Visited an old body shop in Detroit and the whole place still used bondo by hand

Went to a family-run shop in Detroit last Thursday that's been around since the 70s and they were still doing all their filler work with hand spreaders and sanding blocks, no spray guns or DA sanders in sight, and it made me wonder how many of us younger guys are losing the feel for the metal by relying too much on power tools, anyone else ever go back to basics and learn something from the old timers?

4 comments

4 Comments

taylor.sean19d ago

Hold up, did you ask the guys running the spreaders if they ever taught any young techs who just refused to learn the hand method? I'm curious if they see that as a lost skill or just progress. I bet some of them have strong opinions about it.

king.robin19d ago

Wait, they actually had kids refuse to learn the hand method? That's wild to me. I can't imagine trusting a machine to do something that your own hands could screw up later if the spreader breaks down on the job.

kim_johnson5119d ago

You think the old-timers actually rolling their eyes or are they keeping quiet hoping the machines fail so they get to say "told you so"?

vera51419d ago

Funny how that works with everything now. Kids these days can't even change a tire without watching a YouTube video first.