Another - Stay the Hell away from ARD

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Old 10-07-2010, 01:19 AM
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http://www.cargurus.com/Cars/m-Advan...amics-sp270569


I think everyone should write a review on them. The only one besides mine was the owners wife. I posted a link to this thread.
When I did a search for them this carguru website was the only one to show up.
Old 10-07-2010, 01:34 AM
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A friend of mine had a WS6 with a "built" transmission from ARD. It was a piece of **** from the day he picked it up until the day he got rid of the car. He took it back a couple of times to get fixed and I think it got worse every time. It leaked, it slipped, it shifted late and banged on the limiter, etc etc. I've heard/read plenty of other horror stories from them too. The place is a joke.

The best thing to do is keep spreading the word.
Old 10-07-2010, 07:53 AM
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Originally Posted by 96RamAirTA
ARD installed my 3200 stall only to have it cook 3rd and 4th gears due to the tranny not being tuned for the stall and they forgot to install the tranny cooler along with it. the fat guy came out to where i lived and towed it back to the shop and then charged me for a stage 1 rebuilt....i think i only payed liek 1200 plus the 300 for the stall install. and ive still have issues with the tune ever since then but im not taking it back there. waiting for the tranny to go so i can install a perfromabuilt one
dont do that either, pm if ya wanna know why.
Old 10-07-2010, 08:30 AM
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Originally Posted by 96RamAirTA
ARD installed my 3200 stall only to have it cook 3rd and 4th gears due to the tranny not being tuned for the stall and they forgot to install the tranny cooler along with it. the fat guy came out to where i lived and towed it back to the shop and then charged me for a stage 1 rebuilt....i think i only payed liek 1200 plus the 300 for the stall install. and ive still have issues with the tune ever since then but im not taking it back there. waiting for the tranny to go so i can install a perfromabuilt one
The exact same thing happened to my brother about a year and a half ago. The transmission was never the same from the beginning.
Old 10-07-2010, 08:31 AM
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Originally Posted by 78novacaine
Quite a few people received the "duct tape mod" one of em even got a "stage 98593" built trans and when it broke and was taken to another shop it turned out to be a stock 4l60e with a shift kit, they forgot his tranny and flywheel bolts also
Rooster comes to mind....LMAO
Old 10-07-2010, 09:18 AM
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Well yesterday after work I find out that they forgot to put the cover that covers the converter (LT1) and the top bolts on the bell housing...****...Still haven't found duct tape, so I guess that's a plus...
Old 10-07-2010, 09:56 AM
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How..... through all of these years have you people still gone there?

It was known years ago that they were a terrible shop, specifically when their transmissions auto-destructed ALL THE TIME.


Oh well.
Old 10-07-2010, 10:23 AM
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man one of my friends had their car built there and it basically had alot of these problems, the wiring was a freaking mess where they had swapped the motor, tie wraps and tape everywhere, oh yea the transmission was a complete piece of **** and never shifted right, and they couldn't tune it, it would either die at stop lights or just hold at like 2500 RPM i just remember seeing it at LMR getting straightened out, and i remember them having to fix quite a few things.

and they're shop cars are a joke the 3 most vivid off the top of my head are, they're black lt1 formula sounded pretty nasty till it nitrous backfired and blew the intake off, the maroon ls1 formula that was running ok till it did a wheel stand and blew itself all to hell (and when i mean blew itself all to hell i mean blew the front fascia hood and front fender off, blew the windshield out car caught on fie. etc.) then we come to the silver 2010 i was actually kind of impressed with this car seeing it run like a 10.03 or something like that but right after it ran down the track it promptly caught on fire at the end of the track (probably an electrical fire) and retard owen doesn't have a fire extinguisher so the car burns for like 5 min. who drives a 10 second car and doesn't carry a fire extinguisher or have a battery cut off for that matter.

summary- i wouldn't let these guys work on my BMX......
Old 10-07-2010, 10:42 AM
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You know, I took that as my karmic repayment to them. Shortly after my trans went out and I discovered a lot of these issues, I heard about the cars burning up.

The black LT1 firehawk had a 408 that was supposed to be put in my 3rd gen firebird chassis that he wanted to buy. Instead he towed my chassis down there saying he would buy it, then refused to tow it back and let it sit. So I had to pay a truck to go get my car back.

The LSX454 Maple Formula was the one he showed me bragging about the good work they did, and man did that thing look sweet, who would doubt their work with something so clean and well done?

Like I said, I now realize all the money goes into their personal cars, while crap/spare parts goes into the customers car. I can't say I didn't hope that repairing their cars cost them a good fortune (the fortune they stole from me).
Old 10-07-2010, 11:41 AM
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**** ARD,



never heard a damn good thing about them. Bunch of fly by night scammers. If your having transmission problems and you want a no BS quote and quality work, call Century transmission and ask for Mike.

I dropped some coin at that place, but I got a rock solid transmission that I can drop the hammer on any time without a worry. Plus 2 day turnaround time, cant beat that.
Old 10-07-2010, 12:13 PM
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Ard = scam artist want to be mechanics!!!
Old 10-07-2010, 09:04 PM
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wow and i thought owen was a good guy... :/

J
Old 10-07-2010, 10:07 PM
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He is!............till after the do "the work" and take your money. Then your on your own. I had my transmission back to them 4 x's and it still never worked ell. I didn't bother taking it back when it broke down the 5th time. Boy was it a bit inconvenience trying to get a ride back and forth from there to the willowbrook side all those times.
Old 10-07-2010, 10:39 PM
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Like politicians, mechanics will saying anything...to get into your wallet. When you expect results, or promises to be kept though, tough luck. They "seemed" to be very friendly knowledgeable people, until after I signed over that check.
Old 10-08-2010, 06:13 AM
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Originally Posted by $750 L98
Like politicians, mechanics will saying anything...to get into your wallet. When you expect results, or promises to be kept though, tough luck. They "seemed" to be very friendly knowledgeable people, until after I signed over that check.

not all mechanics are like that. this is one of the few threads i've read in a while that actually has first hand knowledge people talking about the same problems with the same shop. so this should be a huge red flag to anyone thinking about going there. sucks that so many of you had these same problems, i would love to see what hit hourly rates are compared to the good shops around the city.
Old 10-08-2010, 07:03 AM
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Originally Posted by kornfreak_401
wow and i thought owen was a good guy... :/

J
I was about to say the same thing and was wondering if Owen still owned the place? Owen actually tuned my LT1 last year at HPE and had a few mods done later on so took it back and had the tune checked by another guy and it was still spot on. Can't say anything bad about him personally as he did me right on the tune, but sorry about all the **** you guys have gone thru as regardless of what I say all of that is inexcuseable.
Old 10-08-2010, 07:43 AM
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Owen does still own the shop, he also does the tunes, TERRIBLE tunes. I need to find that list of all the wacky things he did in my old tune LOL

The only reason my motor survived was because it was broke down half the time, and the other half it was running with such low compression it was incapable of even blowing itself up.
Old 10-08-2010, 10:44 AM
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Their new silver SS couldn't muster up anything below 12's two weeks ago before they broke the driveline.

It sounded impressive when he first fired it up, but watching it run was horrible.
Old 10-08-2010, 03:19 PM
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Originally Posted by DAVE00
I was about to say the same thing and was wondering if Owen still owned the place? Owen actually tuned my LT1 last year at HPE and had a few mods done later on so took it back and had the tune checked by another guy and it was still spot on. Can't say anything bad about him personally as he did me right on the tune, but sorry about all the **** you guys have gone thru as regardless of what I say all of that is inexcuseable.
Same here ive had several things done by A R D and Owen tuned. Never had a problem with anything they ever did.

Sucks to hear to many bad stories..

^about their shop camaro that car has been in the 10's for about 7 months now, maybe the car you saw was a customers.
Old 10-08-2010, 04:05 PM
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Originally Posted by 05 GSXR 1XXX
Same here ive had several things done by A R D and Owen tuned. Never had a problem with anything they ever did.

Sucks to hear to many bad stories..

^about their shop camaro that car has been in the 10's for about 7 months now, maybe the car you saw was a customers.
It was theirs. They were just having problems. Whatever it was eventually led to breaking the DS or rear differential.


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