AVB, that must be why I've seen that mob referred to as 'Harbor Fright'.
Tnx, I needed a good laugh. Don't take me wrong they do have some good stuff but takes time inspecting what your buying and don't just buy something because of the low prices. You need to do your research before buying.
Here I still repair some these cheapo trimmers. They are fairly simple to repair as most of the time it dirty carburetor related and with the ultrasonic cleaner I usually can get by without needing gaskets or parts. Other times they are too far gone to save due either to the lack of parts or the cost of parts.
I am able to do these repairs because my labor rate is about half of the bigger shops in the area that have so much extra overhead and I have a lot of downtime. To me it brings the more profitable equipment repairs as some customers are just uncomfortable with a shop until they check them out. I don't blame them either after some the rigged repairs I have straighten out over the few years I have been in the business.
And I don't blame the larger shops passing up on these repairs as most times they waste a lot time repairing these when they can be repairing more profitable equipment. Good shops usually are very busy usually and don't have much time to spend on non profitable equipment repairs.
Still there customers that are willing to repair the smaller low cost units. Most because of the light weight and ease of operation. These are usually elderly customers that have one problem or another. Sometimes its the weight and other times they are having hard time learning a new machine. The later was the case for my mother as she was developing dementia. As long as she could remember how to use the one she had she use it. I probably had more than 4x what it cost to replace in it but it made her happy just to be able to use it.
There is times even the 200 USD 4 cycle trimmers cost more than they are worth to repair due to parts cost as most times they are only repaired by short blocking if it is anything other than the carburetor when it is engine related.
The other limiting factor is even though I can repair these I can't sell an used one because most customers are not willing to pay much for an used one even when they are good working order. They basically want me to sell them for less than it cost to repair them even if I just charge for the parts. A lot of this is the yard sale mentality where they have brought and got stung at these places.
