Slight drift, sticking with the topic of choosing a mechanic. In my town (Thousand Oaks, CA) I found a small shop run by a mechanic who appears to maintain a devoted clientele. The name of his shop is Spot44 and it is independently owned. The head mechanic is the owner. I like that. He services VWs but doesn’t specialize in them, he actually services a wide range of vehicles - Porsches, exotics, American muscle, vintage, you name it. I visited his shop once as I dropped off my wife’s Beetle for some service and had a quick chat. There was a 356 replica in his queue, and I learned he owns several cars including a VW Kombi and an SP2 that were parked in his shop. Both were very sweet looking. He also owned a Porsche 356 Coupe Super 90 that I believe he has since sold. So he seems to know his way around VW cars as well as genuine 356s. I’m encouraged.
Just tonight I was looking through his Facebook page and ran across a few interesting photos that I apologetically lift to repost here:
I’m not necessarily looking for advice (yet) on how to vet this shop. I don’t even have my car yet so I should have some time before I’ll have the need.
But I am wondering if the owner of the red wide body (with ‘motec fuel injection’) is an SOC member or if anyone recognizes his/her car, or if anyone has any direct experience with Spot44 either in the current location (Thousand Oaks) or his previous location which I think was in or near Van Nuys (?). (For the pixel peepers, I believe that is a 3 wheeled Morgan in the center of the third photo if you can’t see enough to figure it out).
Cheers,
Jon