Too Often We Complain About Bad Service...

.... but I want to mention again a shop that has taken good care of me.
Lakeland Marine in Lake Havasu is my first choice when it comes to Mercury
outboard service. Their shop rate is a little pricey at $90 per hour, but
they seem to fix everything right and quickly the first time.

I called last week and asked if I could drop off the Cat for its annual
service one day this week first thing in the morning to be picked up by the
end of the day.

They told me Wednesday would be a good day for that, and I was there before
they opened. They had a bunch of boats there, but they rolled mine right
in, and got started right away. They found an oozing seal on the hydraulic
steering before I left and said it would take about an hour to change plus
parts. Ok.

Gary and I headed over to the lake to see if we could catch a few fish off
the bank. During the course of the day they called me once on the cell to
let me know some fishing line had gotten up into the outer seal of the prop
shaft and it had to be replaced. Another two hours estimated. OK.

In case you didn't know parts for an Optimax are expensive. List price on
the spark plugs is 29.95 each for example. (They can be had cheaper).
Looking at 3 extra hours of service work plus the regular annual serivce I
was expecting to see a bill for close to a grand. Not so. 6 bills and
change. They only charged me for 3.5 hours total time. Remember those
expensive spark plugs? They were only listed out at 20.50 a piece on the
service ticket. Yeah, I know I can buy them a little cheaper on the
internet, but for a shop that's a great price. The absolute cheapest price
I found anywhere for the plugs was $16.95 when I checked around. I
certainly can't complain. Other parts I checked pricing on were priced
similarly.

I don't know how long they actually worked on my boat, but I dropped it off
at 8:00 am and when I called them about 3:00 in the afternoon they said they
had 30-45 minutes of cleanup left to finish it. I picked it up at 4:00
ready to go.

We test drove it on the lake before heading back to Yuma, and it was smooth
and quiet from idle to WOT. I had not really noticed it because it pretty
much ran fine when I took it in, but I guess it was due for a service
because I sure noticed the difference after I picked it up.

I know this was nothing special or extraordinary. Just a routine service
with a couple extra things that needed to be done, but they did the job, at
what I feel was a fair price and reasonable markup on all parts, and they
did what it says on the ticket. They even showed me all the old parts.
They even replaced a split rubber prop hub for me with a good used one they
had in the shop.

I know this may sound to some like merely adequate service or them just
doing what I paid them for, but to be quite frank I have experienced a
number of places over the years where you don't get what you pay for and
every part that you buy is sold at full list and sometimes higher. I don't
mind paying for good quality work and service and I feel that is what I get
from Lakeland Marine every time I go there.


--
Bob La Londe
Fishing Arizona & The Colorado River
Fishing Forums & Contests
http://www.YumaBassMan.com



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Question about weather in the Southwest. Thinking of towing the boat to Las
Vegas and Lake Mead in early or late June. How hot will be the weather for
camping? My camper does not have air. That way the kids who live in LA can
meet us and do some water skiing an tubing.

"Calif Bill" wrote in message
thlink.net...

Question about weather in the Southwest. Thinking of towing the boat to
Las Vegas and Lake Mead in early or late June. How hot will be the
weather for camping? My camper does not have air. That way the kids who
live in LA can meet us and do some water skiing an tubing.

Vegas proper has temps close to the same as Yuma. June will probably see
100F temps in the mid afternoon. Mead is only slightly cooler than Vegas.

On a positive note. There is a Coleman Roof AC for RV/travel trailers
available pretty reasonably. I think retail is around 799, and I think I've
seen them on EBAY and some other resellers for under 6.


--
Bob La Londe
Fishing Arizona & The Colorado River
Fishing Forums & Contests
http://www.YumaBassMan.com



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
.. .
"Calif Bill" wrote in message
thlink.net...

Question about weather in the Southwest. Thinking of towing the boat to
Las Vegas and Lake Mead in early or late June. How hot will be the
weather for camping? My camper does not have air. That way the kids who
live in LA can meet us and do some water skiing an tubing.

Vegas proper has temps close to the same as Yuma. June will probably see
100F temps in the mid afternoon. Mead is only slightly cooler than Vegas.

On a positive note. There is a Coleman Roof AC for RV/travel trailers
available pretty reasonably. I think retail is around 799, and I think
I've seen them on EBAY and some other resellers for under 6.


--
Bob La Londe
Fishing Arizona & The Colorado River
Fishing Forums & Contests
http://www.YumaBassMan.com



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com


Wife, just does not want to go where it is 100 degrees at 10 pm. So I save
on the Roof air, and my truck camper still stays low ehile traveling. I
have a slide in pop-up truck camper.

"Calif Bill" wrote in message

Wife, just does not want to go where it is 100 degrees at 10 pm. So I
save on the Roof air, and my truck camper still stays low ehile traveling.
I have a slide in pop-up truck camper.

In that case think motel.


--
Bob La Londe
Fishing Arizona & The Colorado River
Fishing Forums & Contests
http://www.YumaBassMan.com



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
.. .
"Calif Bill" wrote in message

Wife, just does not want to go where it is 100 degrees at 10 pm. So I
save on the Roof air, and my truck camper still stays low ehile
traveling. I have a slide in pop-up truck camper.

In that case think motel.


--
Bob La Londe
Fishing Arizona & The Colorado River
Fishing Forums & Contests
http://www.YumaBassMan.com



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com


Think different month.