Is your car making a ”PING-PING-PING” noise? It is going to cost you about 2000 kroner (315 dollars). (Photo: Emil Weatherhead Breistein/ Bergensavisen.

The price list for repairs at Flesland Auto outside Bergen is rather peculiar: It is sound-based. Most of us know almost nothing about cars, and for many it is a relief to call a workshop where you only need to imitate the noise.

– We experience daily that people say that the problem with the car is that they have got noise in it. Then we ask them to describe it. “I have got one of those” SWOOSH-SWOOSH-SWOOSH “sounds in the engine”, they say. It is those descriptions we have taken seriously, says manager Thomas Jamne to Bergensavisen.

And this is not a joke.

– No, it is not. In 90 percent of the cases, we can tell what is wrong with a car by listening to it.

What Does It Cost

Jamne believes that the price list meets the average customer’s needs.

– Most people have one primary interest when the car fails. It is not what is wrong with it, but what it costs to get it repaired, he says.

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Brake check – based on a “PING-PING-PING” noise? (Photo: Flatland Auto AS)

Many customers demand an initial price over the phone based on their sound description of the problem.

– We of course prefer to make a deal where we get to see and listen to the car. It is after all a challenge to give a price based on an unknown failure over the phone.

”KLANK – KLANK – POFF”

“PING-PING-PING” means that you have a slight ticking sound. Probably just a stone that is stuck in the brake disc or something else that does not have to cost much.

”TAFF-KLUNK-TAFF” tells that the brakes need both service and replacements, and you should expect to pay about 8000 kroner (in 1262 dollars).

”KLANK – KLANK – POFF” illustrates a serious engine failure (timing belt/ camshaft) and costs about 20,000 dollars (3155 dollars).

Long Experience

For many years Jamne ran his own taxi bus company, but found that it was at least as interesting to repair cars as driving them. Now he runs a workshop that has specialized in German cars.

He is not afraid of being labeled as unserious with his sound-based price list.

– No, on the contrary. We must of course always check and take seriously what we find even when it does not correspond with what we thought.

– But you have to be quite experienced and confident if you dare to give a price based on the noise the car is making.

Text modified by: Thor Lanesskog, ThorNews

Source: Bergensavisen

Categories: Quirky