Rant: Today's most ridiculously expensive part - Brindabella Motor Sport Club

tortfeaser · 24-03-2006, 09:31 AM

So I put an oil cooler on the Camira, and while all the bits for that are a ripoff, I'd expected it (hose, hose ends, sandwich plate all up $240). But the filter hangs in a stupid place - right above a lower control arm, quite exposed. So a shorter oil filter looks necessary. No problem, call Ryco - shorter filter with same thread is available, Z69.

Drop in to Repco to pick one up = $41. WTF? Who ever heard of an oil filter costing more than $14, much less $41.

I'll get the filter head/sandwich plate modified to take another filter thread I think. It'll be way cheaper.

Insert tales of woe on parts prices here. I'm looking at you Dyne, that stupid oil seal on the remote oil filter housing for the GT4 was a wallet burner.

fro · 24-03-2006, 09:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tortfeaser

Drop in to Repco to pick one up = $41. WTF? Who ever heard of an oil filter costing more than $14, much less $41.

I think you'll find your problem is with Repco, not with the Z69 filter. Z170 Ryco filter from Supercheap = $14. Repco = $28.

Spac · 24-03-2006, 09:42 AM

Did you try other suppliers?

I've seen heaps of those, but two that come to mind:

Non-genuine Volvo uni joint is $80-odd. Guy behind the couter says "I think they're the same as Falcon", so he goes and gets both, and we check 'em out - yep, they're identical. The 'Volvo' part's box even has a Falcon sticker on it, and then they've put the Volvo sticker over the top....
Needless to say, I bought the Falcon one for $20...

One I read about on DBW. You can buy good quality, Australian made, aftermarket bike radiators from the manufacturer or local dealer for $800. You can buy the exact same part from an American dealer, or you can get them freighted back to Australia, pay the usual duties and stuff, and still only pay $500.
Someone is making a killing on them in Australia...

Lots of good stories about parts that are common between Mazda and Ford - the price of the Mazda part can be between 50% and 200% of the identical part, coming from the same warehouse with a Ford label on it. Definitely worth shopping around...

Oh, and I can import a complete RX-8 gearbox from NZ and still pay significantly less than I can get the same part over the counter at an Australian Mazda dealer. It was NS$3400 vs A$5000, IIRC...

Mark · 24-03-2006, 09:46 AM

Well, I'll put the golden oldie up: Ralliart metal headgasket: $697 at the 'trade' price from Ralliart. I think around $900 retail. When some good forged pistons cost $950 retail. A hand made one out of aluminium from C&G graphics in Hume is under $200 etc.

The little cam belt tensioner on an Evo: $255 retail.

Evo cam belt covers: $250 trade.

Spac · 24-03-2006, 09:48 AM

Further to Fro's comments... I won't mention names, but I was shopping around for an RX-7 master cylinder for the 808.
Typical price range was $240 ~ $260 (which I thought was very rude, hence the continued shopping around), but one place had them listed at over $400!

Funnily enough, I'm mates with the guy who quoted me $400, so I had a bit of a discussion with him. He told me that his cost price was significantly under $200.... I know about retail mark-ups, but FFS!
I guess they're at the point where they're happy to lose sales because they make so much money on the stuff they do sell that it doesn't matter...

tortfeaser · 24-03-2006, 09:53 AM

Yep, Repco tax. Autopro = $34 (still huge for a filter).

Repco Braddon have been golden lately, looking for odd bits and giving me trade prices. This $41 price was from Repco Phillip (on my way to work).

Spac · 24-03-2006, 09:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark

The little cam belt tensioner on an Evo: $255 retail.

The timing belt tensioner for a V6 929 is around $800 retail.
VRS gasket kits are ~$1000.

Oh, and a good 'un:
Non-turbo S4 RX-7 gasket kits are around $280 retail. Turbo S4 gasket kits are over $700.
You can buy a non-turbo gasket kit AND all of the turbo-specific gaskets for well under $500. Go figure...

Yamaha is good too... The older parts are, the more the jack the prices up. So as a bike gets old and worth less, the prices of parts go up and up.

It's not really price related, but Suzuki dirt bikes were almost always yellow, whereas some of the road bikes were avaialble in a variety of colours.
Somewhere along the line, they decided that it was too hard to maintain an inventory of all of the different colours and that they'd make parts for old bikes only in silver.
So far so good.
Then some bright spark worked out that there were all of these yellow plastics sitting around, but their computer system thought they were silver....
So they went out and sprayed every single yellow part with silver paint - so if you own an old RM (only EVER available in yellow) and you try to buy a genuine mudguard for it, you'll get a yellow guard that has been poorly painted silver...
And then to add insult to injury, they charge you significantly more for it, because they've had to empoly someone to go and spray the bits in silver....

tortfeaser · 24-03-2006, 09:59 AM

Part is a Peugeot 404/504 filter. Pug tax.

Swill · 24-03-2006, 10:03 AM

Think I paid $8 for a tie rod end for the commodore....

Stewy · 24-03-2006, 10:04 AM

I had a radiator I wanted to see if I could get fixed, basiclly unsure of condition and wanted to get it checked out. Took it to a radiator repairer in Nowra to get it checked. Later that day went back to pick it up and was told they found a heap of corrosion and it had leaks everywhere.
So instead of stopping when they found the corrosion and contacting me to see what I wanted to do, they decided to fix some of the holes in the top tank only, fit a new seal and fully seal up the top tank. They took me out to the testing tank and showed how bad the core was(about 6 or 7 small leaks). After this the guy:then told me it was $80

for what they did

, two leassons learnt, firstly don't ever go back there as I had been told others have had issues with them

, and secondly try and test it at home first

.
I was so annoyed as that was good money that I would have been able to use on rally car

Matt · 24-03-2006, 10:51 AM

FJ20 oil pump - $1500 (from Sydney), $1200 (from Japan)

tortfeaser · 24-03-2006, 11:05 AM

Yep, that's a pricey part right there. Matt's winning so far.

gtvi2000 · 24-03-2006, 12:05 PM

Now here's a thread that's right up my alley!

I used to work in the parts department of a "prestige" dealership so Porsche, Volvo, Audi and Mercedes Benz so I've got too many stories to tell.......

But the worst I've ever experienced was buying spark plugs for my Sirion GTVi, genuine from Daihatsu $38ea. So I was thinking they were the long life platinum jobbies like on some celica's (the ones with 100k intervals)

The were ordered in and I arrived to find them as NGK spark plugs, still in the NGK box, not even repacked! Couldn't even send them back as they were "special precurement". 20k later I bought replacements from Autobarn for $2.80ea!

I even wrote to consumer affairs about the ludicrous mark up, they replied "they can charge what they like"!

No wonder they went belly up in Aus! (great car though)

BEN · 24-03-2006, 12:18 PM

4AGE Toyota Valve stem oil seals $160 for set of 16
ACl set $30

Side quarter window for ae86 Coupe $700

Rubber Boot seal $200

I could be here for days listing every 2nd part i have bought from Toyota !!
But the parts people at Castle Hill Toyota love me so its all good

Ben.

guy · 24-03-2006, 01:36 PM

M6 nyloc nuts for 911 Porsche sump plate 6 required, $6 each. Or 6 cents from specialty fasteners. Thats 1000%!