.
And then they quit. And those aren't the people we need in the workforce anyways. Because if you're going to quit as soon as it gets hard. You know, there's. There's the door. You walked in with your toolbox. You can. You can walk out the same way, right? And it's like, it's.
It's a pain because.
And the frustrating thing I find is, like, the. The generation now, they don't even really want to know how. They just want the. What. Just tell me what to do, right? Just tell me what part I put in to fix this complaint. You know, I don't want to know how to read that electrical schematic for a. The machine doesn't start. Just tell me if I got to put a starter in this or a relay, right? Like, it's so.
And it. It sounds so basic, like. Like, you're the jerk if you don't tell them, right? If they call you up and go, hey, like. And you go, dude, I don't know. I ain't there. Like, you're gonna have to check it out. They look at you like you're. You're just kick them in the knee, right? But the reality is, is it's like the struggle is where you build that next level of ability, right? It's the struggle through.
And, you know, people hate it when it's. When I take such a hard line on it. But I don't want to give you the answer, man. I want to show you the. I'll show you the map, but I don't want to drive you there, you know?
Right? Yeah, absolutely. I. You know, that's. That. And that's the difference between applied failure analysis and a parts changer, right? Diagnostics. And. And that's what makes up the difference is like, you've got. You've got, you know, guys out here that.
That love it. You know, they're like, just tell me what's wrong with it, you know, and we'll replace parts. And I think any. When you start out, you know, that's where you start is being a parts changer, right? For a diagnostic technician. You know, like, I talk about the. The guy coming out saying, yep, the brakes are bad, and me going out, pulling the finals out of this D8 and split the tracks and doing the brakes. But it's like, you. If you don't want to, you know, it's like you said, if you don't want to push further to understand it and follow the roadmap for how we diagnose these things, then.
Then, you know, what. What are you doing? And. And those are the. Unfortunately, it's those same guys, and it's It's a lot of guys in my generation, right, that are like, I, I can go out and make this. Because the overabundance of jobs has allowed for that. And people haven't had to starve long enough for it to, for it to change, you know, so they'll, they'll go out here and, and they'll get, you know, 40 bucks an hour someplace just loading up the parts cannon and hitting the freaking equipment with it until something works. And, you know, I, I go out to these customers, like, third, fourth time they've, you know, I'll give you a scenario. Alta is a big outfit down here, and they sent a technician out to this one piece of equipment.
It was a Volvo loader. And, you know, that the guy was having. He's like, man, he goes, it'll run great. It's intermittent issue, right? He goes, and then it'll just fall on its face and die right where it's at. Like, okay, you know, So I asked him, first thing, I said, they did. Who do you have out there? He goes, Alta's already $15,000 into it and they haven't fixed it. And they told us, yeah, you know, they, they said, we need a, they said, we need a new ECM engine, wiring harness and a fuel system. I'm like, oh, okay.
You know. Yeah, so that's what your problem is. Okay. Yeah, the fuel system intermittently works. I've never worked on a diesel, you know what I mean? And it just stop working like when, when a fuel, fuel pump and injectors go out. They're done. But yeah, it's. We went.
Checked it out, you know, I, I hooked up the, the adapter to it and started reading. It had a couple codes. You know, they're trying to hook up a generic code reader to it. Well, the generic code reader is like, it's, it's reading coolant temperature sensor. Well, the, the SPN for this machine was a crank position sensor. I'm like, okay, you know, circuit intermittent data, erratic. I'm like, all right, so I get the schematics for the machine. I start.
I, I kid you not. I'm here at this guy's house for 10 minutes, right?
Yeah.
This is simple stuff we're talking about, right? Read it, hook up, hook up the right computer, Read the schematics. Okay.
Yeah.
I find a rub through on the crank position harness right at the right at the corner of the head where it, where it crested over the top of the head. And I rolled it over, and it sure is sure as crap it was. It was cut through two of the wires, so I threw a piece of electrical tape on it. I got in the machine and fired it up. He looked over at me, he's like, what in the world was that? You know, I said, that'll be 15 grand, please and thank you. You know, but it's just these. These. You get a.
There's so much work now. You're getting these kids that are going out with toolbox and the back of their pickup truck and just, you know. Yep. I'm a mechanic. And it's like, oh, okay. Well, you know, what. What did you do? What's your. What's your practice? You know, what have you studied? Show me.
You know, so I could reach to this through the screen and shake your hand. Because when you say, like, that'll be 15,000 for years, Brian Pollock and I talk all the time about, like, what's the repair worth? Right? Well, the repair, I always used to joke is, like, whatever they spent that didn't fix it, plus $1 more is where you start on what the repair's worth. And it's. Josiah. It's a really unpopular opinion. Right. But it's. It's kind of scalable.
You know what I mean? Like, they have paid $15,000 to not fix it. You fix it.
Yeah. You know, and. And that's. And that's. That's. That's what it is too, you know, and so I've. I've gotten to the point now where the phone starts ringing, right? And I've become very picky on the stuff I work on. Like, I've got a.
A link over on the Instagram when people are having equipment issue. I'm like, you know, click here. It goes through motion app, schedules them in. We jump on a call. I get to talk to you about what your stuff is because, you know, this isn't. I. I want everybody to get the help they need. But at the same time, when you start, when you flip over to the business side of things, and I didn't realize this at first when I started, you've got to be very selective with.
With your time. So it's the amount of coverage you're being able to give a contractor, that.
Used to drive me nuts. And you were saying, because I got to think when you get calls, like through your app, for people that want you to come out and look at the machinery, it must run the gamut of anything and everything.
Oh, yeah.
And you. Some stuff that's been really, really, really, like, messed with, you Know what I mean? Hacked up to try and fix it. How do you, how do you even start on a job like that?
So, you know, there's, there's always the conversation up front and, and I, I tell, I tell everybody this, you know, and a lot of guys look at me like sideways for it, but there's a barrier of entry, right? We don't work on anything that's older than 2012 now, because nine times out of 10, you know, I, I'll give you an instance. And this, this customer's been great. Um, but he brought me a machine. He, he was telling me that, he's like, oh, It's a Takahoochi TL12. Well, they started making those in 2012. Not, that's not the name. And they don't go together, but that's when they started making them. I'm like, okay, it's, you know, that falls into our category.
And then I try to get with people that have 10 pieces of equipment or more because these one one off pieces, these guys will, you know, they, it's, it's hard for them to understand they're getting sticker shock, right? You know, if they're using it to clean up their yard or whatever, and they're not actually using the equipment to produce with, then they get sticker shock right away. And then they're blowing your phone up four or five times a day. Versus my big contractors that have, you know, 40, 50, 60, 100 pieces or more. You know, they say, hey, this is the broke down equipment. Go out, fix it. Here's your PO numbers. Let us know when you're done. And that's, that's the only time you talk to them all week.
You know, so you go out there, you do a good job and then take care of them and then you get that back. But so like you said, it is a, it is a pile of, of you get a pile of people calling you. Like, hey, I had, I had one guy right after the hurricane down here, he called me, he's like, man, hey, I've got a generator. And you know, in my head I'm thinking, okay, it's a 480, you know, three phase generator, giant diesel engine on it. I'm like, okay, what's, what's going on? He goes, well, I can't get it to run. I'm like, all right, you know, I'm like, well, I'll tell you what I said. I said, have you, have you got good fuel in it? You know, I'm running through the preliminary Checklist, you know, because I, I, I, as much as you, you can go out there and just replace a fuse or add gas to something and take care of somebody's problem. I hate to do that.
You know, I like to add, add value, right? And, you know, so I'll run through these small little checklists with them. And then this guy's like, well, he goes, I picked it up to set it in the back of my pickup. I was like, all right, like, wait a minute. I said, I said, what kind of generator is this? He goes, oh, well, it's. I got it from Ace Hardware, whatever. And you know, I'm like, all right. I said, well, I said, let me know if anything there helps and fixes it. Feel free to give me a call back, you know, I'll help you out when I can.
And he's like, yeah, I'm gonna have to have you come out and look at it. You know, I'm like, okay, well, you know, our, the service call starts at $800, right? It's, yeah, you're, you know, we've got a, we've got all these big, I've got these other big contracts that have endless work. So if I'm going to take the day off or I'm going to schedule other time out, that's the, that's the ungained. Ungained money, you know, that's the, that's the loss I'm taking, right? So, so that, that weeds out a lot of the, you know, the guy's like, well, I only paid 400 bucks for the generator. I'm like, well, then it probably doesn't make sense for me to come out there and look at it, you know.
He needs to go, he needs to go down to Harbor Freight and buy himself a brand new predator.
Yeah, exactly.
6.99 with a warranty on it. And yeah, way you go.
There you go, you know, run it until you run it out of oil and then go take it back and get another one, you know. Yeah, it's, it's a lot. And like you said with the, the other thing is when, when people bring you, you know, five mechanics have been into it. I mean, I've got, I've got one right now that's, it's sitting in my yard right now, and it's a Cat 299. And the motor's half torn apart. All the panels are off of it. The screws aren't in sight. And the guy, you know, he's, he's a, he's, he's a good friend of mine, and he's got all cat equipment.
That's all he runs. It's all new equipment, you know, and I like these guys because they get it right. And he said, hey, I'm going to drop this off. I get back to my yard, and it's missing one track because I needed a track for another skid steer. And, you know, all the panels are mismatched, laying around, and I'm going, oh, man, here we go. You know, but, you know, I just tell them up front, you know, there's going to be a delay and, you know, the process of putting it back together. And I'll tell you what, on a lot of this equipment, too, it's gotten to the point where I go out and I take care of these guys that they don't ask for quotes anymore. They just know that it's going to get done.
It's going to get done. Right. You know, and they just. They just. They're fine with the bill. And, you know, I'm able to sit there and say, like, you know, because, you know as well as I do, what if somebody brings you a motor that's in pieces and says, hey, oh, guys started on this. You think you can put it back together for me? Jeff, you know, there's.
There's not enough money in the world to make it worthwhile. Right. You can't salvage that relationship no matter what. Everybody's. Somebody's got a success story. Oh, somebody brought me a basket case. And, you know, like, we've been doing business for 20 years, ever since.
Yeah.
The world has changed from that. You know what I mean? And I appreciate the person that has that fortitude and the patience to go through it all and invest in that. I don't want any part of that from a business standpoint. Right. Like, that'd be something that, like, you know, the guys that buy an old hot rod and it's in boxes and they put it out together, that's a. That's a passion of. Of love. That's not good business.
No. That's just.
You can't build a business plan on that.
No. And I hate to be that guy that says to that customer, like, I. I get it. I understand what happened here, and it sucks. But, like, I'm not your knight in shining armor. I'm not your superhero, man. Like, it's. This is going to be.
There's be. No. The. The juice ain't worth the squeeze by the time it's done, it's just too much. You know, and exactly sucks when you. So going back to that one, we were talking about the crank sensor because like you talking about different setting like different software systems and all that kind of stuff and it's, it's miss like miscoding for a completely different thing. I can't even imagine what that, how many different service informations you guys must need just to be able to function.
So you know, I'll tell you this. There's. You've got to have. You can get a lot with. There's a system called J Pro, right. And it's kind of okay, so you know, J Pro and we, we can kind of use that on a lot of class, class 6, 7 and 8 trucks and off road equipment to get our very standard codes out of them. But like that's, that's the thing. And, and of course it comes with a charge, right? And I'll tell you this.
You call, you know, Ring Power Cat down here in South Florida out, it's $3,000 just to get them to show up, you know what I mean? Just they, they haven't even opened their toolbox yet on their service truck. It's, it's three grand. And you know, that's the, the, the thing. I feel bad for this guy. You know, he called the dealer. You call the dealer and you're hoping man, I'm going to get, I'm going to get the right help. You know, they're going to take good care of me. And it's like that's, that hasn't been the case for a long time.
So it's up to us to, to give them the right, right care and right treatment. So this, the software back to that is you, you've got to get it, you can get it bootlegged, obviously offline, which is what I know a lot of people do and I have done in the past myself. And you'll run into issues with the software, you know, or you get it off of Friday parts, right? If you look up like you get it on Google, you'll, you'll, you'll Google an adapter, you know, Google adapter for ABC equipment or whatever car and you'll get some bootleg thing. It comes in a box with a CD that's got the, you know, the Chinese numerals on it. You're, you're using your translate to try to decode it and it's, it's a headache. But it works for what you need it for, right? And then it really comes down to once you actually get the software installed it's, you know, it's spending hours trying to figure it out and delineate between what's different from this and what's different from that. You know, the CAT ET and Cummins Insight and, and systems like that, they're, they're pretty user friendly, right? You get into like VOCOM and CAT or Volvo's systems or like Wacker Neison they have the WANDA system and it just, stuff just is completely different and it doesn't make sense but you know, so you feel bad there. You're like, oh man, you know, if the dealer came out they'd know how to use this system.
But at the same time it's like, no, you know, because the dealer came out here. First off they're going to get, they're going to get it right off the bat with, with the service charge. And then second, you know, these dealers as a heavy equipment mechanic are no longer paying these guys enough to want to learn. You know, it's like I, I mean I talked to a, a younger L.
So where do you think that kind of change happened? Like, did it happen because more guys now are not buying a piece of machinery, they're only leasing it.
Like is it the, the owner that's.
Not making the investment?
Oh man. Longterm. Yeah. What's that? Yeah, yeah. And how are you liking it over there? And he said, oh, you know, I, I like it pretty well. They started me over at, they started me over at 19 an hour and this, that and the other thing and blah blah. I'm like, okay, you know, that's pretty fair. I, I think that's nine bucks an hour over or eight bucks an hour over minimum wage here in Florida and you know, but he's sitting here telling me like, you know, their training protocols and this, that and the other thing.
I'm like, you know, what's the training schedule for you? Like, you know, because you gotta, you gotta be able to train these guys. And then he's like, well they really don't have one. It's like fall in as a lube tech and then they kind of stick you there and it's like, okay, well you talk to the senior techs that are working in these places and they're at 26 bucks an hour and I'm, I'm going, there is no way you would get me out and say hey, like I think worst case scenario, right? Hey, this excavators down on the beach with a track off of it and an idler sitting in the sand, you know.
Yeah.
And you for 20? Yeah, no, not gonna happen. You know what I mean? So you're gonna go out to the service call, you're gonna say, yep, it's broke. And then you're gonna get back in your service truck and go back to the yard and leave it up to the service manager, you know. Well, 25 of the profit margin for Caterpillar Corporation was strictly from service. That's, they make, you know, they, that's, that's Caterpillar's overall profit. Right. And their, their service rates 180 an hour. And their technician caps out of 40 an hour figure.
And his benefits, he's probably at 60. So. Yeah, you know what, there's something wrong there. You know what I mean? Oh, well, it costs this to run the truck. Like. No, no, no, no, no, no. It cost you $25 an hour to run that new service truck. That's what it costs.
Yeah, you know, gas, fuel, break down parts. You figure it out and you just sit here and you wonder why these guys don't want to understand the systems or they don't want to understand this technology. And it goes back down to, you know, when you get the systems and the, and the diagnostic equipment and all the software in place to study it, it's, it's like, okay, you know, I have to do this for the customer. And I always put that in context for myself. Like I always tell myself, if I don't do this, I'm going to die. You know what I mean? That's kind of the severity I give myself when studying software systems. Just because you'd think, like I get, I get in trouble myself for this thinking like, oh yeah, you know, I'll be able to get, get a hold of the dealer and they'll be able to teach me how to use this. Just like the customer thinks, I'll get a hold of the dealer and they'll be able to give me better service for this equipment.
And it's just not the case.
No, it still boils down to the person behind the tools. Right. And I mean, that's the thing. While you're having a conversation today, actually it popped up on Tick Tock and somebody put a video up and he's like, hey, professional technicians out there, this person just spent, you know, $2,000 on suspension noise. And these brake parts are, you know, these brake pads are rattling in the brackets.
Yeah.
Now. And so he makes this. And again, he's not a, he's not a quote unquote professional technician. He is a enthusiast diy all the thing. And I'm trying not to hate on those people, right? But he goes on and on and on about it. So which good on him, he actually said, well, here can I call you and we'll discuss this, right? Instead of blowing up tick tock with this conversation. So we had a great conversation, like almost an hour on the phone. And I'm like, you gotta understand, man, from my point.
I said, and this is, this is where it goes. As I said, we could liken this to cooking, right? And you could say, I've cooked the best steak I've ever eaten. My life is still at home. Cool. It doesn't mean that every time now I go into, you know, the outback or Texas longhorn or anywhere else, that I immediately jump online and go, I can cook a steak better than them, right? Or like, we don't, we just don't do it. The public doesn't. But for some reason, always this narrative when it comes to being a mechanic, no matter what they work on is somebody always thinks that they can do it better or should have or the mechanic didn't do it. Right.
And I, we had a, like, we had an hour long conversation about you can spend three hours tearing this car apart and you find out that what you thought was a suspension noise is the brake pads rattling and the brackets cool from us. That's not scalable from a business standpoint because I can't go out and say every noise that a car makes, I'm going to need three hours to find it.
Right?
He goes, well, you shouldn't need three hours. Why should I not need three hours? You. It took you three hours.
Yeah, well, yeah.
You've got way more experience than me, right? Way more experience. That just muddles up the gears in my head of like, what can this be? It's not like everything.
Yeah.
Just sounds the same every time. Or very frustrating conversation. I mean, enlightening conversation. But I still don't think, like, I think I could talk like that for three hours. Right. And people won't get it. You just don't. If you don't do this for a living, you don't understand what it's like to really do it right.
And, and it's like what you said there. And I get this because you hear the flat rate, guys. Oh, it takes me, you know, an hour and a half to do that job or this, that or the other thing. And it's like, well, for, for every guy that says that, on the other hand, I've got a customer that took it to a flat rate guy that got it done and it's hour and a half that it said to take it in the book and now it's screwed up. So, yeah, that's where, you know, you get the customer base. And the slogan I came up with as I don't, I don't just work on stuff, right? It's not fixed. It's not worked on. It's fixed, right? We fix it.
We don't work on it. Because it's, you get these guys that, oh, I'm gonna go work on this or I'm gonna go work on that. It's like, okay, well is it fixed at the end of the day, you know, that's, that's what I want to know, you know, and when I say applied failure analysis, I mean, I have to be able to break down to you as the customer why it broke. I have to be able to show you and say, you know, yeah, you know, we're replacing your cam position sensor because the, the signal circuit shorted out to ground and it was causing erratic data to go back to the ecu. And you know, this is what that looks like. This is my voltmeter hooked up to the sensor and this is what it looks like when I tap it to ground, you know, and when you can show these customers that they're, they're, they're, they're more apt to let you do more for them, right? And they're more apt to say, yeah, you know, hey, I've got this that I need. Because you, you've built that trust and that confidence versus, you know, like, oh yeah, we had at the Flat Rate shop. This is screwed up.
That screwed up. I, I think you're gonna see because there's still a deficiency. I mean, you could, I, I know that we're like 400,000 shy jobs, heavy mechanics wise. I mean, that's, that's been, that's been stated and it's not getting any better, you know, because we had a generation of, of like my father and my father and my grandfather told me, don't be a mechanic. You know, that's, that's dumb, but you know what I mean? And it's like, okay, well, they, they were telling my, you know, my, my siblings the same thing. And you know, consequently, you know, one of us doesn't have to worry about where the bread's coming from on the table at dinner. You know what I mean? So, yeah, it's, I, I, you can't get, you can't get scared of the hard Work. And you, you can't, you can't be afraid to sit there and deal with, deal with problems every now and then because you're going to come up against them.
You got like, and I guess what, what that, what that is is like these kids that'll go out and they'll, they'll do the flat rate work and it'll be wrong or you'll get these inexperienced technicians that think I have to beat it by the book. I have to beat it by the book or I'm gonna get fired. And it's just, that's just, you know, that's just not the case. That's not to say that you can slack off. That's to say that, you know, you're more valuable when you know how to properly diagnose systems to anybody. I mean to the customer, you're more, you know, it's, it's, it's better for you as, as the mechanic, as the employee. When you can go through and do that because you can walk in with this amount of confidence that says, yeah, this is going to get done. You know, like electrical diags.
I, I heard one episode of Guys talking about, you know, we got to do it. We got an hour for an electrical diag. Well, we've got salt water down here, right?
Yeah.
And I'm telling you, I, I've gotten in machines with 200 hours on them and you know, I've had to pin out every single connection end to end and do a wiggle test on it and, and try to find shorts and grounds and bad wire connections. Because that salt water, this is what happens. The humid environment, everything, the human environment works its way into the wiring harness. And then when the humidity drops, that moisture draws in the salt out of the air into the wiring and it, and it causes a myriad of electrical issues. I mean, you know, low hour machines that I'm pulling corroded connections off of, you know, and that's where, you know, there's the, oh, it's the hour diag time. Like I'm honest with guys. I'm like, look, you know, especially the guys that have already had three or four mechanics looking at it. You know, I'm like, I don't know where they've poked and prodded your wiring harness.
You know, I, you know, because I had one guy, he's shoving up, I pulled the cancer, you know, the can harness part. This one had six networks on it, okay. And this guy, like every foot of the can network had just shoved his probe all the way through the Braided wires. And I'm just sitting here going, you know, I'm. I'm like, oh, no. You know, I'm like, this is. And, you know, I have to sit there and tell the customer, like, you know, I'm sorry, but we figured out what your issue was. You had a bad terminating resistor, right?
Yeah.
But you now need a replacement segment of the wiring harness because your. Your br. Your twisted pair of can wires, your high and low, have been poked to death, and they're going to corrode, and you're going to have issues. And in a month, you know, and you make sure you put that in writing. And then they go, oh, yeah, okay. You know, no. No worries. No, I'm not worried about it.
It's running. That's good. And then they'll go out and they'll. They'll work a job at the beach with it for a month, and then they'll go out to start it one morning, you know, and it's like, oh, or worst case scenario, they'll be pushing back the beach at low tide. And then the machine stops.
Yeah.
And it's like, oh, so many situations like that. But.
So when you get tasked with. Say somebody calls up, and I don't want to downplay it, but say, like, if somebody calls you up and says, I think the alternator is bad. It's not charging. Right. I can boost off the machine. Machine runs for X amount of minutes or whatever. Is there an actual labor guide that says the alternator should take X amount of time to do? Or, like, are you kind of. Do you kind of go, I've done one in my.
In that platform before. I know it took me this long. I'm going to start with that.
So there isn't really a labor platform. Right. Cat doesn't say, this takes. I. I mean, as far as I know, I've never seen it or had it applied or brought to my face, but it's like, there isn't. You know, it's. And. And that's.
That's the other. That's the other area in the market where it's just like, yeah, you know, hey, I need it all. You know, I get. Guys, hey, I need an alternator in this. How much do you think it's going to run? It's like, okay, well, you know, we're going to get out there. It's. It's going to be, you know, 500 bucks or it's going to be 2,000. You know, what's the wiring harness look like? Is it you know, because if we get out there and, you know, it's not the alternator or, you know, they're jumping off and it's running for a while, but it's not charging because they have a bad signal off the ECU or this, that or the other things.
Like, you know, it's, it's really hard to quote, quote any repair out here. And, and that's the other part where I don't like to dabble too far because there are a couple guys in the area that will. I. I've seen the quotes for, for simple repairs, you know, and they're like four or five times, you know, they quote them, but they quote them 5x and it's like, you know, customer. You think you can do it cheaper? I know we can do it a little bit better than that because, you know, even, even if I were, even if I go through and do the diagnostic, I mean, for the amount of money you're going to pay, I can buy a wiring harness, I could buy an alternator, I can buy an ECU and install all of them in a period of time that's going to allow me to make a lot of money on that for the amount these guys are charging you. But they're, there are some kind.
They're covering their butt, but I mean, they're, they're, they're covering their ass, but they're not really doing anybody a service at all. Right. Like, it's, that's, that's tricky because, I mean, I know I've gone out to like, lots of stuff and it was like, oh, the truck's not charging. This is back in my days of doing, like, road service for. And most of the time it wasn't the alternator. You know what I mean? It was like, you see how those connections get on the battery boxes and they run them up to the. You know why the heavy guys want to always steal power off the back of the starter to stay, you know, to power something else up. Why do they do that? Like, it just doesn't make any sense to me.
It's so stupid. And, you know, you find one green connection on the back of the starter that's powering up the alternator. It's like, here we go. Can I fix that temporarily? Oh, yeah, I can certainly fix that temporarily. Like, no problem. Get me a booster cable, right? And I'll run right from the battery to the back of the starter lug or, you know, alternator lug, and you're back in business down the road where you go get those pineapples delivered.
Yeah, that's right. But I mean, that's right.
You know, when somebody calls out like us in the automotive, it's like, okay, I need an alternator. We're on the phone. Order an alternator. You know what I mean? Yeah, but in the. In your sector, it's like, you guys have been a lot better about saying, okay, I'm gonna check the damn vehicle out. Right? Like, or the piece of machinery, because it's not always just an alternator.
Right.
That's where I cut my teeth, and that's where I learned, you know, how to kind of slow down a little bit. And look, I'm still not perfect, but I mean, like, that's just because I started it on a heavy side. So I understood that people like, listen, it's downtime that's killing me here, not the repair cost.
Yeah, exactly. And that's. That's what you said right there is. Is. I'll tell you this, that. That was the. The best learning thing at Precision was if you had a failed part. I mean, they had.
They'd come to a job, they'd set up a yard. You know, we'd set up a yard in the middle of nowhere. It would be just a cornfield that they brought generators into and a mothership. What they called the mothership was the warehouse. It was a semi tractor trailer. And they cut doors in one. One trailer. They would cut doors into the sides of both of it and back other semi trailers up to it.
Right. That was your warehouse. And. And they would have loaded. I mean, loaded with parts. So they. That the downtime, right. They did not want the downtime, so they didn't care.
You know, if you're having an issue with a steering control or tiller handle or something, you'd go out with the tiller handle. You go out with the sensor, you go out with the cab harness, you would go out with. You know what I mean? And. And you. You better have it figured out. You know, when you. When you got done, there wasn't. There wasn't as much diagnostic there, which is, you know, I looked at.
At a big contractor like that. Like you said, the downtime. You know, some of These crews cost 130, $140,000 an hour to run. And it's like, what. You know, you. If. If one. If one thing went out.
I remember this. There's one group called the firing line. It's all the welders and the welding shacks and the side booms. And if one of those went down. They, it, it was bad. I mean, it was, it got, it got more expensive when they were down because then they had, they were behind and they had to work overtime. And these, these, these798 welders, when they hit overtime, you're talking. Their benefit package is like 110, $120 an hour, right? And it's like that, that was the crew you didn't want to be on as a mechanic because you were scared to death.
You know, you, you went out and if, if something didn't even look right, if there was a headlight that was dim, you're in there replacing it, you know what I mean? And just you had a, almost had a, the back of your service truck full of a complete engine for one of these machines if it were to go down. But, you know, they, they, they kept, you had to keep them up and they didn't care how many parts you had for it, just so long as you had everything you needed. And then, you know, the, the flip side of that is, you know, the smaller contract that's got to say, well, is it going to be cheaper for me to rent a machine to do this job for the week? Or, you know, have you take this one out of service for a couple days? And it's, it's all about finding, you know, that area of the market that you like to work in. Right? Because those, those big contractors, I mean, they'll, they don't ask you the price, they just want it fixed. You know, they, they, they go out and they say, you know, we, they, you better not have a redo, you know, ever. But if they, if they can trust you to go out and do it, you know, you're good to go. And then on the other side, you know, the smaller guys, they'll, well, this guy's 20 bucks cheaper an hour, you know, and they, you know, it's like, well, I'll see you in a month and a half, you know.
So what do you think about the, the emergency emerging technologies that's kind of trickling in like I talk. I don't know if you're familiar with Edison Motors, if you've seen them out of Canada, what they're doing, where they're kind of taking like diesel, diesel logging trucks, right?
Yeah.
And converting them to hybrid, which is nothing. People that maybe don't know in heavy equipment. That's a hybrid technology is not anything new at all. Right. Like, it's been lots of that for a long time. Right. A diesel generator just running electronic motors. Right?
Oh yeah.
Like I had a former guest on Lee who used to work. And those things will even drive themselves now down into the mine and come back out. You know that truck completely is unmanned. It's like a drone for God's sakes. But do you think that that's kind of going in the wrong way for what this, this, this the construction trades needs or do you think it's a.
Good thing, you know for, for the. We've got a big outfit down here in Florida. Um, they're, they're, they're in South Florida called Quality Enterprises. Right. And they're working on a remote operator station right. Now. I get it from a business standpoint because if you can, you know the, the most expensive part about mining is the insurance for injury. Right.
For these guys on. So if you can get rid of every guy that's on that mine site and just get it down to guys that are working in a off site location running the equipment remotely.
Yeah.
You're going to say I, you know you, you could cut your production in half and you'd make more money because you would save on the insurance. Right. And you know mshaw M. Shaw won't apply because there isn't a single man soul that's out there. And then obviously maintenance us, we have to go out there and work on it. So they, you know, you still got to be covered for that. But I, I think it's, you know there are certain things that, that technology because we're, we're looking to it like I mean for instance, I've got a freaking robot that vacuums my house. Right.
And it sits here and it starts on a schedule and it goes around and it cleans everything and it even mops the floor. You know, but throw in a shoe and it's, it's, it doesn't know what to do. Right. It's like oh, you know. So I think we're long ways away from that being implemented everywhere. But it's, it's definitely, I think in the construction industry it's a step in the right direction. So long as, so long as the fail safes are put in place to keep these operators from mashing this equipment up. Right.
Because that's, I bet you 80% of what I do is operator error. That's, that's no exaggeration.
I was just going to say that because I mean it must be, that's the frustrating thing, right is that I know when I talk to them about the, the equipment at the Goodyear tire plant here.
Yeah.
And they'll say a lot of the time that what the damage to the equipment is done is through the person that's operating the machine.
Exactly.
And they're either trying to sabotage it to get out of using that machine, or they're just, like, trying to race through to be able to clock out early. Right. They hit their cold, and they get to go home, and they're just pounding the machine right to death.
Yeah.
And then you're dealing with a unionized contract, so it's like, what do you do with that person? You can't do anything with it. You got to keep your cool. When you go see that same guy, he's tore up his machine again. You can't, like, chewing him out. He don't care. Yeah. His dad. You're not his boss.
Right. Like, he's got. The union's gonna protect him or her. That's damaging that a piece of equipment. They'll just put him in a different one.
Yeah, yeah. That right there. That right there. That. That right there was probably one of my biggest things from that not continuing my relationship with or working as a union member was I would go out, you know, and I would. I would get sick. Especially my first year in business. My first year in business and why I say it was a dumpster fire initially was like, I thought, you know, as a union member, I'm like, oh, okay, yeah, I'll be a union contractor.
Right. Oh, my gosh. Like, the. How expensive it was and the. You know, if they're. If. If they held their standard, you know, and with guys like that that were intentionally or not necessarily intentionally, but just damaging the equipment because they didn't have the proper training, you know, if they would. If they would say, you know, hey, you know, you're not going out onto another job until you get retrained, you know, from this hall, that.
That would. I. I would be a union contractor right now, you know, without a doubt. Same thing with the mechanic side. You know, if they actually had these guys in maintenance that, you know, I hired an apprentice, and he. Oh, that was a bad deal. He. He did a rehose on a machine for me, Right.
Take a hose off, take it down to the. Take it down a quarter mile down the road, get it measured up, put it back on, do the same thing. It's this. This crane's got 100 hoses on it. You know, just finger tighten them. We'll go through and torque them up. Right. I'll teach you how to cork with a crow's foot.
And.
Yeah.
So he, he went out and he did this while he broke every one of the, the holding brackets inside of the outrigger beams and put these back in. Didn't say anything, just the bolts. Bolts were rusted. They broke right off, you know. And then puts it back together, slides the outrigger beams in. Said everything go right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, we're over here torquing the ends, this set and the other thing. And I looked over one of the outrigger beams and it was fine.
It did not break off, you know, and I didn't look over the rest of them. I just said, okay, that one's good, the rest are good. And that's my fault, right? It's not necessarily his fault. It's my fault for not checking the work. But it goes out to a nuke plant and then they go to shoot the outrigger beams out. One of the hoses gets pinched and this thing's blowing oil all over this power plant. Like I've got, I gotta, I gotta call it like 1:00 in the morning. Hey know, we need you to come out and look at this.
I'm like. Or yeah, we're over at, you know, we're over at Fermi and I'm like, the, the nuke plant. They're like, yeah, like we got. The machine's blowing oil everywhere. And I'm just like, you know, this is, this is, I'm six months into business for myself at this point in time.
Yeah.
And I'm like, oh my gosh. You know, so I get out there and looking at, I'm looking, I'm looking in the, in the outrigger beam frames and yeah, the brackets were all broken. And you know, so I sit there and I, I told, you know, I took the kid and I told him like, look, you know, we can't have this. You know, let's not do that again. Long story short, few other screw ups happen, you know, and I lay them off and then I get a call from the hall, you need to pay his benefits. I'm like, you know, you guys told me from day one that I didn't have to pay his benefits right front. Well, you didn't get that in writing. Oh, okay.
Well, allow me to show you what he cost me. And you know, I'll explain to you because it costs 60 bucks an hour to have a kid there that's breathing. I'm just, just a heartbeat and a warm body. It's like. And it's, it's. You're not even getting anything out of it. Then, you know, I'm like, why, why am I sitting here having to teach kids how to, to turn bolts? You know, Like, I, I, I guess this is also another thing. Like, you get so far into this, you forget what fundamentals are, right? You know, I, I had another apprentice down here the beginning of the summer, and he didn't understand righty tighty, lefty, Lucy.
And I'm just like that. That's where we went in. And I said, you know what? We're not going to get anybody that doesn't have a bare minimum of tech school done, you know, and we'll, we'll treat them the same way. I'm not going to expect them to know the world, but, you know, learning to use the tooling is a whole nother animal in and of itself. And for sure, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's hard to deal with, it's hard to deal with these guys, they come out and they do this stuff. So, yeah, I mean, the unionization, stuff like that, you know, that was kind of where I, I, my final straw with them was like, look, guys, you know, if you're not going to audit your training programs and audit your members, I, I can't, I can't sit here and keep throwing money at you. You know, it doesn't do anybody any good. It's, it's, it's cutting everybody short.
It's screwing the contractor, you know, it's screwing me. It's, it's not doing any justice to the member. It's not doing any justice to my customer. You know, I, we're not going to do it. And, you know, well, that's okay, you know, and we'll take your pension and blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, okay, you know, that's cool. Do what you got to do. But it's, it's so this, Is there.
A base certification that anybody in your side of the industry has to have to be able to go out and do it or. Because you hear in my side all the time, people ASCs, ASEs, ASEs, right? Like, it's, everybody wants that as at least a basic earmarker of some level of competency. Do you guys have that or can you literally. Could I get in my pickup truck with a box of tools tomorrow and go out to a construction site and say, you know, I'll go fix that for 80 bucks?
So I'll, I'll say this. There's a lot of, there's, there's a Couple guys out here that are working for themselves that I'm acquainted with. I wouldn't say we're friends because we're in competition. Right. I've focused. I'm heavy. Heavy certification and quality qualification. Right.
I mean, we can have the certification, but can you actually do the work?
Right.
And I'm, I'm real heavy on that. Like, I made sure with my customers, you know, if we're going to be doing a job like, hey, just so you know, you know, we're certified by the American Welding Society. I believe heavily in the certifications because that gives me. That's not to say, like when you get those certifications, people like, oh, I'm certified. You know, I'm the best that there is. It's. I use certification as a, as a barrier of entry. Right.
This means that I have enough knowledge about the process that I'm getting ready to do that I can learn about it effectively and execute properly. Right. So, you know, there is no requirement. I mean, you know, if you go to be, you know, there's a couple manufacturers that we're authorized service providers for. N Con Corporation out of Sweden. We do, we do some work for them. But as far as, you know, they have their own specific training. But as far as like certification, that's the part that's honestly the most terrifying to me is because there's so much work that these guys, you know, these guys don't know how to work on the equipment.
They're just hoping this mechanic that comes out and does it's. I've provided in our business and the business I'm doing now, it's like, you know, we have a bare minimum of certification and hydraulic theory. Bare minimum by the International Fluid Power Society. Right. Because the number one thing that's going to kill you on this heavy equipment is the hydraulic system. You know, these are the failure of that component. Right. And so that's, that's, that's a one for, for me, anybody that comes to work for me, that's a, that's a, that's a bare minimum requirement.
And then Siemens Electrical Communications, which is a can, you know, they have can protocols that you can go through and do online. If you understand can at their level, you're going to be able to figure out can systems on any software. I haven't, I haven't seen can. Can different. You know, pulse width modulation gets even easier yet. And then so you look at, you look at like stuff like that. And those are training protocols, but not necessarily a certification program. Right, Right.
These Guys are graduating these tech schools with a degree in applied science and diesel technology. Well, what, what do you know how to do? You know what I mean? And I think, I think there, there needs to be a lot heavier focus on the certifications because that would definitely help a lot of these, these customers out. You know, I've got a lot of recurring customers just because, you know, Let me, let me explain to you what that is. You know, these customers, if they ask me what's, what's, you know, what's aws, American Welding Standard Society. It's like, well, you know, with aws, it means that, you know, we cover ABC protocols, you know, we understand what necessary measures are for structural repair, welding and things of that nature, you know, and, and you do a good job for them and, you know, they're happy. You know, there's only, there's a couple times I've been X rayed and stuff like that. We pass and, you know, they're happy with that. So the other side of that to the International Fluid Power Society with the hydraulic systems is, you know, you're able to go out and explain to people how these hydraulic components work.
I guess more so what the thing is for me, and I'm working on it right now, where the certification procedure is industry standard. Nothing. You know, there's no, there's no barrier of entry or anything. And you know, you look at like Caterpillar Corporation or any of these guys, they're like, oh, we don't understand why we haven't, they haven't. They've lowered their standard of a mechanic versus, you know, building them up to like, give them these certifications, right? So instead of, instead of sitting and taking the technician that's been there at your, at your shop for 10 years, absolutely busting his butt and giving him that certification and giving him a healthy pay raise, you know, hey, you know, we're going to send you to class, pay hourly, you know, here's 25 cents an hour. It's like, okay, you know, and, and it doesn't take long to reverse engineer what profits are for these companies, you know, and, and how, how big the gap is, you know what I mean? It's, it's, you pay your guys as much as you can, you give them as much training as possible. Like you, you got to train them to where if they leave you, they're going to be the best technician there ever was, and they've got a good story to tell, but the idea is that they don't leave. Right? And I, I don't you know, there, there isn't really anything like standard wise.
I mean you have AC certifications, right? But really, you know, you start busting tracks apart and, and, and doing this, that and the other thing. It's all on the job, you know, and unfortunately because of that, you know, lack that, that gatekeeping. Right. It's, it's like there's a lot of us that are younger like that are just trying to figure it out or you know, you get an older gentleman that started a tool manufacturing company for a specific job and they come out and give you site specific training, like for instance, Thermic Lance. If we're lancing out stuck in frozen pins, they'll come out and give you on the job training on, on their tooling, you know, so there's, there's just so much as a mechanic that you have to learn which is why, you know, I, I call us, we're the titan of the trades. I mean that's, that's all there is to it. Because 100, you know, you know, exactly.
Even in the automotive side you can have like, you know, they used to call them like undercar guys, right? Oh, he's an undercar tech. And it was like, oh, he was a tune up specialist or whatever right now, you know, and everybody just, well, a mechanic is a mechanic. It's gotten so far beyond that that I can't even like, I can't even say anymore. Like, can I do it all in a car? Yeah, I can.
Right.
Is there some places I'm more effective to my employer? Oh yeah, 100%, you know, like I am not your, you know, I'm, I'm good under car. I'm good. But like don't, don't jam me up under a dash. And then you know, wonder why it takes me so long. Look at the size of me, look at the age of me. Like it's, it's just like I'm going to be cursing it every second, you know, but go and give me that car that won't start or doesn't run. Right. Or has a can problem and, and just sit back and kind of watch what, what I do and then try to see, you know, how did I get there.
Well, lots of wanting to do that. Right, right. And that's, I think when I see the guys I saw him with my little 10 years in the truck shop is like you might work in a truck shop where they were specialized in leaf springs and bushings and stuff like that. They did that all day long. Suspensions, alignments, and all kind of. And then you go in there with like the truck was in D rate, right. So you almost wanted to like, don't stop there, drive down the road, get to the next possible friggin places going back to the J Pro. Like we'd hook a J Pro up to it and it'd be like it would spit out three codes.
Yep.
And then be like, I don't, I can't. You know, you do whatever you could. You can't get a regen. You take it over to Freightliner and Freightliner looks at it and hooks up theirs. And you're standing there watching them. Seven more codes all of a sudden pop up on his software. And now you're like, now I know why it won't regen. Right.
As an example, like that was the part that always just kicked me. And it's just like, you know, what if more of us in, in the skilled trades would stay in our damn lane.
Yeah.
We'd all be better off stop selling ourselves as like the, the one and done do it all kind of thing. We're not, we're not.
You were definitely not. You definitely have to have, you definitely have to have your limits. You know, like I get being in Florida, we get a lot of guys, I'll get calls all the time to work on boats and stuff like that. And that's when I'm like, no, you know, I mean, I'm not a marine guy. Yeah, right, right.
It's like, yeah, got a 3146. Like come on. You know.
Yeah. And you do, you know, you get, or you get the old Detroit two stroke diesels and some of these old barges and stuff like that. But it's just, it's like there are guys that, you know, they have a system for the way they, they, they, they work on these vessels. They've got dry docks, they've got. I don't have any of those, those connections or hookups. I, I've never, you know, worked on, on a maritime vessel. You know, it's, it's just like, I'm sure we could figure it out. It's like you said, where are you most effective? And that's for me, it's like, you know, I got a guy that, you know, I work on a lot of his equipment and I worked on his pickup truck for him one time just because he's a good customer.
And you know, it's, it's the same pickup that I have. So I'm very familiar with the ins and outs of the system and what fails in it. But, you know, I, I told him, like, dude, I'm, you know, I said, I'll help you out and we'll get it done. I'm like, but it's not going to be the most price cost effective because, oh, I'd rather have you do it anyway. All right, well, then his buddy says, oh, I heard you worked on his pickup and you got to turn him away. It's like, well, you know, I'm not a truck mechanic. You know what I mean? I, I, you know, even in the class, the heavy class 8 stuff and class 7 trucks and stuff like that, we don't, I don't really do much of that anymore just because I'm not, I'm not the most effective at it. I've really got to focus on what it is that I'm good at, you know, and, and, you know, we offer all makes, all models, but yeah.
Specialize in Caterpillar equipment, Cummins, you know, we've gotten really well versed with Takahoochi systems, which have the absolutely most annoying schematics ever. They give you a. Oh, I can.
Just, yeah, just imagine.
They give you one sheet. It's got all the wires on it, and there, it just has numbers from end to end. And then you go to the other sh. For the reference. It says, oh, this wire number is this. And it's like, okay, it's, it's a pain.
But that was like freightliner. When they used to be, all the wiring was white and there used to be a number scripted right on the wire. It was. Every couple inches would be the. That was your circuit number. And I can remember that all sounded great until it was like the numbers would wipe off the wire.
Yeah, exactly.
And you're like, where the hell do I go from here? Right? And it's like, oh, now you got to go back to the pin and try to trace it and. Yeah, no, like, yeah. And back in my day, we had truck drivers that would like, he'd still put his own radio and he'd still put his own CB and he'd wire an inverter in. Yeah, he did not want to touch that truck for all the money in the world when they were done with it, like, they got it to work, but what did they screw up in the meantime? You know? And that's the other thing. I'll, I'll say this to people that are listening. You gotta remember when you go to a piece of equipment now, you're oftentimes dealing with like, it might be CAT software to do some of the shifting and it might be, you know, maybe that's not a good example, but like. No. Yeah, you go to a truck for instance, and it's like it's got an Eaton system in it for doing some of the shifting and then it has a CAT engine in it and then it has a Freightliner software that's inter in like allowing everything to talk to one another.
Like we automotive guys, sometimes we forget we're not like as much as we curse. Could be a lot worse, right? When you're like different, different languages trying to talk to each other and there's one main brain that has to solve it all. Like it just knows exactly.
Yeah, that's.
Don't miss those days at all. No. Josiah, Moving forward, buddy, what do you want for yourself?
Oh, you know, for me it's looking forward at the, at the next, at the next five years. I've, I've kind of shortened my window of time out. Right. It's going to be, it's going to be doing, kind of doing what we're doing. I want to be able to hold that standard and offer service to the same service that we're offering to, to everybody in the whole state. You know, obviously we'd love to be the best in the United States and I talk with my, with my good friend Jesse bout about this all the time. We're the same age. He's got a phenomenal field service outfit in Williston, North Dakota.
He's got, I think he's got 20, 20 plus trucks now, you know, and he's just phenomenal. He's really good at it. And you want, we. I, I want to be able to sit here for myself and, and just. I'd love to do something else. Right. At the same time I feel like, you know, abandoning society with a skill set that you have that is, is hard to, you can't, you know. And any mechanic listening to this knows this.
You know, you can go through all the tech school in the world and all the training in the world, but if you don't, if you don't have it, you don't have it, you know, and, and to turn my back on, on this skill set and try to go do something else, you know, I, I'd love to, I'd love to be a pilot full time. And it's just like, you know, I, I know I've tried it, I've tried to get away from it, you know, and then as soon as something breaks down and you got a mechanical Mind and the ability to diagnose mechanical, electronic, electromechanical components. You know, you find yourself back there again with a wrench in your hand fixing something because the tech they sent out is. Can't tell his, you know, his butt from a hole in the ground. And, and it's for myself, I just like to keep doing what we're doing. Add. Add a couple more people to the, to the fleet down here. Get a couple more people that like to enjoy this warm weather we're having.
You know, it got cold this morning. It was a whole 43 degrees Fahrenheit. So I don't know what it was up there, but, you know, it. It's. It stays warm down here, you know, it's Good.
It was 22 this morning.
Wow. Yeah. Yeah.
Cold.
It's getting cold up there, huh?
Yeah, already. So let me ask you then, a really strong automotive technician, have they got a future working for a guy like yourself?
Oh, absolutely. You know, like, like I say, the, the. The biggest thing from automotive coming over to heavy equipment equipment is hydraulics. Right. If, if you can, if you can read an electrical schematic and you can identify symbols on an electrical schematic, you're not far off of hydraulics, hydraulic components, you know, and when you think of hydraulics, everybody just immediately thinks hydraulic. But a water pumps, a hydraulic circuit, a fuel injector is a hydraulic circuit. You know, anything that moves fluid power is a, Is a hydraulic system. So when, you know anybody that wants to get into that.
Yeah. I mean, you've got, if you're already an automotive mechanic and you say, you know, hey, I think I'd like to get outside and I'd like to hop in a service truck. Because that's the most fun part about it is, you know, getting, getting in the. Getting over. Being over at the yard and getting a call to go, you know, an hour and a half away to work on something and just driving there and, you know, getting out and doing it, being in the field and being in nature and stuff like that. In the elements. Yeah, there's a huge future. There's a huge future in it.
You know, it's. It's not pretty. Every day, you know, the. I think. I think about. I think about that a lot when it's. It's pouring down rain or there isn't a breeze and it's 100% humidity and, you know, 95 degrees. But it's, it's very rewarding, you know, being able to be outside.
I just, I can't. I Can't think of a better opportunity for somebody that's an automotive to do that. Yeah, there's a huge, huge, huge opportunity. And if anybody that's watching this would like to move to South Florida. We're going to be doing some hiring here in the near future. And yeah, anybody with that experience is more than welcome. More than welcome. Get a hold.
Very cool. Well, I want to thank you for coming on here. Yeah, I really appreciate it. I'm going to reach out to you again, you know, again, because I want to, I want to keep having this conversation. We're trying to, you know, as always, showcase more people and more people that are, you know, pick up a wrench every day and go to work, you know, and it's not just about the automotive side. There's so many things like, you know, people are listening to this. If you, if you fix a boat every day, like, get a hold of me, I'd love to hear what that's like. You know, like, we're all, we all have the, that same love and desire to take something that's broken and fix it right? And, and there's always going to be a spot for us.
But I just wanted to, I wanted to shine light on you because I think it's, it's something that is in my background that I just couldn't hack it way back then. And, you know, cars kind of be where, where I wound up and, you know, I have a lot of respect for guys like you, so I wanted to thank you for coming on and sharing it with us, Jeff.
Thanks. And that you as well, though. I mean, I, I, my, you know, that's vice versa. I think we're two, you know, two different ends of the spectrum here where, where we're seeing that because I hats off to you guys for being able to have the patience to, to deal with a lot of that stuff. So don't, you know, thank you. I appreciate it.
Yeah, the view sometimes never changes, but I mean, it's like, you know, it's just the level of suck can still go up. You know what I mean? Like, that's how we see it. So, yeah, you just think when it's, yeah, you're on fire, but it's not that burning yet, you know?
Yeah.
All right, well, thanks very much. We'll reach out to you soon. Good to hear you.
Good talk to you. All right, man, thank you.
Take care.
Yep.
Bye.
Bye.
Thanks, everybody. Hey, if you could do me a favor real quick and, 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. Thank you to my partners in the ASA 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.
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