Grand Ledge Foreign & Domestic

When seeking a quote on a clutch, these guys knew I was being jerked around by my dealership,Williams Auto World, who I had trusted up to now. Williams said I'd need a new clutch by the end of the month, and these guys told me on the phone it couldn't be right but asked to look at the car to be sure. Sure enough they saved me over $2k worth of work my car never needed. They really know what they're talking about too, I'll never take my car anywhere else.

I've been going to Roy and Chris for almost 20 years and am lucky they are so close. Good mechanics and good people. (Roy comes and plows me out for free when we get a heavy fall of snow!) Their prices are always reasonable and I feel very safe in their hands.

I've been taking my cars to Roy Smith and the guys at Foreign Car for many years. They have fixed everything I've thrown at them, and lots of things I didn't know about. My cars are always in good running condition, thanks to Roy and crew. I wouldn't think of buying a car without having Roy look it over for me first. A few months ago, after a particularly long period of rain, my husband's Subaru Forester developed an annoying electrical problem. (My husband is an electrical engineer, so you would think that he understands electrical systems. Not so. I had a headlight that was out for 9 months. There was a problem in the wire harness somewhere. David promised to fix it and he did actually look at it one day, but after I got pulled over for the third time, I took it to Roy. He found the problem and fixed it in an hour.) Anyhow, the Subaru's parking lights would not turn off. We checked all the fuses and looked in the manual for information but couldn't find the answer. After all the rain, the best guess we could come up with was wet wires. So we would pull the battery cable off everytime we parked, to avoid draining the battery. This went on for two months. Finally, David was driving near Roy's shop and he pulled in and asked Roy to check the parking lights. He explained the problem and what we were doing to correct it. Roy watched as David turned the car off and removed the keys. The parking lights stayed on. Then Roy started laughing. He asked David if he wanted the 10 cent fix or the $100 fix. David asked for the dime advice. Roy reached into the car and depressed a little switch on the steering column. The lights turned off. Roy explained that he had a Subaru that suffered from the same problem. He tore apart the dash and the steering column, he replaced the fuses and the wire harness, and the light stayed on. Finally, he looked in the manual and discovered that there was a switch on the steering column that you would never know was there if you didn't know it was there. It can be tripped by your elbow when you clean your windshield, causing the lights to stay on all the time. There have been a few times in the past that I have been unfaithful. Roy is a demanding mechanic and I don't always have time to oil the door hinges, so I confess: I have strayed. I have been seduced by the pull through bays and the clean floors and the clean uniforms of the dealership, a time or two. But I always come back to Roy and his little shop in Grand Ledge. The same guys have worked there for years. They will buy the computer chip for their diagnostic computer that I alone need, so that they can tell me why my check engine light is coming on every 100 miles. They ride me home in the tow truck when I drop off and stay late for me to pick up my car. They are very patient when they explain to me, for the 99th time, that unless I clean the mud out of my wheels at least once a year (I live on a dirt road), my car will thunk and pull to the left. Then they wash it for me. They don't fiddle with the radio. They leave the keys under the floormat if I can't get to the shop before they close. They let me see what the problem is while the car is on the lift, even though the insurance company would bar me from the shop floor. I treasure my car shop. I think I'll bake them some brownies right now.

We have moved out to Mulliken. It is only a 8 minutes farther than the old shop on Jefferson. We still give people rides home, and we now have a loaner car, a blue Ford Taurus 2000. Also, there is now a waiting room and barbed wire fence protecting everyone's cars or trucks. Roy Smith, the old owner retired, and his son, Chris Smith, has taken over, but Roy still does our towing. If you are trying to find us on GPS Tom Tom, please don't. We don't want you getting lost, because the GPS is backwards and will take you to a middle of a field somewhere. Look us up on Google for Foreign Car Service, our new name!