How has you experince been with Advance Auto Parts? (Page 1/3)
infinitewill OCT 10, 10:26 AM
.

[This message has been edited by infinitewill (edited 01-05-2016).]

Fformula88 OCT 10, 12:49 PM
I have had the opposite experience. Advance has been the only place I have been able to find consistently reliable brake parts. (I shutter at the thought of ever buying autozone brake parts again!).
thesameguy OCT 10, 01:51 PM
IME, it's less about the source and more about the specific part and the specific remanufacturer. I think some remanufacturers are better than others, but it also depends heavily on the specific part. IE I've had great luck with Centric reman calipers s on a variety of cars, but every time they touch a Saab caliper with a handbrake mechanism disaster ensues. I've had no problems with Cardone reman alternators, but terrible luck with their starters.

I tend to stay away from store brands - like Valucraft (Autozone) and O'Reilly's brand of the hour. I'm *pretty* sure these guys just put their boxes around lowest bidder products - they certainly don't operate their own nationwide parts remanufacturing service! Sticking with national brands helps ensure I know what's going to be in the box, and gives me some control in ensuring the part I'm getting is from a brand that tends to do a good job.

To that end, I order from rockauto as much as possible. They virtually always have a choice of national brands in their remanufactured parts, so you know what you're getting. I have yet to have any reman part sourced from rockauto fail... which could be luck or it could be excellent brand selection on my part, but I'm not rocking the boat.

FWIW, the ONLY reman part I've ever had totally fail instantly was a reman distributor for my '62 Falcon purchased from AAP. Start car, horrible racket, distributor shaft is wobbling wildly in its housing chewing up the brand new cap & rotor. I'm still installing a Lares (I think that might be AAP's brand) reman'd steering rack in my XR4Ti. We'll see how that goes...
fastblack OCT 10, 04:26 PM
I've also had terrible luck at Advance Auto, both in parts and service. I now stick to my local Napa store.
RWDPLZ OCT 11, 07:28 AM
Depends what parts you buy. I've had good luck with Wagner Thermoquiets, and Moog suspension parts. I used to stop at 5 different stores to do a major job, to get the best combination of parts and supplies, since no one store would have every good part, or ridiculous prices on some.

The service at the dozen or so I've been to in consistently 'meh', but that's more management's fault for hiring idiots. Then again, if you pay someone minimum wage and don't train them AT ALL, what do you expect? I was a parts counter guy for years, and I was only making $9.15 and hour after 4 years when I left. Out of the dozen or so parts stores in the Traverse City area, there were maybe 4 good parts guys, a couple kids, and a couple guys who had been at it for 20+ years. Lots of incompetent kids, and incompetent grouchy old guys.
infinitewill OCT 11, 08:17 AM
.

[This message has been edited by infinitewill (edited 01-05-2016).]

craigsfiero2007 OCT 11, 10:54 AM
I have bought a few parts from Advanced with no issues. I prefer O'Reilly's or Rock Auto. I will go to NAPA for some stuff, but not for Batteries or Alternators, I have had too many problems with those parts from NAPA in the past.
tesmith66 OCT 11, 11:24 AM
Advance screwed me over on some lifetime shocks once. They refused to replace them without a receipt, so after asking them to look me up in the computer the manager came up and said that they only replace their "lifetime" shocks for 2 years. After that debacle (they would NOT honor their "lifetime" warranty) I just never went back. It's been almost 10 years now.

------------------
1986 SE Aero coupe.

3.4 DOHC swap is complete and running, now just have to finish the rest of the car...

Dburger OCT 11, 11:58 AM
Agreed, depends on what you buy. We just bought a starter for our 84 C30 diesel a month ago and it needs another one.
tebailey OCT 11, 05:57 PM
My problems with AAP is too long to list here, all bad. Got lied to so many times that I won't even go into the store, even if they were the only ones that had the part I needed.