Technician

well young man you've taken the first step already. you've decided on a goal and are trying to plot a course to attain it. is there a vo-tech high school in your area? if so take the automotive course. you need to build yourself a good foundation in basic principles. find a ferrari dealer or a shop that services exotic cars and offer you services for free. do the grunt work. clean the lot, sweep the floors, clean the bathrooms, run for lunch, detail the cars after they've been serviced. ingratiate yourself into the shop. show up on time, ready for work. dress for work, not for play. impress the managers with your initiative. always smile. be pleasant and respectful. keep you ears and eyes open and your mouth shut. that's how you learn. if you need to ask a question make it direct and listen to the answer. try to travel to different shops and meet the people who work there. get to know their names and let them know yours. make regular visits. grease the wheels. a dozen donuts and a pot of coffee can go a long way. most importantly is to be persistent

 

Rick has some good suggestions.

I would personally stay away from schools like UTI or WyoTech as they are more interested in your $$$$ than they are about giving you a top notch education.

Go around to all of the local dealerships and see who the service manager and top techs recommend for a trade school. Also ask if they have a scholarship or sponsorship program for new techs going to school. Then see if you can work for them as a lot tech. Yeah it is a thankless job but it gets your foot into the door.

Best of luck in your career choice it can be fun and rewarding both at the same time. I have been a service tech for well over25 years now and look forward to going to work each and every day.

 

Even if there is no Exotic dealership where you live at get your foot in the door with the local car dealerships. This will only help you out once you are out of high school.

 

Ask your local independent garage if they need a part time helper or apprentice. This is a great way to get your feet wet. Most dealerships work at a very fast pace, to fast for you to really learn anything. A race shop would teach you the proper installation methods and go deeper into what each part does and why. Best of luck!!

 

Basic knowledge can be gained early and doesn't have to be on a Ferrari. If this is your dream you can pick at it by getting good at working on cars. When I say good I refer to knowledge, not speed. If you speak to a well seasoned mechanic, the quantity of knowledge inside their heads is amazing. It all starts with stripping your first bolt and getting past it. I stoked my passion when I was young by spending time in the garages of friends as we mostly destroyed the cars we worked on, but we learned a lot. If you can find a rough old fiat spider dohc, you're working on similar technology, at least for 70's and 80's stuff. If you stick with it you'll get there.

PS, don't neglect your other studies, a successful mechanic can become an independent shop owner someday and then understanding business and balancing a checkbook is handy. Math, and engineering give so much back too. When you understand why things hold up or fall apart, or how much clamping force a bolt of a certain size will have and why, things get very exciting. As the older cars get older and parts are hard to find the mechanics are finding alternatives and ways to fix unfixable problems. You can be a part of that.

 

All of this is good advice.

Good luck and enjoy you endeavour.

 

There is no average salary. You will be paid based on your years of experience and your knowledge of the the cars and their eccentricities. Remember, this is not just a "monkey" job. You will be servicing a car that the owner has waited a lifetime to buy and (hopefully and probably) knows many more stats about her than you ever will. It's personal for them. That is what's most important to your work.

Keep sight of the dream, but unless you start a very comprehensive apprenticeship with a respected (and do your research) expert, start cutting your teeth at a local high-volume dealership. You need to learn basics and most importantly how to recover from (and avoid) screw-ups when replacement parts are cheap. Over torquing a part on a Ferrari or mis-diagnosing a problem will easily cost you a month's pay or your job in one shot.

Getting a chance to be a part of each vehicle's history is a great feeling. Seeing a grinning owner right after delivery is one of the best feelings ever.

 

This is a loaded question as each shop and location has a different pay scale and plan based on the local economy, customer loads, etc.

Most technicians work on "Flat rate". If lets say a jobs flat rate is 4.5 the customer is charged for 4.5 hours of labor at the shops labor rate lets say $100/hr customer pays $450 in labor charges. The tech gets paid $20/hr per flat rate hour billed. If you do the job in 3 hours you get paid $90 if it takes you 4.5 hours you get paid $90 if it takes you 20 hours you make $90.

Some techs are paid commission where they get paid a percentage of what they bill out this works similar to flat rate.

Other techs are paid hourly. it does not matter how many hours you bill out you get paid for every hour you are on the time clock.

One thing to think about when you are working "Flat Rate" or "commission" is if you do a 5 hour job in 4 hours and you mess up and have to do it all over again.. Only this time the repair is not a billable hour so you are doing the repair on your own time. If it takes you another 5 hours to repair you screw up now you just lost 5 hours of potential billable labor. You lost money, the shop lost money, and you might have also lost a customer. So It pays to take your time with attention to detail especially on jobs that you are not familiar with.

 

According to my mechanic a Ferrari mechanic makes $350.00 an hour. He is no longer my mechanic.

 

It is knowledge. Often, the more you know the more you make, but all the above variables come into play. I mentioned above getting a Fiat. Some of my best experience came from a 1980 Toyota pickup that was trashed. I paid $75.00 for it, and it wouldn't be worth that today in it's condition at that time. Everything was bad, and I had to fix everything by pulling apart and rebuilding. In the end it ran great, but still looked like a $75.00 truck. I sold it for $250.00 to someone who happily drove it down the road.