He should demand a refund from the dealer and hand it over to you. At least a reasonable amount.

Honesty is everything, you will gain customers for life.

You are not only a great mechanic on these bobcats, you are also very honest as a former bobcat owner who had the benefit of a dealer who did watch out for the clients it is greatly appreciated.

40 years in heavy equipment I can tell you that you hit the nail on the head.I have seen some talented people feel defeated by management and even supervisors by lack of support. Older and experienced mechanics need to pass the knowledge on to the newer and less experienced guys . When they are gone so will be that knowledge. Of course this is just my personal experience of our industry. Thanks for the videos.

ACU stands for Auxiliary Cash Unit

Yea. You won’t ever be charging me for a repair that couldn’t be found and done.

It sounds like you are a good boss to work for.  You know your stuff, and also recognize that we all need to work as a team and learn together

This is my Bobcat T 770 he was working on.  
I took it to the dealer in early October to fix what was described in this video. After weeks of no response I called the service department and asked what the status of the machine was and the service writer said that they would try to get it in tomorrow.  Weeks went by and I got a phone call asking for another hour or two of diagnostic time because the tech, "almost had it."  I authorized the additional diagnostic time. Then two weeks later I called the service department to ask what the status was.  The service writer said that the tech was at lunch but that she would talk with him about it when he returned and get right back to me, probably 30 minutes or possibly one hour.  I called again two hours later and nobody answered the phone.  Then a week later I got a text message with a request to authorize the repair. $900 for diagnostic and $2500 to repair the problem.  I was angry. I was angry that they wouldn't communicate with me.  I was angry that they wouldn't get this job done without constant prodding. I was angry that it was so expensive. I can take one form of abuse, but for them to charge me exorbitant rates and string me out for months was too much.  I called the dealership in the morning and told them I was declining the repairs and that I'd be picking it up on Monday.  They didn't ask one question as to why I was upset, they didn't offer to understand my position. Just okay they said.  When I went to pick it up she told me that the total was $3200.  How's that? I asked.  She looked over the work order as she didn't know anything about it and recited to me all that had been done. Then she told me that she would take 5 hours off making the total $1800.  I told her that I didn't authorize the work to be done. She cut me off and told me to stop. I was furious and told her that I wanted her to listen to me. She silenced me again and told me that I wasn't listening to her. I paid the bill, and walked out of there for the last time. This was December 17th. So about 10 weeks since I dropped it off for service.

I took it to South Valley Equipment and they asked me if it would be okay if they got to it in a few days.  Absolutely.  Then I got a text message later that day that it was finished. I came in the next day and was told that the repair took 15 minutes and that he wasn't going to charge me.

It seems clear to me that management at the Bobcat dealership has told the service writer in the past that it doesn't matter what the issue is, but that these customers need to pay for the time the techs worked on it in the shop. I think she had her hands tied.  It didn't matter that they didn't know what was wrong with the machine, or that they spent all kinds of time trying to figure it out, or that the techs didn't know what they were doing.  What mattered to them is how much money they can get out of me, and they figured it was $1800.  Well I needed my machine that day and they had me over a barrel. I paid it.  Never again.

I am keeping my 1994 New Holland L785 skid steer.
No electronics.
Never broke down except hoses since 1994 Perkins power .

Everything is junk today.

Excellent you try to help people 👍

You would be amazed at how many techs work and donty even understand ohms law or kershoffs law 😂😂😂😂😂

Went out to a customer site with a newer younger tech. The younger guy had been at that site for three weeks starting up a machine after a major control system up grade. The reason I was there was the customer asked for an “Experienced “ tech to fix the problem that the new guy could not and had been trying to tune using the software for two weeks. The problem was the machine speed was not tracking the set point properly and it was erratic. Walked into the unit building after talking to the supervisor and my guy had already sat himself down in front of the control panel and had his laptop hooked up. I looked over his shoulder for about 5 minutes then walked over to the unit to watch the throttle response. The whole fuel control and throttle unit had been upgraded during the refit to a newer one. Watching the throttle I noticed the spring return was not working right as the little roller fitting that pushes on the throttle to move it back and forth had a 1/2” gap between the roller and the throttle arm. Then after about 40 seconds the spring finally over came what was holding it and it snapped against the roller. When that happened the unit slowed down then started to accelerate again. Grabbed the new guy and showed him what was happening. Shut the unit down and tried moving the linkage by hand it would stick at about 80% full throttle. The linkage had two small pillow block bearings one on each end the rod had two holes drilled in it that had roll pins in them to hold to the bearings. I took a hammer and a small punch and knocked out the roller pin on the out side on the bearing that was just for support. The side of the bracket holding this assembly jumped out about 1/4” when the pin dropped out. After that the throttle moved freely. When they made the bracket holding this assembly they had made it about 1.4” top wide and it was causing the shaft to bind. Started the machine back up and it was working fine after that. Total time on site for me to that point was 1 1/2 hours with most of that meeting with the supervisor. Sometimes you just have to go and look at the thing that is causing the problem not sit in front of a computer.

Never in a million years did I imagine I'd see hexadecimal CAN bus data on a YouTube video...I spent a good portion of my career analyzing raw hex bus data on military aircraft and never expected to see that again, especially on YouTube, after retiring.  Nice work!

I used to love it when there were problem machines that an owner would have been given the run around and I discovered the problem quiclky! Almost as good as being sold a "junk" machine that I eventually fixed and made my own!

I work in an electric utlility. Came in as an electrical engineer, but went into the project manager (PM) role. My company went the DEI/Woke path in ~2019, hence my exit from engineering around this time as the opportunities as a male with experince are no longer valued. We now have a bunch of females in the the superviosr and manager position within engineering who didn't have the experince and nobody in the company gets meaningful training.... blind leading the blind.

As a PM I am more exposed to issues on projects, especially when team members make mistakes. We now have a steady exit of the remaining experinced people leaving, Management say they are on the "industry average for attrition", which means management could care less. They seem to prioritize KPI's that only benefit themselves. It's sad to see lack of management throughout many industries and many including myself are now starting to care less as workers are not valued. "Do enough to not get fired" is the new motto.

I worked for a dealership service department for years and I will tell anyone who asks... never bring your machine or vehicle to a dealership unless it's a warranty issue. Even then it may not get repaired correctly if at all.

12:15 hit the nail on the hammer. Currently work for a dealership. Technicians like you are a needle in a haystack. I enjoy learning from your videos.

I have that power probe circuit tracer. One of the best purchases I've ever made for finding shorts and open circuits without having to dissect the entire wiring harness.

Its one thing to miss diagnose equipment, its a whole different level when it comes to surgery,  Thanks for posting.

💯 percent agreed!!! The days of dealerships doing repair work are coming to an end. So they will only have warranty work and we as independent mechanics, will take care of the rest.

I was a young tech trained on diesels, dealer wouldn't hire me for diesel but lawn mowers and another was semi trucks but all I got was jobs I had no training in. Was told to Google the stuff I was working on. Other techs refused to share any info. This was 10 years ago, I left dealerships and make the same money on farms as in house mechanic getting to operate half the year