At Megatyre Towbars, we always advise our customers that second hand towbars are a false economy and that fitting a brand new towbar is always a better choice.
Recently I have had a lot of phone calls from people wanting us to install second hand towbars for them. These are towbars they have bought on trademe, had given to them or have taken off wrecked cars etc.
Its pretty ugly!
Basically, second hand towbars are an unknown quantity; they may be accident or corrosion damaged, they may have parts missing, it is highly likely they do not fit properly or are actually for an entirely different model or chassis number, the customer may not be accepting of the need to completely replace all nuts, bolts and washers, original fitting instructions will be missing. Then there is the issue of what to charge; most towbars are not fitted in 10 minutes, one to two hours is much more realistic. And then there is the issue of public liability if something goes wrong with the secondhand towbar after fitting.
Following is a case study showing how things can go wrong. Years ago an old guy got Megatyre towbars to fit a towbar to his car; he left us a very happy customer. He came back 3 months later saying he had sold that car because he could no longer drive a manual and had bought an automatic car. Both cars were exactly the same, same year, model, even the same colour! But one was manual, the other automatic. He asked us to swap his towbar from the old car to the newly purchased automatic. In the circumstances, I had to agree but I warned him there might be differences in the cars; basically the customer told me I was nuts because they were identical cars!
So the customer and his wife brought both cars in, we took the rear bumpers off and proceeded to change the towbar to the new vehicle. Believe it or not, but the automatic vehicle had a different exhaust system to the manual vehicle meaning we had to do extra work to shift the exhaust system so the towbar could fit.
And lastly, and probably most relevant, in many instances we can supply and fit a brand new towbar for less than the cost of a second-hand towbar plus fitting charges. And one should remember that there are many instances of people buying towbars that are claimed to fit their vehicle but never will, often this becomes money down the drain.
Also, there is no sense trying to fit a second-hand towbar, which has no history or guarantee, when you can fit a Megatyre brand new towbar, with a lifetime guarantee, for not much more than the price of a second-hand towbar. So contact us at Megatyre for a free quote on a safe quality towbar with a lifetime guarantee.
Megatyre Towbars, Browns Bay, North Shore, Auckland. www.megatyre.co.nz
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