ADAS Empowered

Joel (00:00)
Good afternoon, good morning, wherever you're at. Joel from Revv here on our next episode of the ADAS Empowered Podcast. Appreciate everybody taking some time to tune in with us today. We've got some great guests, Katie Mueller and Adam Newberry from On the Road Garage looking forward to our conversation to talk about ⁓ all things industry related, specifically on ADAS and hearing

how they're attached to the collision side and the ADAS side of the world. for those of you listening out there, you can subscribe to our podcast through any of favorite channels, whether that be Spotify, ⁓ Apple. We've got our link on YouTube as well. And obviously we host everything through our ADAS Empowered Community, which you've not had a chance to register for. Feel free to do so. We'll share some links with that as well.

Again, I want to say thanks to Katie and Adam for joining today. Both have a long and sort of diverse background within the repair industry. looking forward to ⁓ sort of uncovering some additional opportunities within our conversation today. So without further ado, Katie, I'm going to go ahead and have you introduce yourself and a little bit about who you are and what your background is.

Katie Mueller (01:14)
Yeah, great. Thanks Joel. Thanks so much for having us. So Katie Neeler here and I come from a background in safety. I came to On the Road from the National Safety Council. So I've worked in policy and advocacy, communications, program development as it relates to driver behavior and vehicle safety. So that's kind of what led me to On the Road Garage.

fun fact is I'm a fatality crash survivor and so I really like to focus on the safety of vehicle technology and how we can all empower each other to make good decisions, ⁓ improve our driver behavior, and really make a difference.

Joel (02:01)
Wow, that is amazing. It's great to have you on, obviously. would love to, ⁓ if you're okay with it, hear more about the story you mentioned as far as being the survivor of that at some particular point. But great having you on. Love the opportunity to connect here, and I know you've been active within the community as well.

Katie Mueller (02:10)
Sure.

Joel (02:21)
grateful that you get to spend some time with us this morning. And Adam Newberry, again, thank you for joining us. Part of the On Road Garage team as well. Got a chance to meet Adam at our Dallas co-hosted event back a few weeks ago and be interested to kind of get Adam's feedback as far as that event goes. But Adam, take a few minutes and please introduce yourself.

Adam Newberry (02:41)
I'm Nick Berry. I've been in the auto repair industry for about 20 years now. Started out out of motor repair, working with classic vehicles, but quickly progressed to working with modern cars. in the early 2010s, I started working with mobile service group, working with collision centers and diagnosing, repairing safety systems.

electronic control systems, doing diagnostics in those systems, making sure that all those systems are repaired properly back to a pre-coercion status, or even better, a faster if there was something wrong with that system. Just make sure that the car is safe to drive and road. And that's slowly integrated where all these AVA systems are integrated in the cars and surround the perimeter of the cars.

quickly adapted to working with those systems for OE procedures using OE equipment and everything, just as the manufacturer states. I've had nothing but a passion to make sure that those systems are stored back to the way they were designed. That led me here to On The Road Garage, out of that motor service group, come to the collision center to kind of address a problem where a lot of...

I wanted to teach

some instruction, some knowledge to this personnel to ⁓ help them get over this hump that the ATIS community has seen for a long time. And that was to basically get blueprints proper in the very beginning where some of these systems may be damaged and they might need some diagnosis. They might need another eye to look at it and see maybe the mounting points need a little extra.

love, as you could say, maybe some extra measurements or whatnot to make sure that these things are ⁓ restored back to the way they are. And also for a ⁓ quicker, better repair process, make the customer happier. Insurance company knows what they have in the forefront. So been here for about three and a half years and things have been going pretty well. ⁓ Also instruct a ⁓ apprentice group on the mechanic side.

Joel (05:06)
Awesome.

Adam Newberry (05:13)
and also with the ⁓ getting some new guys acquainted with ATIS control systems, which I think is great for them. That way they, ⁓ once they hit the field out there, they might be better equipped than some of these guys trained at the manufacturers.

Joel (05:31)
Love to hear more about that. It's always fun to have folks like you guys on, you both have a unique angle and lens to the ADAS community and the industry, obviously. I guess I'm always, I always think of the industry that we're all sort of moving in the same direction. I think I'm overly optimistic in that regard. I think having people like yourselves on a call like this, you guys are sort of at the forefront of.

of proper movement, positive movement, accountability, things like that. But for the folks that maybe are a bit challenged in proper resources, proper information, doing things correctly, really truly understanding like why ADAS matters. And think this is one of the topics that we wanted to kind of reach on early on in this conversation. ⁓

And again, because you guys have got a little bit of a unique angle and lens into why ADAS matters, I'd love to hear from you both. ⁓ How do we get to the folks that it's not necessarily that they're trying to do things improperly, they just don't know any different? Maybe they took an online class somewhere or they got their equipment.

shipped to them and they took it out of the box and put it together and truth be told, I applaud their ambition, but there's too much at risk, right? mean, there's too much safety and liability and goodness, Katie, you've experienced this maybe firsthand, but as far as what you mentioned at top of the podcast, I'm curious to hear about that, but like...

What do you think that looks like? I how do we get to the consumers and how do we get to that crust of shops and individuals that it's important to know what to do and how to do it right? Katie, I'll start with you on that.

Katie Mueller (07:27)
Sure, yeah, I think that, you know, it all starts with information, Joel. Just information, putting out information like you guys were doing and that we tried to do because people don't understand the features of their vehicle to start with. You know, there's no class that you take when you buy a new vehicle. You know, I think everybody has a little bit of responsibility there, both the consumer and

Joel (07:44)
True.

Katie Mueller (07:54)
the manufacturer and a lot ⁓ of people in the community. But it really starts with education. And education from the right source, I think, is really important. There's regulatory, there's the insurance industry, there's the collision repair industry, there's the vehicle, the manufacturers themselves. I think everybody has a responsibility to put out information that's

correct and accurate and useful to consumers. I think drivers make mistakes and you know, the reason that cars crash is because we're people, you know, we make mistakes and so I think the technology is there to serve us really, really well and to kind of

you know, prevent really bad things from happening when we do make those mistakes. And so really understanding how the vehicle is meant to help you, not turning those features off because they're annoying or because they are, you know, ⁓ because you don't understand them. Take the time to understand the features of the vehicle. And the same goes on the repair side. Invest in education. Invest in understanding the types of vehicles that you're working on.

the OEM information that's out there. I think ⁓ you guys know this a lot better than I do, but I think there's abundance of information out there. It's really taking the time to understand it and take it in and hear and do what's right. That's really what it comes down to is understanding the information and taking it in and doing

Joel (09:45)
So as quickly as the information changes, because I agree with you, I mean, it's paramount. We're all busy. Look, I mean, there's too much riding on the line to negate safety because we've got too many other things going on that we're managing our shops or running our shops. And sometimes they're more like, maybe they're running us versus the way that should be. at your facility, Adam, talk to me about how you guys sort of stay on top of

some of the updates and information as it comes down. Because you guys are challenged too. I you've got a lot of cars, you've got a lot of people, you've got a lot of things going on, but you've clearly, you've clearly put your arms around what ADAS is and the importance of it. And you're even taking a further step into doing apprenticeship and things like that, which I'd love to hear more about as well. But like, how do you guys at On The Road Garage sort of maintain that?

that information overload that can kind of come out with all the new position statements and service bulletins and everything.

Adam Newberry (10:49)
Well, I research as much as I can in my free time, consistently ⁓ going through OE service information.

Our center is Ford, GM, and Rivian collision certified. We've got direct access to their OE service information about weekly. I go through and I review the position statements for the collision industry part and kind of make updates. I try to review all that information and ⁓ disperse it out to our personnel, mainly the blueprinters, estimators, managers, whatnot, so they know about different changes.

Joel (11:06)
Okay.

Adam Newberry (11:30)
anything less.

Joel (11:31)
Do you submit that out through them

like electronically or is it you're printing off copies of some sort or is it some sort of like how do you manage that communication flow?

Adam Newberry (11:40)
⁓ Usually through email electronically. I'll print out the position statements, service information like that in PDF forms, email them, instruct them, sometimes highlight the changes that were made from prior to now. Like, know, we have a new one here from Honda.

of July of 2025, they no longer feel an OEMC scan is good enough for a pre or post-collision scan. That's one thing I've reviewed with the collision center and everything like that. We're getting ready to update to that. We've been using an aftermarket tool for that.

Joel (12:21)
when you say OEMC,

is, I know it's OEM compliant, but what is that compatible? Okay, okay.

Adam Newberry (12:26)
⁓ OEM compatible, what it's

been described as. And that comes from ⁓ all the different types of ⁓ software vehicle communication interfaces that are used that aren't.

certified by Honda motor manufacturing. So basically you require IHDS with their vehicle communication interface to not be OEM compatible to actually have.

Joel (12:59)
so not going through some sort

of gateway per se.

Adam Newberry (13:03)
Yeah, I mean, it's been proven that it's hit or miss on which aftermarket tools, some aftermarket tools may miss a module or two in the entire vehicle scan and everything's functioning properly.

Joel (13:19)
And that module could be either an engine control module or a radar or an ADAS module, correct?

Adam Newberry (13:26)
⁓ Never really an engine control module that just goes under some rights to repair acts. That's all that's going to be on the scan. yeah, it's going to be a subsystem basically. Not mainly a powertrain, drivetrain, any like brake. But some of the smaller systems with all the computers that are in the car could be an AIDAS system for sure. ⁓

Joel (13:32)
Okay.

Do you anticipate

that other manufacturers may follow suit of Honda?

Adam Newberry (13:52)
⁓ Yeah, Subaru. Subaru has pretty much followed state with that. ⁓ I seem to believe ⁓ that a lot will follow. Honda seems to be one that writes their procedures, their position statements to make sure everything ⁓ being done with the car pre-calibration, post-calibration, everything that the vehicle is in like a perfect condition.

for those calibrations to be performed. They do a lot of things to the T and that's just ⁓ them making sure that there's no liability on their part and their procedures. That way the people that are out there being instructed by this OE service information is doing everything they possibly can do to do it properly. So I do feel that manufacturers...

sooner rather than later might be falling suit with that.

Joel (14:51)
It's interesting too with potential, well not potential, but with FMVSS 127 coming down in a few years for automatic emergency braking. You know, the OEMs have in some cases pushed back because they say it's going to drive up the cost of the vehicles because of the added amount of additional technology and research and things like that. But on the other end of it, I have to tend to agree with you that I think more

more OEMs may go down the path of ⁓ pre-scans, post-scans, maybe even anything in between. It may have to be rendered off of an OEM specific tool, not necessarily an aftermarket or an OEM C tool. ⁓ Something to definitely keep in front of us. And...

I'm curious when that Honda position statement came out and you presented this to your team as far as the updates, like, did they ever ask any questions, like, or anything unique as far as, know, maybe not this specific example, but anything where the position statements have changed. know like when Toyota seat weight, you know, tensioner thing changed a few years ago, that was always a big issue. And I'm curious like what the response is typically from your team when there's a change to this stuff.

Adam Newberry (16:10)
⁓ That's usually my part of it. I'm just kind of giving them an update of what's occurring. Like as far as the scanning goes and everything like that, you know, if it was something that's body related as far as like.

Joel (16:16)
Okay.

Adam Newberry (16:27)
what bumpers we can use. A lot of position statements are out there. We can't use aftermarket bump fascias, et cetera, or where we can repair that bumper fascia, the mill spec on the paint, the type of paint we're using. We use the PPG system, and our painter is aware of all that. ⁓

Joel (16:49)
It's a big consideration when you start talking about a refinish and we've talked about it at some of our events. We brought in specifically PPG to be part of these where they talk about proper application and refinish thickness around, specifically bumpers that got the parking sensors or blind spot sensors. I think a lot of shops are sort of behind the curve on this. I think it's...

for folks out there listening in. I think it is something to consider. You should talk to your paint rep or your jobber and get some additional information on them on, know, metallics, reflection. I mean, there can be a lot of things that you have to consider. It isn't necessarily just refinishing a bumper anymore. And again, I think that's going to continue to evolve as far as one more layer of complexity and thing we have to think about on even

what I would maybe classify as an insignificant ⁓ collision repair. The term is bumper job, right? We hear that all the time. Well, it's just a bumper job or it's just a cosmetic or it's just a shopping cart ran into the back of my car. It was rolling down the parking lot. And it's like, well, there's a lot of things to have to consider now. And ⁓ I love the fact that you guys are really on the forefront of like,

Adam Newberry (17:52)
Thank

Yeah.

Yes.

Joel (18:12)
especially yourself staying on top of this information. And I think again, to reiterate, you're looking at this really in your free time, at least weekly doing the research into OEMSI, OEM procedures, position statements. ⁓ I can tell you from experience alone, working with certain groups that they may not even be looking at it once a year, much less every week like you are. So to say that, I think that's the new bar that people have to get to.

Maybe it's not that frequent, but I think it's at least a few times a month, you've got to be referencing that information, specifically on every, just what every car you're working on now. should, whether you're using a platform to help identify ADAS and ADAS calibrations, re-referencing information or double checking your work, going back to OEM, it's gotta be the new narrative, I think, on just about every vehicle that comes through a shop nowadays.

Adam Newberry (19:04)
Every single calibration I do, no matter how many times I've done it with the same year model car, make, et cetera, whatever, I'm always referencing to the service information for that procedure at that moment because there can be changes. I mean, I've seen it rapidly in my time where one week.

It was done this week, this way, the next week. It's a whole different thing. yeah, do that with every car. I'm always referencing the service information every single time I'm working with that procedure.

Joel (19:25)
Thank

Amazing. Kudos to you on that. That's just can't be overstated, I think. Katie, we talked a little bit sort of in our run up here to this conversation, consumer awareness. You talked about it and from, I think of it as a grassroots, I go buy a new vehicle or somebody goes buy a new vehicle. The appetite for this technology is there as consumers purchase vehicles. They have no idea how it works. They have no idea that it needs to be even thought about. ⁓

after an accident or even an alignment for that matter. I don't think there's necessarily a right or wrong answer to anything with this, but like, what would it look like for you from a consumer awareness standpoint? Like how do you guys sort of manage that even now when your folks come in for repairs? Like what does that talk track look like? What do you think from a sort of a national level campaign almost, or like how do we get folks?

Katie Mueller (20:14)
you

Joel (20:33)
really engaged in the conversation so that they know what's on their car. They know to certain degrees like how it works and what it's supposed to do in terms of helping them stay.

Katie Mueller (20:44)
Yeah, I think like I said before,

the responsibility is really everyone's, but when it comes to shops and comes to collision repair, think, you know, putting it like Adam said, putting everything up front for the consumer so that they understand, you know, the estimate includes everything that you need to do related to ADAS, whether that's, you know, after a simple repair or if it's after an alignment or something like that, not giving.

the consumer the option to skip it because it saves money or something like that. Not that that's saying a lot of people do that, but I think that transparency is our friend in this situation because just like any technology as consumers start to hear about it more and more and they become to accept the technology. If you think about

back when airbags, everyone was working on airbags and afraid to work on airbags and you know the liability around airbags. I feel like we're kind of in the beginning ⁓ with ADAS where we were with airbags like 20 years ago. And so once consumers start to interact with the technology and understand its benefits, they don't have to understand everything about it. We don't need to teach them a dissertation in the shop, you know, in the shop.

Joel (21:53)
example.

Katie Mueller (22:06)
But they need to understand the significance of including it into the repair and every part of the repair. Not just big jobs, not just small jobs. And having that dialogue with the consumer, with the insurance company, with everyone up front. And so everybody is talking about it like it's a normal operation. That's I think how we get to the next level.

get to uphold the standards that are needed to make sure that everything is done appropriately.

Adam Newberry (22:39)
And can I add something? That's one thing ⁓ I've addressed big time here at this collision center. mean, we have a lot of claims that come in, but we also have customers that come in, they see a minor scratch on their front bumper, they see this, they want to get it repaired, they're gonna pay out of pocket to do it. And our service advisors, our whole team is trained up to ⁓ understand it. We're not gonna write them that estimate that the customer needs to understand that. ⁓

Katie Mueller (22:41)
Yeah.

Joel (22:41)
Please do, yeah, please do.

Adam Newberry (23:09)
there's

an ADIS component that could possibly be behind that panel that we're going to have to, ⁓ once we tear the vehicle down, we're going to have to inspect it, this and that. But we usually give them a quote, ⁓ adding in the ADIS calibration, explain the reasoning of it. And we really don't have too much pushback just given the way our service advisors present it, that it's a safety system. And, ⁓ you know, it's for...

Joel (23:13)
Mm-hmm.

It's amazing, yeah. How did you guys create that

culture? I think that'd be a big question that as folks listen in, they're like, know, this is what everybody strives to achieve is that there's just, it's not skipping vehicles, it's not picking and choosing, well, this is a 22 and this is a 14, this is a 16 year model. Like, how did you guys create this culture? mean, this is fascinating. I'd love to hear about this stuff.

Katie Mueller (23:50)
you

Adam Newberry (24:00)
⁓ I think it mainly came from our CEO, Michelle Corson. ⁓ She built us some beautiful facilities here and has a significant ⁓ investment into the company and she cares to make sure that we deliver the best quality product we can as far as service and repairs and ⁓ cheese.

She's done a lot of research herself. She's not from the automotive repair industry, but she's done a lot of ⁓ research and ⁓ I guess it intrigued her a lot to know ⁓ how these systems get serviced and making sure that they get serviced properly. And that trickled down from the top of the mountain there to everybody else.

Joel (24:33)
Interesting, okay.

I

would have to expect that your CSI scores, your customer service, just gotta be top notch in terms of that reflection, sort of top down, trickles down into everybody at the shop. Everybody feels that, everybody senses that, everybody's got some stake in each and every vehicle, no matter what their role is within the shop, whether they're writing the estimate or through final detail.

I'd love to hear more about that at some particular point. We'd have to schedule another podcast with you guys to talk about culture. Because I think it's such a huge buzzword. I mean, it's the thing that I think, you know, there's the rationale of the mentality from years past of the industry that we just continue to do things the way we've done them, because that's just how we do things. And then there's folks like yourselves that are, you've got a leader that's not from the industry, which is really intriguing. And yet she understands.

the importance of all of this and how these systems work. I find that just incredibly fascinating. So ⁓ grateful that you never were able to talk about this one. But yeah, please.

Katie Mueller (25:57)
Yeah, I always like to say that's, yeah, that's

the reason that I came to On The Road was, you know, really just how Michelle approaches her business. And also, you know, I think the investment, I think there has to be investment, right? Because this service is expensive and it has to be an investment by the organization. And then bringing people on, like Adam, we don't sublet, you know, I think that's a big part of it, that it is,

Joel (26:15)
It is.

Katie Mueller (26:26)
service and so making that commitment as an organization that you're going to invest in, know, obviously the tools and the people to do it right is really the start. And that to me is what drawn me to the organization. then you then I can my job becomes a lot easier because I can go out and tell people what a great job that we are able to do because of the investment that we've made on the front end.

Joel (26:51)
appreciate that they can, you you're backing up those words with true satisfactory work, proper execution, great culture. One of the things that we wanted to highlight too was like, you know, best practices within the shops and like Katie, like what your experience looks like and as a consultant, like helping build that. mean, what does that look like for you?

Katie Mueller (27:11)
Yeah, I think it all starts with learning. You know, one of the things that we do really well on the road garage is, Adam talked about it a little bit, is our apprenticeship program is, you know, we have five registered apprenticeships in our shop and we're looking at building more related to ⁓ ADAS and related to AV and, you know, just how the evolution of the industry is happening.

You know, it's not just body repair anymore. It's not just paint. It's not you know, the kind of traditional occupations But again, we've invested in the training. Yeah

Joel (27:48)
Do the apprentices, awesome.

Do the apprentices, do they then stay with on the road garage or they go out and find work elsewhere typically? Or what does that, what does that process look like for intake, the training itself, and then like you're released from the nest so to speak. What does that look like?

Katie Mueller (28:08)
Yeah, so some of them do stay with us, but some of them go on their own as well. Adam can speak to this a lot better than me, but we only have the capacity that we have. I wish we had more capacity to have trained more, but everybody kind of has a capacity issue with their training programs, I feel like right now. Obviously because we have to have that five to one mentor.

to mentee ratio in order to have the apprentice in house. And so kind of how do you balance that with ⁓ your staff and all of that? So, you know, we train them to go. We train them to go elsewhere. know, hopefully what they have learned with us is adequate to go get a job anywhere that they want to go. Our goal is not to keep them internal. Obviously, if we need folks to work for us too.

But we're ⁓ not a brand specific apprenticeship or anything like that. And so I think that we need more of that. We need more ⁓ training opportunities for people to understand what Adam does and what advanced diagnostics looks like in a shop.

Joel (29:22)
I all the time, even more it seems like recently that folks are, the appetite to learn is certainly there. ⁓ You guys have any information that you can share after this? We'd love to be able to share that out with the community or feel free to do so obviously yourselves too. But Adam, I think you talked a little bit about sort of maybe some of the prerequisites at the top of the podcast about the apprenticeship. If you want to talk a little bit more like,

you know, if somebody were interested in being part of this, you know, I'm not an ADAS expert, would I qualify? Or do I need to have some actual dealership time, diagnostic time? What does that typically look like? like, and then...

setting them up for success through the five to one ratio. I love that. It gives them lot of, think, time together, but also with the instructor led and it's a small group it sounds like, which I think folks learn really, really well in a little bit smaller, tighter knit groups. But talk us through that a little bit. What does that typically look like?

Adam Newberry (30:22)
⁓ prerequisites usually for doing a disc calibration in my opinion ⁓ technician needs to understand engine management systems, drivetrain control systems, brake traction control systems and and the electrical aka nervous system

Joel (30:44)
So certainly more

than just the plug in the scan device and the OBD2, put the VIN in, what you're gonna calibrate and follow the prompts. It's certainly more complicated than that. I think that's what we wanna kind of enunciate here too.

Adam Newberry (30:51)
Yes.

It is. Yeah,

yeah, yeah. They need to have some experience on ⁓ how to navigate service information, follow those instructions and everything. it's not just that. mean, yeah, people think that you can just open this up and then you just.

go through it without any experience and that's not true because they're going to hit a lot of brick walls without the experience in those systems. Let's just say we had a front bumper strike on a Honda, need to calibrate the adaptive cruise control front distance sensor and ⁓ it's got prerequisites and needs to have an alignment. So they put it up on the alignment rack. What else they got to do to alignment? They got to calibrate the steering angle sensor.

Joel (31:16)
Yeah.

Adam Newberry (31:46)
and they're gonna have to navigate through ⁓ multiple different service repair procedures to make sure they capture and make sure they do everything to a T as it should be. They're like, just do alignment. They don't refer to the service information and see down at the bottom after they did alignment, they're gonna have to calibrate the ABS sensor, the longitudinal, latitudinal rate sensor, et cetera, on a flat level surface with the steering wheel straight or anything like that.

There's a lot of people out there that might be doing ADIS calibrations that don't have those prerequisites and they might get some successful calibrations but they are going to experience some failures. There's some cars that ADIS system will not operate if there's a check engine light. Check engine light may not be related to the current claim and maybe they do everything right and they come to the end they're like, don't worry about that check engine light we'll just calibrate this eyesight system.

Like, guess what? That eyesight system isn't going to work because there is a problem with the engine control system. And that's going to have to be repaired before we can calibrate this system and make sure that it's working, operating as it should be.

Joel (32:50)
Fascinating.

When

you think of that specific scenario, calibration failed as I like to call it, and you're a mobile calibrator potentially, you're sort of flying solo, you just started out. I'm curious what your thoughts are as far as like what happens with that vehicle? Like what's the typical?

resolution, if any, or next step in the process when that calibration fails. And unfortunately that person may not necessarily have any other resources other than the teleshop. Hey, I can't get this to pass. Here are the keys. What do you think that looks like? I don't wanna like go down a path here of like fear or anything, but I think this happens quite often.

Adam Newberry (33:46)
I'm sure it does. ⁓ You know, I worked in mobile. Any vehicle I was coming to didn't have any knowledge of it beforehand or anything until I get to their facility to either pick up the vehicle, take it to a calibration facility or be able to do a calibration there at their facility with the right conditions and everything. But, you know, I got to get a full repair estimate of the vehicle. I got to get a scan of what the vehicle looked like before. Obviously I'm scanning it now, so I know.

what faults may be occurring at that moment. But when you get a calibration to fail, that's when your experience.

can shine through. You're to have to sit through that repair estimate, see where they worked on different areas of the vehicle, start to go through wiring diagrams, removing panels to access those systems, double check the sensors, make sure they're mounted properly, nothing's bent, something might have got missed that may not be seen.

without a really close inspection, I guess you could say. Things like bumper reinforcements that distance sensors are attached to or rear body panels that blind spot modules are attached to. It could be as simple as a dynamic calibration. I've seen some of them fail and people are telling me maybe they... ⁓

They didn't care to calibrate it, but then they see that there's a problem. They're driving down the road. There's no object in that area of blind spot, but the vehicle's picking up on something and it's lighten up the indicator and come to find out that the body tech installed the blind spot module backwards, facing the vehicle. And it's something as simple as that. uh, uh,

Joel (35:28)
Backwards, ⁓

Adam Newberry (35:35)
I've definitely given instruction to our body repair technicians on how to ⁓ handle those sensors, those systems, install them correctly, making sure they're not repairing in those areas. But yeah, even in those cases, sometimes maybe they might have put some body filler over the bumper. got to have a mill thickness gauge maybe ⁓ to check the thickness of the ⁓

Joel (36:01)
Another tool, right?

Adam Newberry (36:02)
the media that's on the bumper

when everything is looking right and everything's no fault kids are popping up but a calibration just won't pass through but there's there's so many things that you're going to have to check when something does fail as to what could cause it that's that's why I feel like there should be a lot of ⁓ other knowledge that leads up to you know doing any kind of a just calibrations and success

Joel (36:27)
Yeah.

Bring up a really good point. think it's interesting. You talk about the maddening process sometimes, especially when a calibration fails. Could be a number of different things. Sensors on backwards. There's too much pain on the bumper. It's out of alignment, out of vertical and horizontal alignment, because somebody didn't check it. The bracket's straight, but it's not straight and completely.

So many things to have to consider. guess my question on sort of the flip side, as you guys work through vehicles, through your repair process, certain that there's times where things come up where you're just, you know, you've to do a little more investigation, right? Like what's going on with this vehicle? There's something that's failing. what, because of the process you guys have built, the culture, the atmosphere, those types of things.

What percentage of vehicles that you're doing calibrations on are passing with limited or no additional work for lack of better way of saying it? Like, what does that look like? How have you guys been able to improve on, I think, ultimately like cycle times and efficiencies?

Adam Newberry (37:36)
⁓

Couldn't give you an exact percentage. ⁓ Like I said, these vehicles that come in, we have an ATIS mapping ⁓ software that tells us an abundance of information we need. And ⁓ when we get that, we have the vehicle fully tore down, inspect those areas. ⁓ Like let's say we were working with Rivian.

and it had a really, really light bumper hit. No matter what, Rivian's got a part in their position statement that says when that bumper comes off, I've got to check the vertical alignment of the front distance sensor. And I make a measurement of it with ⁓ the digital inclinometer, make sure it's on level ground, the vehicle stands properly, et cetera, et cetera. And you got to check and make sure that that sensor's at the exact same angle after the repairs have been completed.

before putting that bumper face showing. Not even needing to calibrate it or anything like that. It's just making sure that there wasn't no movement from that. ⁓ you know, I got called out on this on our summit, but I do have a very low amount of failures due to the things that I do during the repair process. That was my whole reason of coming here. Everything that I'm checking.

after vehicle has been torn down, after an ADIS inspection was done, I come in and I check those components. Check the cameras, check the sensors, check this, check that, connections, harnesses, etc. Make sure that something didn't get missed. With all that extra work that happens, we really get a very rare amount of vehicles that do fail. If it is a failure, it might be an environment condition. Like, you know, I had to find a... ⁓

Joel (39:26)
Sure.

Adam Newberry (39:30)
suitable space in our our collision center just to do Subaru eyesight calibrations once I found that I'm getting 99 99 % yeah pass which is really good

Joel (39:38)
That's amazing. That's amazing. I think that's the one, that's the one,

yeah. Those and there's a few others that I, you know, on some of the different social feeds that I see, that's the, the Subarus are with Thorne on a lot of people's sides as far as gets to 60 % and it just fails and it's, and then everybody chimes in, well, you got a toolbox in the background that's giving you some static or there's too much light or there's...

Adam Newberry (39:55)
Yeah.

Joel (40:07)
If you find that dedicated space, leave that space alone if you're doing super. Anyway, it's fascinating. I think that's phenomenal. Again, I think that speaks to, again, that sort of that top-down leadership of, know, we check and recheck, we validate, we verify, we work as a team. Every car is important to us. Big hit, small hit, anything in between. So again, for anybody listening out there.

and culture is a gigantic buzzword and very, very cliche, but you guys are living it. You guys are proof of it. I think this is what's fascinating about being able to have folks like you on a podcast and look an episode like this is it can be done. It is not easy work. It takes a lot of process, a lot of best practices, a lot of everybody's got to be on board is I think really the mantra. Katie, I'll come back to you on this because I'm curious.

Adam, you talk about Rivian. I think a Rivian customer typically or Rivian vehicle owner, maybe a bit more technologically advanced in life. You you maybe walk into their house and it's a bit more of a smart house, so to speak. They've got less switches they've got to turn lights on. know, again, I'm not trying to like stereotype anybody, but I think that could be sort of the case. But you know, what...

Questions if you were talking to a Rivian owner like what questions Katie would you have them ask a shop if they had to take their car in for repairs like what does that what do think those things should look like as far as The Rivian owner. I mean again now they're probably gonna take their car to a Rivian certified job Which most cases is gonna be the case, but maybe a Subaru or a Subaru is incredibly loyal fan base right they They love their cars. They love the technology like Katie. What would be some questions that you'd have consumers ask?

Adam Newberry (41:55)
Yeah.

Joel (42:01)
if they're taking their car to a shop. Tell me how you guys are gonna fix my car. What else would you have them ask?

Katie Mueller (42:07)
Yeah, think, you know,

being assured that they know what they're doing, that they have the tools necessary to do what they need to do. Just something as simple as asking, is everything included in this estimate, this first estimate? Is there anything special that needs to be done? I'm talking really dumbening it down for folks because whenever you're taking your car in for...

Joel (42:24)
Hmm.

Katie Mueller (42:37)
closure repair or some type of maintenance. If I'm taking it in, it's very different than if Adam is taking it in or someone with prior knowledge is taking it in. You know, I think...

Shops have to do their diligence to in assuring the customer that they know that they have the tools, they have the training and they know what they're doing. All the way from the service provider, the service estimator, the service advisor, understanding everything that needs to be done and being able to explain it in a way that the customer can understand. Because if you come to me and you say, you know,

Joel (43:12)
Yeah.

Katie Mueller (43:17)
you need to do all the things that you guys have just described to me, that's great to me. Like I'm gonna say either okay or no, I need to call someone and ask them or I'm gonna take it somewhere else. And so just understanding, asking them to explain it to me in a way that I can understand. Asking them if the estimate includes everything that needs to be done. Asking them have they talked to my insurance about it? Asking them,

You know, hopefully consumers have done their diligence. Like if they're a Rivian owner, they're going to a Rivian certified shop, probably. You know, if they're a Subaru owner, they're probably very well aware of where to go and where not to go, for lack of a better word. They're also very connected communities in those spaces. And so if you do it wrong one time, you're probably going to get on the no-no list, you know? And so, you know,

Joel (44:16)
for it.

Katie Mueller (44:17)
Asking questions, think is the big thing. And not being able to be afraid to answer those questions. Our service advisors are super approachable. I think that's another thing that we do really well is having somebody that's super approachable and they don't understand something, then they're gonna walk back and ask someone. And so I think setting up

success whether you're the consumer or you are the shop owner is you know asking questions and knowing the answer knowing when you don't know the answer to something ⁓ is huge

Joel (44:57)
think the ability to get out ahead of the game, as I like to say, when the consumer calls you and says, hey, I want to schedule an appointment for an estimate, whether it was a referral from the local Subaru dealer that doesn't have a body shop and you're the, you start asking the questions ahead of time or in your mind, you start thinking they've got a 24 outback, more than likely it's going to have, they're telling you it's hit in the front and whatever.

in your mind as a service writer, and I always like to coach shops on this a little bit, start thinking about like what ADAS might be on that particular. You know, you're thinking of everything, right? You're thinking of like handling the claim with with with insurance and like all the steps there and like all the SOPs you got to think about because the insurance is going to request all this information and certain things you can you can bill for and you can and then you know, on the ADAS side in your mind, it's like

they've got this vehicle, it's relatively new and more likely has some ADAS systems on it. I know from experience that we've had to you know, do an eyesight calibration on a Subaru because it's been involved in the collision. It says right in their position statement. Getting out in front of that talk track, I think is really, really important. Because here's the other side of this argument that just drives me mad is when the proactive shop like yourselves does this.

and then the consumer goes home and calls the shop down the street, says, you don't have to worry about that. We don't worry about all of it. And I'm telling you, this stuff happens. I know you guys know this stuff. I'm preaching the choir about it. It drives me insane that this happens. You know, even blending into the talk track. just like, look, if you... I would love to hear, yes.

Adam Newberry (46:34)
I actually have a real life example we had last

week. It's not it's not anus related. It's a airbag related. But you know, we get some vehicles in here that are older and

It ⁓ was a Japanese auto manufactured car and they have a position statement. All Asian Japanese cars have a position statement. You can't do any repairs to ⁓ safety restraint system circuits.

Joel (47:08)
all

replacement.

Adam Newberry (47:09)
It's

yeah, you have to replace an entire harness. You cannot splice a circuit. You can't do anything. You can replace a plastic housing as long as you're not disrupting that that terminal or the circuit. And that that could be a case by case thing, depending on the manufacturer as well. But we had a vehicle come in, had an active airbag light, had a fault, saw on the scan before he even got to tear down. I saw the scan and came out there, took a look at the car.

pulled apart some of the interior parts to get to that airbag component and come to find out it had some nasty repairs prior.

someone had ⁓ cut these seatbelt retractor and pretensioner connectors off and they were loosely put back on. They weren't even soldered, weren't using a butt connector or anything that would be the ⁓ industry standard for a splice. And just basically twisted together and ⁓ put it in with electrical tape and I said, we have a problem with this car.

Joel (48:14)
has a huge problem.

Adam Newberry (48:16)
Yeah, yeah,

and I was like that entire floor harness of that vehicle is going to have to be replaced because of that repair. And we knew about that. We had that in the forefront. We went ahead and tore down the car, wrote the estimate, got those parts of it approved. And then we got the vehicle finished up. But of course, we're going to have to notify the customer of the problems. And I helped address that customer to better explain.

why we can't touch that at the moment and what it's going to take to repair it and why. And that was a good interaction with the customer. Come to find out, we thought the vehicle may have been repaired at maybe let's say a used car lot given the type of repairs that were done to it and that system and some other parts of the car.

Joel (49:09)
Mm-hmm.

Adam Newberry (49:10)
And come to find out that it had a prior claim with the same insurance carrier handling the claim at the moment here. ⁓ And she was pretty upset about it. ⁓ But glad to hear what we could tell her about it. ⁓

Joel (49:24)
I might be putting them out there.

Adam Newberry (49:29)
And I gave her the information she needed to know and she's looking to open the claim back up, bring it back here to get those systems restored properly the way it should be. Yeah.

Joel (49:41)
These are airbags. mean, these are critical

safety things that the average consumer just expects. If something happens, these things deflate. I appreciate you sharing that. I hate to hear things like that, but unfortunately, I think that's all too often. A lot of what we do here is I hear like a lot of post repair inspections that are going on, know, ADAS and otherwise. it's, again, a maddening task to see

Improper repairs being done over and over again, which is really really really unfortunate. I think it goes to say Katie kind of going back to like what you were talking about do your due diligence and if you do choose to you know, you can pick whatever shop you want ⁓ Do your due diligence know who you're working with know who's going to put hands on your vehicle and make sure that you're asking the questions Hey, is there anything on this estimate?

Adam Newberry (50:11)
⁓ yes.

Joel (50:34)
Because I think a good estimator typically says, hey, look, I can only see so much. There will be more on here eventually. Great, keep us posted. We'd love to know everything that's going to be on this car. And you're exactly right. Talk to us like this is our first time getting behind the wheel of a vehicle. We need to understand the complexity of the safety systems as much as we can absorb it and understand it. And I do think that's a good analogy brought up too that.

conversations we had around airbags many years ago, that's starting to become a bit more of the norm with the consumers. So ⁓ this has been phenomenal. Please, yes.

Katie Mueller (51:09)
Yeah, I think an

important thing to understand that consumers need to understand is that ADAS features are on 90 % of cars now. This isn't like a far off technology that we're talking about. know, blind spot warning, forward collision warning, those types of automatic emergency braking are on your vehicle today. This is not something that we're talking about.

coming in the next 10 or 20 years. dealing with it in 90 % of vehicles today.

Joel (51:38)
Yeah, it's here.

Yeah, and depending on where you're at too, in certain parts of the country, like six out of 10 cars need a calibration of some sort, whether that's a steering angle reset, seat weight, ADAS, what have you. So again, if you don't think ADAS is in your shop, I think you're solely mistaken. Again, this has been phenomenal. I love conversation. I love the energy that you guys bring. I love the feeling of culture, what you guys are doing. Wish it could be replicated at every shop across the country.

⁓ We'll get you out of here on this for both of you. If you could spend five minutes with any shop owner, what advice would you give? Katie, we'll start with you.

Katie Mueller (52:20)
Yeah, invest in your people. I think that's ⁓ what we've done really well at On The Road Garage because you can just tell by the level of service, the level of ⁓ everything that we do is really based on the investment that our owners have made in the people and the equipment and doing it right.

Joel (52:42)
love that. Yeah, people are people are what make this industry. You know, we fix cars, but we're really taking care of people are taking care of lives. We're consumers, right? People that are working on the vehicles themselves. We've got families, we've got considerations that of safety and ⁓

Adam Newberry (52:45)
Yep.

Joel (52:59)
I love that. think that's paramount among everything else. Invest in your people, invest in your equipment, invest in your process. Things will turn corners for the positive. Adam, same question to you. If you had five minutes with every shop owner in the country, what advice would you give them?

Adam Newberry (53:15)
⁓ Same thing ⁓ as Katie says, invest in your people. Make sure your advisors, your body technicians take their training even into ADIS. It's not something that they're working with, they're not doing the calibration, but they're still working with those systems. They're working with the customers that have cars that are quick with ADIS. They need to be able to inform them of ⁓ what additional repairs we have nowadays because

of these AIDAS systems and ⁓ that's and just just keep on reading procedures keep people in top research every single car that's that's all we can do invest in people

Joel (53:54)
It's every vehicle, right? Just research every car.

I've preached about this before on

other podcasts, but I'll say it again is the narrative has got to shift from every vehicle. have to expect that every vehicle needs some sort of ADAS recalibration. And until it tells us otherwise that we don't need to, because we've researched and double checked our information and all we need to do is a pre and a post scan and we can ship this thing out the door. Until it tells us otherwise, we need to expect.

assume that every vehicle coming through our shop, just like Keity said, majority vehicles got ADAS on it, six out of 10 cars already need calibration, we've got regulation coming down. Again, we've beaten this into the ground a thousand times if we've done it once. ADAS is in your shop, it's there, it's too important to neglect.

Adam Newberry (54:46)
Yeah.

I would say another thing I could add for shop owners, and I know this is a big investment, but ⁓ with the abundance of the mobile AIDAS service companies that come out, I would say that it can be quite difficult to, sometimes impossible, to get the correct environment in a collision center.

and they really need to dedicate an area to do these calibrations properly. Just the area alone can cause a failure and they may not figure it out there in that area until they take it to the correct environment.

and that can reduce cycle time. And a lot of things, those areas can be used for more than just ADIS calibrations. You know, we have one and it can be used for our PDR techs that come in. Estimates that need to be vehicles that need to be looked over again by a service, by an insurance claims adjuster, maybe a customer or anything like that. That area gets used for multiple things besides just ADIS.

Joel (55:35)
Yes.

Adam Newberry (56:00)
That area is definitely something that shop owners need to look into investing in definitely before 2029 or if not at 2029 at the latest.

Joel (56:09)
Yeah, comment.

It's coming fast. I think that's phenomenal advice. I think again, I think a lot of shop owners to some degree are investigating, you know, maybe a separate facility or adding onto their current footprint if they can. But I think because of the prevalence of a lot of mobile calibrators and they're providing a great service. But again, I'm only as good as the environment I've got to use. And if your environment is too small, too reflective to this, to that.

Look, I wanna work with you, ⁓ but I just can't because of limitations as far as the environment goes. And I just, gotta put my head on a pillow at night and feel like I'm doing things correctly. I'm an extension of your production floor as your sublet. I've got liability. I've got skin in this game too, so it's important. But I think that's phenomenal advice.

Adam Newberry (56:52)
Yeah.

Joel (56:55)
Again, appreciate you both being part of this. We could probably talk all day long. We wouldn't get anything done, obviously, as far as our day-to-day jobs, but really appreciate you guys being on. It's been great spending some time with you, again, both in Dallas at the event we hosted. ⁓ keep doing what you're doing. Keep preaching, keep doing your apprenticeship, keep doing the consulting. ⁓ We'll keep following you along and supporting you as much as we can on our side. And just want to say thank you and appreciate you guys being on the episode today.

Adam Newberry (57:25)
Thank you.