Finch Restorations

Hi today I was fortunate enough to visit and go through Finch Restorations at Mount Barker SA .As a retired Motor Trimmer it's great to see such very high quality workmanship building cars from scratch and modifying many older vehicles so thanks to all the friendly staff for the opportunity today greatly appreciated cheers Peter Heron

I only had a small job but they were very happy to help me out, great customer service, would highly recommend this company.
Thankyou

I had a complex job done on my 200 series Landcruiser. Finch were great to deal with and the workmanship was outstanding. Great result. As they say "you get what you pay for".

Top quality workmanship for anyone wanting a specific detailed restoration these guys will bend over backwards to make your classic as original as possible. True craftsman

Positive conversation with Tim. Waiting to hear diagnosis and have my car running well again.

These guys make the impossible possible. Quality Quality Quality, great work and passion from this team of miracle workers.

Everything is first class in this business

Attention to detail and an eye for classic quality

Top workmanship

2014 Morgan Roadster - LHD to RHD conversion with Engineer's Report for the Regency road-worthy inspection.

For me, three things matter most with a project like this; i) Quality of Work ii) Cost Control, and iii) Schedule Adherence. So first the good news...

Quality: the car got its Roadworthy Certificate at the first attempt, so job done! But not without a few niggles, the major one being the spacing between the (old) brake and (new) throttle pedals, the brake pedal needs 'adjusting' to the left a bit, which would have been easy while the pedal box was out at Finch, but is now going to be much more difficult - plus a few minor ones like the brake lights not working, air-con not switching on and the clock had stopped - fixed by me post Finch. I'm not sure electrical work is a Finch competence tbh, but, overall I must say it would be difficult aesthetically to spot that the car was ever a LHD, so a solid 8 out of 10 here.

Cost Control: non existent and I don't know why they bother giving estimates, which they charge you for doing! The job ended up costing more than twice an estimate that had included some wiggle room in it. I don't know if this is deliberate or incompetence, either way, for me, its unacceptable. They charge by the hour and just keep going - if I did that with my customers I would have been out of business years ago, so, as they say in Eurovision its 'Nul Point' here from me.

Schedule Adherence: I suppose costing twice as much inevitably takes more time and (unsurprisingly) the job was late, twice! To be fair this wasn't a big issue for me although it did cause me some inconvenience the second time - I did think the point of having a 'Project Manager' was to watch over such things... 5 out of 10 is fair here methinks.

Conclusion: Finch do perform work to a better standard than most and charge more for it, no problem with that and I'm quite used to paying for quality in life, but it's the seemingly cavalier attitude to estimating and subsequent lack of evidence of any cost control that leaves me feeling a bit 'dudded' - from my recent experience if you use Finch you will in essence be giving them a blank cheque - this may be okay for some, but please go in with your eyes open.

I had quite extensive body repair work and painting completed by Finch. My overall experience was pretty poor. My main complaint is that the eventual cost worked out at 4 times the original estimate even after I reduced the scope of work and completed a lot of work myself. I understand that work involved in restoring old cars can be unpredictable. However Finch quite deliberately significantly underestimate costs for reasons best know to them. Some work was completed to an acceptable standard and some was well below an acceptable standard for a restorer charging premium prices. Rust repair was done quite well, but I suspect it was done inefficiently with the customer paying for the inefficiency. Paint work was completed to a high standard. Unfortunately the trial fit of panels and doors prior to painting was completed to a very poor standard, with the full extent of errors not evident till I got the car back home and attempted to complete assembly. I have subsequently taken the car to a second restorer for rectification work. Too many problems to detail here; suffice to say the rework will necessitate some repainting. which is a bit heart breaking. Also numerous errors made in disassembly and reassembly including refitting one of the leaf springs the wrong way around which effects the vehicle track. This particular problem was misdiagnosed by Finch technicians as being due to an incorrect spring being fitted at some point in the cars history. I witnessed a significant level of disorganization. Parts from my car ended up mixed with parts from other customers cars. After painting I ended up having to rummage through parts racks to collect parts that should have been painted body colour when the car body was painted. Workshop staff had no idea these parts needed painting and I am pretty sure they were not even aware the parts belonged to my car.
I think a significant underlying factor in many of the problems I encountered comes back to the under estimating of costs. I.e. when cost blow out by a factor of four, you end up having to make compromises.
I could not recommend Finch restorations to anyone. There are restorers out there who charge less for much better work.

Never answer phone calls and even tried messaging on Facebook as last resort with no response. Don’t know how you get customers if you won’t answer the phone or messaging.

Tried calling in October, November and December. Poor customer service Finch