Where to start? The beginning I suppose. lol Pull up a chair, have some popcorn and a drink. Most all of you know about my first two motors. Yes, the weekend I got home from having my S/C installed 2 years ago, I had torched my motor. Some of you still doubt that it was my fault. Well, it was. In short, my A/F gauge lost its calibration (unknown to me at the time) and was reading 7.4 the entire ride home from SoCal to NM. My buddy (at the time) Randy was my shotgun and we pulled out the Innovate CD and looked at the trouble shooting guide. It basically said that the gauge had to be free air calibrated (Pull the O2 sensor out for 8+ hours). While reading we saw a highlighted section that said an "On the road" calibration "Could" be possible. We tried that 5 or six times with no luck. We decided at the time that the gauge was fine and that for some strange reason the ECU lost its tune. Anyway, we retuned the next from being home and got the A/F near the 11.1 mark. Two days later we decided to fine tune. By the way, the sled was running like a raped ape. haha We disconnected my A/F gauge and put my friends handheld a/f gauge. This is when we realized that the tune was fine from the beginning. lol A/F read 16.8. YIKES! We began dumping fuel back in. Once we were done, BOOM! Second motor was the dealer. They did not clip one of the valves into the rockers. Got into SoCal on vacation and BOOM! No, the S/C was not installed at the time. During the two motor episodes, I must say that GSM was very good to me. They covered many costs that they did not have to. Not saying that the shipping and communication was very good, cause it wasn't. Yup, first motor I got 2 left sided heads. New intake manifold came with no TB or Aux injector spacer. So yea, I did haveegistic issues. But again, Scott did not charge me for many parts or he charged me at cost! This was thankful in itself. Fastforwarding... Scott and I obviously became friends and throughout times Scott did take care of me with misc. items that I wanted or needed. He did not have to, but he did. Fastforward some more... Comes Spring Festival 2008. This is where I began to have doubts. About a week or two before SF 2008, I coordinated with Scott on getting my car Direct Port tuned and to have my R&D 1/2 Shafts swapped with the production models (no retainer clips in the R&D set which allowed one of them to shift causing leakage). Told Scott that we would be in SoCal on Tuesday and needed the car back NLT Wednesday at Noon. Hell, I was on vacation with Maureen and wanted to go do some site seeing and visiting friends. Not too much to ask, right? lmao NOT! Tuesday comes and the car is in the shop and many things are going on. Scott is not there, but is available via cell phone. Scott tells the guys what needs to be done with my car and they are off. Now, Hal and Cindy are due in Wednesday and I got authority from Hal to use his car while mine is being worked on. Sweet. Thanks Hal! Wednesday morning we discover that one of the 1/2 shaft cv boots is torn. UGH! Take that one out and I go to get it repaired. Of course it takes a couple hours. Upon my return in the early afternoon, nothing else has been done to my car. Come on now, one would think they would continue to perform the scheduled work? I begin to get fumed! Of course they never finish my car Wednesday and blame it on the torn cv boot. hmmm Thursday was suppose to be the day that Maureen and I celebrate our 14th year of marriage, so we do, at GSM. Yes, Maureen is PISSED! But what can we do? lol Thursday morning, Scott is nowhere to be found and the guys are not really working on MY car! ****! We do, however, have a great lunch with Steve (SGTStanko), Hal and Cindy, and Jeff and his wife (From Mopar Supercenter). Finally, Scott shows up, my car is strapped to the dyno. Takes another hour for Scott to start tuning. UGH! Tuning begins. WooHoo. Of course Scott is rushing it now and I am PISSED and have already exchanged some words with Scott. It's nearly 7:00pm. I noticed that Scott was NOT pulling the car past 5800 rpm or past 9psi (I run 12psi). Top end numbers are low, but below the curve is awesome 50 - 75 whp gain. Scott starts to rap things up. WTF? I am not happy, but I HAVE to get out of there before Maureen castrates me. Nice way to celebrate and anniversary. lol So I settle with that and make an agreement with Scott that he will finish my tune via email when I get home. The car is definitely pulling harder. Oh yea, the extra fuel line (for the Aux injectors) and the Aux injector spacer were never removed. I had Scott send me the replacement TB to Aftercooler hose and did it myself. Fastforward... About four weeks ago I learned from Erik (Hemi31) that he was going to put in a S/C. Nice! I offered to send him my tune to give him and Mike a start on his tune. Ugh! A couple days later, Erik calls me and informs me that Mike had saw that my tune was running as a 1 bar map. YIKES! Erik also explained that many things within the tune were jacked up. ****! I ponder on this for another day or so and finally go to get a second opinion (sorry Mike, no offense man ) So, I send my tune to DynoSteve. Steve calls me the next day and asks me WHY my motor is still in one piece. lol I scratch my head and ask him why? Steve explains that it appears that my tune is done to a 1 bar map. Woops, guess Mike was dead on as well. Thanks buddy. Sooooo, I get the part number for a two bar map from Erik, go to my dealer and order it. Two days later, I have my new sensor. I pull the old sensor and install the new one and all of the codes and limp mode issues I was having with Steve's tune went away. lol I then took the old 2 bar map sensor to my dealer and have the parts guy do a check on the part number that was on the old sensor (mind you the part number is on a sticky label). Parts guy can't find anything on that number but does state that since it started with a "P" it used to be an older Performance part number. hmmm I then notice another number under the labeled part number, so I pull the label off and what do I find? Yup, the SAME EXACT part number that was on my new sensor. Great, now I am really confused and PISSED! I write Scott an email (just don't want to talk to him at this point) and explain to him what Mike and Steve found in my tune. Scott writes back and says that he LOCKS his tunes and that is why it appears to be a 1 bar map. I then reply and tell him about the two different part numbers. Scotts reply is that his sensor was a Performance part (yea, I gathered that already) and that Diablo folks looked at my tune and agreed it was a good tune. Which COULD use some changes. I then tell Scott that his map sensor is a two bar. Scott comes back that his sensor is a 3 bar map sensor scaled down to a 2 bar map. So, I write back again and tell Scott he is missing the point. I told Scott that my NEW Map Sensor and GSM's map sensor are the SAME fricken sensor and what Scott did was scaled a 2 bar map down to a 1 bar map. ****! A HUGE thanks goes out to Erik, Mike, and of course Steve for finding the bad tune and getting me back on track. I would also like to APOLOGIZE to everyone for not sharing this sooner. I do have my reason, which I still can not talk about, but I do feel better now. Thanks to the few of you who have talked to me and listened to my story over the phone. You guys are GREAT people and I value all of you as GREAT FRIENDS! Cam, kiss my ass. lol Had to get that out of the way first. hehehe Please feel free to ask questions if I you did not understand some portions of my story. Also, I did leave some legistical stuff out, but I wanted to give you guys the gist of the story and not bore you much more with those left out items. lol Thanks for reading. Ron
While I am sorry you went through this and glad I could help............I bet this thread makes sense to alot of people all of a sudden:grin: http://www.srtconnection.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7353
Ron... glad that you have a safe running car now.... Plus I am glad that I don't have to call you 1BLOWN4DR again...
Wow! At least your problems are fixed, Its ashame it had to go down like that, Honestly after all your cars been through, It deserves to run GREAT! Im glad it does now thanks to Erik, Mike, Steve! Great work guys!
Man, I'm starting to think I need to change my name, lol! Ron, thanks for the story, very informative. I can understand your feelings, torn between both sides, one having a friend you trust and two, having the work he did suck. Sorry brudda. One thing constant in life is change and it sure appears to me GSM has changed ... in a bad way. Again as I said in Mach4s thread I just don't get it, Scott is not acting like he cares much about his business anymore. You keep your good customers, you don't screw them! And you certainly don't screw someone that's a mod/owner of a forum that can put the word out!! What's he thinking?!?!? My 2 cents. Oh, and now I understand Dave's "quick release fasteners on your motor mounts" comment. Agree with Steve, that was just wrong, lmao!!! Again, good read Ron, thanx!! izza:opcorn:
is there a waaayyyy over your head smilie??? whatever the specifics .. Ron, I just hope your beast is running well and it is safe for you and your awesome wife Maureen.
lol Well I am actually having another issue fixed right now. lol The Steel Braided oil return line from the blower to the oil pan has sawed a hole into one of my brake lines. Should be done today. lol Dropped and waiting sweet cheeks. hahahaaha
Well Ron I guess where there is smoke there is fire...people on different forums have reported bad encounters with GSM over the last 3 yrs....Took my brother months to get back his core deposit when he bought heads from GSM a couple years ago....
Wow, very interesting story. It truly is a shame when a vendor messes up the car thats in the most shows around the mopar scene. Truly takes a retard to mess up a car that important to the vendors image.
Totally agree. That's what I was saying in Mach4s thread, why screw your current customers ... and in Ron's case, WHY IN THE WORLD WOULD YOU SCREW SOMEONE THAT CAN BRING THE WRATH OF GOD DOWN ON YA!!! Don't quite understand the business logic Scott is using right now.
Ron you were a card-carrying member of GSM...you would have jumped into a foxhole and fought to the death with/for them......It's a shame...they were there at the begining and had the luxury of being at the top because of it. All they had to do was hold their position at the top, now they have a ton of work cut out for them......:bang:
Thanks for putting your story in writing Ron. It's like Jesus has been reborn....we were ALL just waiting for the resurrection. That story makes my "used" strut tower brace I got seem insignificant....Dave's story on the other hand might actually top yours!! Thanks for sharing buddy...AND...being a loyal friend for so long to Scott despite him being incapable of running a customer service related business.
