Shelling out hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy your dream exotic car is just a portion of the money it takes to own one. Most first-time buyers of uber-expensive automobiles fail to gauge the ridiculous amount of money that goes into the upkeep of an exotic car. Replacing even the most basic components can eat up thousands of dollars. Case in point, a Rolls-Royce owner was asked to pay $2,500 for the replacement of a faulty clockspring. That’s a lot of money for a part which is quite crucial but shouldn’t be that expensive. However, the owner was smart enough to use an age-old trick to save a lot of money. Components and platform sharing are common practices in the automotive industry, which allows for fewer parts for different models of vehicles. This greatly helps in bringing down the overall production costs.
Since BMW owns Rolls-Royce, there’s a lot of component sharing between the vehicles individually manufactured by both companies. Not ready to pay $2500 for a clockspring, the Rolls-Royce owner decided to seek help outside. It turns out that the Wraith Coupe, owned by the person, shares a lot of components with the third-generation BMW 6-Series, including the clockspring, which is only a $160 part from the BMW catalog.
Crazy, right? The details of part swapping were posted on a Reddit thread dubbed “Justrolledintotheshop,” courtesy of a user named Fixitsteven. Claiming to be an exotic car mechanic, it seems the fix was carried out by the same person, who even shared photos of the whole process. Without any surprises, it went viral on Reddit, with many commenters lauding the resourcefulness of the mechanic.
The module housing the clockspring from the F12-generation BMW 6 Series is a direct fit for the Wraith, except for different stalks, which had to be swapped by the mechanic. The clockspring is a spiral-wound electrical conductor that allows the steering wheel to turn while maintaining electrical connections. It’s crucial for functions like the horn, airbag, and other steering wheel-mounted controls.
All it took was a little bit of digging deep into the parts catalog and some hands-on work. But it helped the Wraith owner get the clockspring for just $160 instead of the eye-watering $2500, helping him save $2,340. It’s quite possible that the Rolls-Royce owner might have saved some more money on the labor cost by getting it fixed from a garage and not the authorized dealership.
[All images from Reddit]
