My car wouldn't start in the cold and they banged on something and it started

It looks like they changed the starter, the starter relay, and the battery. The charges look ok. Thanks to the Fed, costs of things made of metal, especially lead, have gone up about 300% in the last two years.

That, plus 3 hours labor at $50/hr. Frankly, it could have been worse.

So the battery has gone up 300% in two years? That means it was about $44 two years ago.

They replaced your starter and what they called the "accessory relay" - likely the starter relay. From my experience with Toyota's I'd guess the starter brushes were worn out - and you have over 125000 miles on the car. I used to replace starter brushes and solenoid contacts on them but a lot of those parts are now getting REALLY HARD to source.

Been a long time since I've been able to buy a battery for less than $90.

It's a 2005 Camry and that's what I have.

And I have over 125,000. In the old days, I'd have replaced the st arter myself, but you know, I just don't want to anymore.

And I do mainly short trips so the wear on the starter is even more.

Sort of related and defintely related to the OP's description of the mechanic banging on something, I had a convertible top that often wouldn't go up or down. I'd open the trunk and bang on the top pump with a tire iron or a wrench and that would do it. As time went on, I'd have to hit it more times, from 1 up to 4.

Not from Chrysler but I bought brushes in advance at a hardware store. When I took the motor apart, the brush was the right size but the braid used as a wire was much lighter than the original. I wanted to finish so I took some aluminum foil and balled it up and put a piece under each original brush, to make them longer and it worked fine for several years until I no longer had the car. I'm not saying this would work for a starter motor, but if you're stuck it can be worth a try.

Federal tax and Federal reclamation fees.

Post appears to be click bait if OP cannot understand receipt and introduces it wrong.

Stuck solenoid.

or a stuck bendix drive.

neither of which requires replacing both the starter and solenoid unless other problems were found.

any hack shop which doesn't explain what they are doing and why before getting it approved by the customer before doing it doesn't deserve repeat business regardless of how low the shop rate is.

$50/hr? who did this job? a backyard hillbilly with one tooth and a rusty monkey wrench?

Okay? I'd charge my friends more than that. And three hours is about right if it's not all rusty under there.

--scott

Nothing to do with the Fed and the price of the battery hasnt.

No click bait. The subject is normal for someone who knows nothing about cars.

He banged on the relay. Sometimes that works. OTOH, when I had a loose battery cable I banged on it with a glass coke bottle. That worked too.

I don't think it took me 3 hours to change the starter in a 1968 LTD, but there was a lot more room to work then :-(

This needed 2 or 3 feet of extensions to get at the bolts. My mom's car. She always had it serviced at the dealership. I had to replace it because it started making horrid noises and not working properly. Turns out it had been replaced once. One bolt was entirely missing. One was sitting on top of the starter. The third one had loosened enough to allow the starter to flop around. Fine dealer workmanship.

The only advantage of my having as smaller car now with a smaller engine is the smaller starter motor. I just about broke my wrist or arm trying to lower the one from the 400 or 455ci engine, and putting it back in place afterwards was worse. I'm not as energetic now as I was then, and I think I can handle the smaller starter if I need to.

Most cars have more bolts than they need. It's a known fact, look it up. It's caused by pressure from the bolt manufacturers. And pay-offs.

My brother bought a new car in 1964. Repeated starting problems. Dealership said it replaced starter, battery, alternator, and regulator, each twice. Still problems. I took it to Sears and bought a new battery and while he was putting it in, he fixed it for free in 10 minutes.

When I moved to my brother's city in 1971, the dealership was out of business.

Actually, the reverse is true in current day cars. These days they are engineered to the minimums. In the past, especially with British marques, cars were overengineered. I have worked on thousands of those old British marques so I have seen/experienced the engineering first hand.

Looks like they had *no trained technicians* who could *diagnose*.

Dealers usually don't have technicians who can diagnose on staff, because most of their business comes from warranty repairs and the car manufacturers won't pay for diagnosis under warranty. Ford/GM/whoever is happy to pay the dealer to replace the short block several times, but paying them to figure out why the engine keeps failing is rare because there's no billing code for that.

--scott