Technical Why can’t they leave well enough alone?

It seems brick and mortar stores only sell “a” movers (fast sellers) anymore and can’t figure out why people shop on line. If I need anything out of the ordinary (car parts or household stuff) I don’t even try buying it at retail, they wouldn’t have it.

 

People shop at Walmart because it's cheaper than anywhere else but complain when they don't stock slow moving inventory that drives prices up for any business. Makes perfects sense.

 

The last time I was at Walmart was 2 years ago when I needed a new wrist watch. They were the ONLY place in town I could buy a wrist watch off the shelf, and there were only 4 to choose from. That store chain is the very last resort I'm going into for anything. Don't much like Amazon for online purchases either.

I've reached a point where I am surprised to find anything I need in stock anyplace, but like a fool, I always check local stores before buying almost anything. If it has to be ordered, I'll probably do the ordering myself.

 

Many places ship for free & have near equal prices & they deliver to my door . I don't have to leave my address, no driving the car , no parking the car , no walking in to the store , on interaction with underpayed employees who dont want to be there , infinitley simpler cheaper , without stress from home .

 

All the parts houses around here are big chain stores now. So amazon it is

 

That would be like looking for flat head stuff in 1973.

 

Maybe Wally is on the HAMB? I was there today and lo and behold…PH-5’s on the shelf again!

I’m not sure what to make of this… I guess I should go back to Wally’s.com and see what they say they stock now.

 

There are other numbers that fit a sbc. PH-13 comes to mind. Here are some others.
CHEVROLET 5.7L/350 Chevy small block Gen I Fram Oil Filters - Free Shipping on Orders Over $109 at Summit Racing
I am sure the other makers have a similar list

 

How’s the watch doing keeping time?
I needed a am/fm clock radio. 13? Bucks on Amazon.
Has preset time, just select the time zone.
Cool. Out of the box about 1.5 minutes slow.
This was a few years back.
Checked it the other day. 9 minutes and 45 seconds slow.
I figure eventually it’ll show the correct time

 

I have a tablet , my wife uses the PC , both are on the same wifi , both are auto time set , neither are the same .

 

Remember , they're human ....

 

Don’t you have a phone?

I bought my last wrist watch shortly after I bought my last buggy whip.

Bought my last alarm clock about then , too.

 

Yes, I have a phone. Its a flip phone, and it sits on the kitchen table most of the time. I only take it with me if I'm traveling someplace or if I'm expecting a call. I have no internet on my phone and I am not addicted to it like some.

As far as the watch, I bought it because I had misplaced my old watch when the band broke. I've found it and have replaced the band. The new watch is sitting on my dresser, the time is accurate except for the last time change (its off exactly an hour). I don't like the band that came with it, and it takes an odd width band.

Our alarm clock is a 1970s model. and it works fine. We don't replace things until the old stuff can't be repaired. That used to be called "being frugal".

I'm not afraid of technology nor of using it, but I'm not allowing it to invading my life. Every road vehicle here has had electronic fuel injection since 2012, but none of the technology is going to be new enough to store or collect data about me (except this pile of junk I'm typing into, and that is as limited as I can make it.)

 

for stuff shipped to my house walmart ships it for free as long as I spend $35 or more. This is without paying their walmart monthly fee to get free shipping. so many pay walmart $12 a month to get free shipping as a member but i just order over $35 at a time as a non member to get it free.

For bigger items or items they don't ship to you but it comes on their own truck I get free shipping to the stores. like the kids ride on tractor that was heavily discounted online was shipped to the store for free or i could have paid extra to have it shipped to me but it was quite a bit more, just cheaper to get it at the store seeing i had to drive past it that week anyways. tires, you just never know. 1 time they shipped them to my house for free but the next time they wanted like $40 each so I had them shipped to the store for free and I picked them up there.

Now sam's club will ship some items free (no minimum)if you are a plus member so I guess i technically paid extra for that even though i got like triple my money back already and i still have a few months to go yet. Like today I ordered 1 item that was $5.98 and fedex will deliver it Wednesday for free to me.

 

I was thinking about saying that chain stores are better than Amazon. Then I looked up who owns Autozone.

 

I buy all my automotive maintenance items at garage sales/tag sales whatever they are called in your neck of this orb.
Found filters oil thermostat housings you name. Often $1 and many times free. All old style Chevy SB and BB.
Same place I buy my clothes and household items such as pots pans slow cookers etc. All used once or twice then being dumped by the seller.
A few hours at a city(700-5000 population) wide sale day and it's a full truck. In the fall the church bazaars are the supplier of jams and jellies for winter. All homemade and mostly free of all the chemicals added by the big producers.
Sometimes it pays to shop outside the box....box store and check the box online.

 

I get my filters and parts as well from my local auto parts store. It costs a little more but not much and he is a local guy and has a lot in stock. There are very few places like that around here with all the chain stores that have popped up.

 

I would much rather support my local hardware and auto parts stores than further line the pockets of Jeff Bezos, the Walton clan, etc. The locals provide jobs and tax base to the community, as well as support local causes. A few bucks aren't worth driving them out of business!

 

Wow! Two pages and no one sees the elephant in the room?



Bones

 

I don't want to burst anyone's bubble, but "free shipping" is like "free lunch"...... they don't exist! Do you REALLY think Amazon (Jeff Bezos) is so nice that they forego some profit to help YOU out?????
When I order from my local business they don't charge shipping.... it's built into their pricing structure, so where's the advantage with Amazon (the locals can have it in their store just as fast as the blue truck can bring it to my door, and I'm not so far away from my local source that I can't afford 15 minutes to go get it)

 

........... any time you're ready.....

 

I hate missing the elephant!
I believe I've seen a few in here already, but please feel free to show me the elephant in this "room" I have apparently not seen yet.

 

Don't be shy , speak what's on your mind , Really don't like guessing games , twenty. questions , etc .

 

When I went to Hershey, PA last year, I stopped in at the local Walmart to get some socks and underwear as I thought I had left them at home (turns out I found them later in my hotel room in the drawer). Lol!
Anyways, they were locked behind glass doors! I was like WTF!? Is this “normal” in the states? Another guy was wanting some as well, and had sent his GF looking for an “associate” to open the doors. I was just stunned. What also stunned me was how bad the food selection was. All I saw was literally junk food stacked to the rafters. Much different than the ones here in Canada. I used to pick up Mobil 1 at the Walmart in Ogdensburg, NY when I went there to pick up parts from a freight forwarder, but haven’t done that in years as I found the price difference wasn’t really there anymore. Frigg, a Timmies coffee there was more in US$ than it was back in Canada.

 

I bought most of my oil and filters the last 40 years from Walmart. Brand name oil, store brand, Motorcraft and AC filters. But now, you can’t hardly find a quart of any brand that’s not at least semi synthetic, and filters, well, when they don’t have a Fl1A ford filter INSTOCK or a AC for a SBC, something is wrong. Both of those filters cover hundreds of applications, not just automotive engine, but welders, pumps, generators, some tractors, etc.
My stock of filters is empty, so I need to start looking. At least Tractor Supply still carries dino oil, for now anyways.

Hey, I’m just an old curmudgeon who hates change just for the sake of change….

 

And this is how I ended up with a shelf of parts for cars I haven't owned in 30 years.......

 

What, pray tell, do you find offensive about semi synthetic motor oil?

 

I'm curious what you're soldering that gets up to 150 psi? Most water systems get nowhere near that, that's why I'm curious.

Store like Wal-Mart sell to the masses. The filters you mentioned that should be on the shelf are purchased only by a small subset of people that have 30+ year-old engines AND service them themselves. Those of us buying those parts are part of a niche market, so a volume retailer like Wal-Mart is eventually going to drop those slow-moving part numbers. The only time I've gone to Wal-Mart in the last 5 years is to get baby products, as they have the best in-stock selection in town. When I want filters or oil, I go to the specialty parts store.

The stuff we like has long been out of circulation, so we need to hunt for the parts now. The old idea that a mechanical fuel pump or alternator for your regular sbf or sbc will be on any parts store shelf is no longer true, because you don't see that stuff on the street much anymore. If you do find it on a parts store shelf, there's probably a layer of dust on the box.

2 falls ago I lost my alternator/water pump belt while driving through a larger mountain town. They had a Canadian Tire, a large automotive store chain with a lot of other household products as well. They didn't have a single V-belt, only ribbed belts. When you realize that V-belts haven't been on production cars in probably at least 30 years it makes sense, so when you buy one you buy two and stuff the other one under the seat with a wrench so you can change it easily. Buying a couple v-belts doesn't steal profits from my local parts store, that's not the stuff that makes them money. They make the majority of their money selling parts for average everyday modern cars and SUV's.

 

I thought everyone knew that Fram filters tested poorly and were to be avoided. I quit using them thirty years ago, and went exclusively with Wix.




Bones

 

See post 59.


Bones