MAN I feel this so hard. I was watching a YouTube mechanic talk about this exact thing, he said the warranty companies basically rewrote their contracts after 2020 to make everything an "exclusion" instead of a "coverage." He showed a claim denial where the customer's whole engine went because of a bad oil pump, but the fine print said the pump was covered, not the damage it caused. So basically they cover the $200 part and leave you holding a $4,000 bill. The gasket thing you mentioned is REAL, I read a post from a guy in Houston who had a rear main seal leak at 70k miles and they told him "wear item" and walked away. It's like they know the exact parts that fail and make sure those are the ones not covered.

Forget percentages, @the_william, just tip cash and call it done.

Hold up, did you notice the cavitation completely disappear right when you cut down to those 10ft sections, or did it take a little while for the pump to settle into the new setup? I'm asking because I've seen guys switch stuff out and blame the wrong fix, thinking the shorter hose solved it when really they just let the line warm up or something. Also, how much slack are you leaving in those sections now, like a full loop or just a gentle sag? That foreman's comment sounds dead simple but it's the kind of thing that makes you question every other rigid habit you've got.

You ever tried to actually work in a dark corner with one hand while holding that phone in the other? That old halogen throws light everywhere without needing a second hand, and it doesn't die halfway through a shift.

Did you guys try changing the day you meet? We had the same problem when our usual spot closed down, and for us it was less about the place and more about the routine being off. We ended up doing Thursday nights at a buddy's unfinished basement for a couple months, and the first two times felt stiff, like we were all pretending to be somewhere we weren't. But once we brought our own cheap coffee and stopped trying to make it fancy, it just became the new normal. The garage thing you mentioned is real, nobody cares about the walls once the talking gets going. Maybe someone in your group has a porch or even a shared laundry room that nobody uses, it just needs to be dry and not too loud.