I haven't seen any mention about them on this forum in quite some time. I know they fell out of consideration for many once Eli left and the new manager took over and they raised their labor rate to $110 (or something close to that) but aren't that far from my office in RI so I might look into them again when the need arrises.

...on your car, it is cheaper to simply buy another one and keep your original.

I'm trying to cut back, and seem to be successful so far. I've also been meaning to head to VT, but keep pushing that back at the last minute.

I really should get some days in soon though since I'm supposed to be heading to Whistler in March. I bought a new board a few weeks ago and haven't even bothered mounting bindings on it yet.

I bought a newer Atomic Rapture than what I already had. My 06 has about 150 days on it, so I bought a New Old Stock 07 version of it.

and apparently at one point its 1500' above the ground. Take some pictures!

The two towers to connect the peaks are stupid high. The lift is bar far the most ridiculous I have ever seen.

I didn't love dealing with Jim the two times I went there since his arrival, and that labor rate is ridiculous when there are very good shops such as Advanced Technologies and FasTrack that do excellent work for reasonable rates. They were also unable to diagnose a simple problem (after my last two visits there) that Lee @ AT diagnosed in one visit.

Dick Shine is still one of the best VW/Audi mechanices on the planet imho, but the shop has just gone downhill over the past few years.

...Yeah, everyone liked working with Eli but, he didn't really run the shop the way that Dick would have liked. For the caliber of work they do, they should be charging in the $100/hour range. Plus, Jim is usually pretty flexible on the price of the overall repair (maybe because I do all my service there).

As long as Dick or Steve are doing the repairs -- I won't have any issues with Shine. Recently, I had them do my regular (syn) oil change and Steve found one of my TRE's to be shot ($75 for the part and $50 for the labor). He did the swap in about 30 minutes and kept the alignment pretty darn close to where it was (I still had NTB adjust the front alignment later that week).

Jim is all business (and sometimes a bit abrasive) but he's very good about keeping his loyal customers happy. Plus Dick, Steve and Jim are always very good about educating their customers about real preventative maintenance -- and not the stuff promoted by the dealer(i.e. 5-10K between oil changes and lifetime tranny fluid etc). In my view, these are prereq's for a solid Mom-n-Pop-Indy-Shop (yes, I planned out that little rhyme).

Their new shop location is hard to find and a little cramped but at least you can sit and work for a few hours with a free internet connection.

Over the last 6 years, I've probably spent $3-4K with Shine and I can honestly say that it was worth every penny.

.02