Shop warning!!!!!!
04-15-2013 | 02:59 PM
#1
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Joined: Mar 2013
Posts: 15
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From: Momtgomery Texas
Shop warning!!!!!! Shop warning
I have been using the same Houston shop for a little over a year now and at first they did a top notch job but as time went on things started slipping. As with anything I got complacent and let my guard down, but the warning signs were there if I would have paid attention. At first the car was always kept very clean and the workmanship was great, then things started popping up. My car was scratched once, another time it was struck by another car and they had it buffed out. The mechanical screw ups include filling the coolant system with Green coolant, using a hose clamp to attach an aftermarket trans cooler to the transmission hard line, it came off and puked trans fluid all over my garage, breaking a ride height position sensor. I also feel that some of the issues were either attempts to sell me things I did not need or just gross incompetence. My starter was dragging last year and I was told it was the battery so I replaced the battery but the problem persisted. They said it was the starter and figured I would bring it in but I bought the starter myself and when I went to do the repair I found the battery cable was left lose on the starter. So now I own a new starter I never used. One time the car had a rattle in the front end and I discovered the power steering cooler was left hanging on the front of the car. This last go around I brought the car in to have a trans cooler installed in both front fenders, oil change, adjust the tune, and a trans / rear diff brace installed. A month later the car was finished and I paid them what I felt was an absorbent amount of money $700.00, but they gave me the sob story about all the money they have saved me by doing more work than they charged for. I supplied all the parts and hardware for the job. On the way home the car is running like crap and it did not run like this when I dropped it off. I call them and they tell me the valve springs need to be replaced and I figure I have a broke inner spring. So I order new springs and the new camshaft I have been waiting on. After a couple days a little voice keeps telling me to check the car out myself and what I find is a spark plug wire hanging and when I put it back on the car starts running fine. A scan of the car should have shown this! Now I am upset so I check the other work and discover that only one cooler was installed. They charged me for installation of both coolers, I supplied two coolers, the hardware / plumbing, and when I paid they never said anything or offered the other cooler back to me. The coolers are B&M coolers with fans and therm control. I email them about the coolers and ask if they installed both of them, they said they installed one cooler per my instruction. I tell them why on earth would I supply two coolers and all the hardware if I only wanted one installed, I also tell them I would never have paid them if I knew they only installed one cooler. I tell them I want half my money back and that never happened. When it became apparent to them that I was upset they offered to install the second cooler free of charge, and said they only installed one because they wanted to see the effect of one cooler on the cars temps before they did the second cooler. I would like to add that when I picked up my car it was out of fuel as normal, and they had left it in the rain so it was covered with dirt and water spots. This might sound like me wanting to extract a pound of flesh from them but I have referred a great deal of business to this shop and I want to make sure these people watch out for issues with their cars.
Powerfab Automotive
10541 Fm 1960 Rd W, Houston, TX 77070
I have been using the same Houston shop for a little over a year now and at first they did a top notch job but as time went on things started slipping. As with anything I got complacent and let my guard down, but the warning signs were there if I would have paid attention. At first the car was always kept very clean and the workmanship was great, then things started popping up. My car was scratched once, another time it was struck by another car and they had it buffed out. The mechanical screw ups include filling the coolant system with Green coolant, using a hose clamp to attach an aftermarket trans cooler to the transmission hard line, it came off and puked trans fluid all over my garage, breaking a ride height position sensor. I also feel that some of the issues were either attempts to sell me things I did not need or just gross incompetence. My starter was dragging last year and I was told it was the battery so I replaced the battery but the problem persisted. They said it was the starter and figured I would bring it in but I bought the starter myself and when I went to do the repair I found the battery cable was left lose on the starter. So now I own a new starter I never used. One time the car had a rattle in the front end and I discovered the power steering cooler was left hanging on the front of the car. This last go around I brought the car in to have a trans cooler installed in both front fenders, oil change, adjust the tune, and a trans / rear diff brace installed. A month later the car was finished and I paid them what I felt was an absorbent amount of money $700.00, but they gave me the sob story about all the money they have saved me by doing more work than they charged for. I supplied all the parts and hardware for the job. On the way home the car is running like crap and it did not run like this when I dropped it off. I call them and they tell me the valve springs need to be replaced and I figure I have a broke inner spring. So I order new springs and the new camshaft I have been waiting on. After a couple days a little voice keeps telling me to check the car out myself and what I find is a spark plug wire hanging and when I put it back on the car starts running fine. A scan of the car should have shown this! Now I am upset so I check the other work and discover that only one cooler was installed. They charged me for installation of both coolers, I supplied two coolers, the hardware / plumbing, and when I paid they never said anything or offered the other cooler back to me. The coolers are B&M coolers with fans and therm control. I email them about the coolers and ask if they installed both of them, they said they installed one cooler per my instruction. I tell them why on earth would I supply two coolers and all the hardware if I only wanted one installed, I also tell them I would never have paid them if I knew they only installed one cooler. I tell them I want half my money back and that never happened. When it became apparent to them that I was upset they offered to install the second cooler free of charge, and said they only installed one because they wanted to see the effect of one cooler on the cars temps before they did the second cooler. I would like to add that when I picked up my car it was out of fuel as normal, and they had left it in the rain so it was covered with dirt and water spots. This might sound like me wanting to extract a pound of flesh from them but I have referred a great deal of business to this shop and I want to make sure these people watch out for issues with their cars.
Powerfab Automotive
10541 Fm 1960 Rd W, Houston, TX 77070
04-15-2013 | 07:57 PM
#5
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Joined: Mar 2013
Posts: 15
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From: Momtgomery Texas
I have brought them a great deal of business and my friend has spend a great deal with them also because I suggest them. They have done a 416 short block swap, heads, cam, exhaust, tune, clutch, meth, nitrous, etc, etc on his ZL1. They said it made 720rwhp and 740 torque, we just had it dynoed at a different shop and it made 630rwhp. After the new shop go rid of their tune the car made 710rwhp and it now runs like a beast. I also had another friend bring in his ZR1 corvette and after they tuned it the ride control no longer worked. They installed a carbon rear diffuser and akapov exhaust but the mild to wild has never worked right. He was so put off with their work he went back and had them remove their tune. don't take my word for it just go to you tube and you can see the cars I am talking about. I gave them every chance to mke this right but they dug in and refused to refund half my money even though they only installed one cooler. Now they are saying if I bring it back they will install the cooler free of charge. It is to late for that I no longer trust them with my car, nor will I refer them to anyone.
04-15-2013 | 09:42 PM
#7
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04-15-2013 | 10:00 PM
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04-15-2013 | 10:34 PM
#10
Teching In
Joined: Mar 2005
Posts: 4
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We have a pretty straight forward stance on people trying to trash talk the shop, we stick to the facts and we let people draw their own judgments. In the process of this we will name manufacturers names and in no way intend to slander or defame them, it’s just easier to keep the facts straight when you can follow names. If your not down for a long read, hit the back button, cause it’s all being put down in chronological order.
This is the track record for this car:
May 2011 – Car comes in as is for a tune having been purchased by the customer in an “as is” or already modified fashion consisting of a vararam intake, 1 & ¾” longtube headers and catted mids, magnaflow axle back, and pre-existing cam selected by previous owner. Adjust the tune and correct the cars issue with going lean up top and smooth out the transmission tune a little bit. Finishes out at 443rwhp/414rwtq through the cammed stock LS3 and 3600rpm or so vigilante convertor if memory serves me right.
August 2011 – Customer brings car in having dropped a valve on a reported over rev and windowed the block. Requests us to replace the engine. Customer sources his own assembled long block from a engine builder who I believe is now out of business, it consisted of a 416 long block with LS9 heads and a cam that they spec’d out, and at the same time decides to source his own built transmission, C6 Z06 rear diff, his own motor and trans mounts, his own fluid coolers, his own electric fan setup, and elects to have electric cut outs outfitted to his axle back exhaust. Seeing as we have the car so far apart, a large portion of these elected upgrades installations were done at no charge to help the customer out since he had the unexpected expense of a new engine. Customer was advised the car should really have a different intake and intake manifold, a FAST102 and a Halltech intake are recommended. Suggestions declined due to lack of funds. Car finishes out at 480rwhp/441rwtq with intake restrictions logged during tuning.
November 2011 – Customers alternator dies, replaced.
August 2012 – Customer finally opts for a FAST102 intake manifold on the car, declines changing away from the vararam intake to a halltech. Water pump is also found to have a bit of a hanging spot on rotation and is replaced at that time. Car still shows restriction on logs during tuning, loses 10hp/20ft.lbs down low with added plenum volume, gains 5hp/5ft.lbs up top in the more efficient to the cams profile range.
October 2012 – Transmission comes out to have a circle D convertor installed. Old convertor shipped to the purchaser customer sold it to for customer’s convenience. Customer is advised the trans cooler arrangement is inadequate and should be changed/upgraded. Declined. During subframe reinstallation a ride height position sensor arm is broken, a new OEM unit is purchased and installed at no charge to the customer.
Jan 2013 – Car finally receives a Halltech intake. Built transmission from century provided by customer during original motor installation dies. My memory is a little foggy on this one, but I believe this was the second failure of the transmission. Customers been talking/checking/comparing with everyone under the sun and the general consensus is the clutch packs are set too tight and it wiped itself out again. Previously it was allegedly the valve body itself that took a dump. During this session the car is backed into in a parking lot by a random woman while our tuner was flashing adjustments to the ECU resulting in paint transfer from her rear bumper to just under the passenger side headlight. Customer is notified, we agree to have it fixed for him, and do so. With the Halltech now in place, the car picks up to 492rwhp/465rwtq.
March 2013 – Having been battling temperature issues for awhile due to the arrangement of coolers the customer had originally chosen, the time has finally come that were going to outfit it with a cooler arrangement we’d discussed for 6-9 months or so where we bracket and duct coolers so that we have full frontal radiator flow and then separate airflow for two additional coolers in the nose of the car. The car had been experiencing high engine coolant temperatures and trans temperatures in stop and go traffic, and the decision was made to separate the two systems to their own fan airflow based exchangers. Two coolers were provided by the customer, with the 1st to be installed as a trans cooler, and then should that provide enough cooling capacity, the second could then be outfitted as a oil cooler. In the event it didn’t reduce trans temperatures enough, it could be a second link in the trans cooler chain. Customer also at that time elected to provide a trans brace to have us install at the same time and well as an oil change. It was also found that the customer supplied Hinson motor mounts had failed, so we worked with Hinson to get him new ones, and replaced those for him at no charge even though we were not the point of sale for those items. Preferring rather to take care of our customer and then work something out with Hinson ourselves after the fact. The various tasks are completed, customers in a rush to entertain out of town clients with his car and make C&C, works completed, car’s released to see what the trans temps do since we didn’t have time to do any shakedown miles ourselves with the customers social schedule.
A week or so thereafter customer calls in asking about how the coolers are configured in regards to switches and thermostat switches. Upon the discussion of the cooler layout customer becomes irate insisting he requested both coolers installed previously. Work log’s are checked, notes about temp checks verified, and the customers informed that we’re awaiting his feedback to finish the installation depending which system the second cooler is required on. Customer is also notified that there is no charge for the second cooler install as the total tickets closed. Customer becomes belligerent and begins threatening all manners of things, sends a company courier to pick up his components, and here we are.
Additionals – What’s not covered in those date track able items is the additional hundreds of hours we had into working with the customer on their various aspects of their tune, talking theory, trying out different tuning strategy’s for their car to suit how they drive, refining the car with them at the drag strip, picking the car up from their home a hour away when they couldn’t get a ride, and generally bending over backwards to help him and his project progress all out of our own kindness and desire to see him succeed. There could be many conversations of character and how this and that is complete fiction about their accounting of things, but that would just invite more fiction and more dishonesty. So we’ll just summarize as saying it really sucks to see a customer make up so much utter bullshit, makes it extremely disheartening to really put faith and energy into a customer for the sake of wanting to see them succeed and then have this type of stuff pulled on you as a company.
This is the track record for this car:
May 2011 – Car comes in as is for a tune having been purchased by the customer in an “as is” or already modified fashion consisting of a vararam intake, 1 & ¾” longtube headers and catted mids, magnaflow axle back, and pre-existing cam selected by previous owner. Adjust the tune and correct the cars issue with going lean up top and smooth out the transmission tune a little bit. Finishes out at 443rwhp/414rwtq through the cammed stock LS3 and 3600rpm or so vigilante convertor if memory serves me right.
August 2011 – Customer brings car in having dropped a valve on a reported over rev and windowed the block. Requests us to replace the engine. Customer sources his own assembled long block from a engine builder who I believe is now out of business, it consisted of a 416 long block with LS9 heads and a cam that they spec’d out, and at the same time decides to source his own built transmission, C6 Z06 rear diff, his own motor and trans mounts, his own fluid coolers, his own electric fan setup, and elects to have electric cut outs outfitted to his axle back exhaust. Seeing as we have the car so far apart, a large portion of these elected upgrades installations were done at no charge to help the customer out since he had the unexpected expense of a new engine. Customer was advised the car should really have a different intake and intake manifold, a FAST102 and a Halltech intake are recommended. Suggestions declined due to lack of funds. Car finishes out at 480rwhp/441rwtq with intake restrictions logged during tuning.
November 2011 – Customers alternator dies, replaced.
August 2012 – Customer finally opts for a FAST102 intake manifold on the car, declines changing away from the vararam intake to a halltech. Water pump is also found to have a bit of a hanging spot on rotation and is replaced at that time. Car still shows restriction on logs during tuning, loses 10hp/20ft.lbs down low with added plenum volume, gains 5hp/5ft.lbs up top in the more efficient to the cams profile range.
October 2012 – Transmission comes out to have a circle D convertor installed. Old convertor shipped to the purchaser customer sold it to for customer’s convenience. Customer is advised the trans cooler arrangement is inadequate and should be changed/upgraded. Declined. During subframe reinstallation a ride height position sensor arm is broken, a new OEM unit is purchased and installed at no charge to the customer.
Jan 2013 – Car finally receives a Halltech intake. Built transmission from century provided by customer during original motor installation dies. My memory is a little foggy on this one, but I believe this was the second failure of the transmission. Customers been talking/checking/comparing with everyone under the sun and the general consensus is the clutch packs are set too tight and it wiped itself out again. Previously it was allegedly the valve body itself that took a dump. During this session the car is backed into in a parking lot by a random woman while our tuner was flashing adjustments to the ECU resulting in paint transfer from her rear bumper to just under the passenger side headlight. Customer is notified, we agree to have it fixed for him, and do so. With the Halltech now in place, the car picks up to 492rwhp/465rwtq.
March 2013 – Having been battling temperature issues for awhile due to the arrangement of coolers the customer had originally chosen, the time has finally come that were going to outfit it with a cooler arrangement we’d discussed for 6-9 months or so where we bracket and duct coolers so that we have full frontal radiator flow and then separate airflow for two additional coolers in the nose of the car. The car had been experiencing high engine coolant temperatures and trans temperatures in stop and go traffic, and the decision was made to separate the two systems to their own fan airflow based exchangers. Two coolers were provided by the customer, with the 1st to be installed as a trans cooler, and then should that provide enough cooling capacity, the second could then be outfitted as a oil cooler. In the event it didn’t reduce trans temperatures enough, it could be a second link in the trans cooler chain. Customer also at that time elected to provide a trans brace to have us install at the same time and well as an oil change. It was also found that the customer supplied Hinson motor mounts had failed, so we worked with Hinson to get him new ones, and replaced those for him at no charge even though we were not the point of sale for those items. Preferring rather to take care of our customer and then work something out with Hinson ourselves after the fact. The various tasks are completed, customers in a rush to entertain out of town clients with his car and make C&C, works completed, car’s released to see what the trans temps do since we didn’t have time to do any shakedown miles ourselves with the customers social schedule.
A week or so thereafter customer calls in asking about how the coolers are configured in regards to switches and thermostat switches. Upon the discussion of the cooler layout customer becomes irate insisting he requested both coolers installed previously. Work log’s are checked, notes about temp checks verified, and the customers informed that we’re awaiting his feedback to finish the installation depending which system the second cooler is required on. Customer is also notified that there is no charge for the second cooler install as the total tickets closed. Customer becomes belligerent and begins threatening all manners of things, sends a company courier to pick up his components, and here we are.
Additionals – What’s not covered in those date track able items is the additional hundreds of hours we had into working with the customer on their various aspects of their tune, talking theory, trying out different tuning strategy’s for their car to suit how they drive, refining the car with them at the drag strip, picking the car up from their home a hour away when they couldn’t get a ride, and generally bending over backwards to help him and his project progress all out of our own kindness and desire to see him succeed. There could be many conversations of character and how this and that is complete fiction about their accounting of things, but that would just invite more fiction and more dishonesty. So we’ll just summarize as saying it really sucks to see a customer make up so much utter bullshit, makes it extremely disheartening to really put faith and energy into a customer for the sake of wanting to see them succeed and then have this type of stuff pulled on you as a company.
04-16-2013 | 02:01 AM
#16
Teching In
Joined: Sep 2007
Posts: 7
Likes: 0
I personally love that response, its not to often you see such a detailed response from a shop much less pictures and dates to back everything up. I have never heard anything bad about Powerfab myself nor have I seen it however that does not mean it doesnt happen. In this case however it does not appear to be the shop doing anything shaddy to me seems they went above and beyond.
04-16-2013 | 07:46 AM
#20
Stop guys you'll get a pm asking you to explain your post LOL.