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Recent Columns
- Solving the Tech Shortage: How Conditions, Culture & Compensation Can Help Body Shops Attract & Retain Employees
- From the Desk of Mike Anderson: Reflecting on My Journey in the Collision Repair Industry
- In Reverse: The 1980s – The Advent of the Unibody
- Best Body Shops’ Tips: How to Position Your Collision Repair Shop for Sustainability
- In Reverse: Collision Repair Shops “ARM” Themselves
Gary Ledoux
Gary Ledoux is a freelance writer with 48 years in the automotive industry.
He can be reached at mayorclum@yahoo.com
Gary Ledoux
In Reverse: Collision Repair Shops “ARM” Themselves
From the start of the “modern” collision shop in the late 1940s up through the 1970s, body shops, as a business, were fairly crude by most standards.
In Reverse: The 1980s – “A Time of Awakening”
Those who have been in the collision industry for a long time remember the 1980s as the advent of automotive unibody construction.
In Reverse: The 1980s – Keeping up With Technology
It seemed like we had just gotten over the decline of the hippie movement, and the rise and fall of disco and a TV actor being president of the U.S.
Truck Topics: Shop Profile – Diversified Body and Paint
In 1989, Mark Gibson started painting Peterbilt hoods in his father’s garage - an inauspicious beginning to what would later become one of the premier heavy-duty truck body shops in the country; Diversified Body and Paint Shop located in Denver.
Truck Topics: Hey Buddy … Got a Millisecond?
During the 2nd annual HD Repair Forum event held in Fort Worth, Texas, in March 2019, John Spoto, National Heavy Duty Truck Commercial Fleet manager for the 3M Company gave a fascinating presentation on the effects of a crash and how so much can happen in a very short amount of time.
In Reverse: 50 Years – A Retrospective
Fifty years ago this month, September 1969, I took my first job in the automotive industry.
In Reverse: An Industry in Constant Flux - A 1970s Perspective
The collision industry went through many changes during the 1970s.
Truck Topics: Need Techs? HD Shops Have the Advantage
Most automotive and HD truck shops—mechanical and collision-repair shops—need more technicians.
In Reverse: The 1970s - Trade Associations Become a Driving Force
Auto body associations had been around since the 1940s.
Truck Topics: The HD Collision Market – Challenges and Opportunities
Most people in the auto collision industry agree that the collision industry was born around 1946.
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In Reverse: The 1970s – Part 2 – The OE’s Become Their Own Worst Enemy
The American fleet had grown exponentially by the 1970s.
After a car collision occurs, one must figure out how to get their car repaired, arrange alternative transportation and so on.
Truck Topics: Truck ADAS Systems – the Good, the Bad & the Ugly
Written by Gary Ledoux
Advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), a computer-aided means of keeping a vehicle in its lane and preventing or mitigating collisions, is a relatively new concept in the automotive world and even newer for the trucking world.
As I-CAR celebrates its 40th anniversary this year, we thought it only fitting to provide some insight into the organization’s natal beginnings.