I have thousands of dollars worth of parts I am no longer willing to sell. Either from having to replace it on a customer cars for free, or listen to people complain to me about it. I called and spoke to their sales manager who told I couldn't return the stuff because "they aren't a Walmart." I waited a bit because I got busy and then asked that Scott call me himself. Spoke to him this morning and he asked what I needed, he had the whole team their listening. Explained to him I wanted to return my inventory because of the lack of quality. I constantly lose money from selling/installing their parts. Told nope. He then actually told me he's never heard anyone that's had problems with his products. I told him he needed to ask around. I know even locally, I'm not the only one that complains about their parts. The straw that broke the back for me was ANOTHER sending unit that went bad. It was a whopping 6 months old when it went out. I replaced that for free. Now I know they have to know this. This quote here below is no more than 2 days old from another board member here PM'ing me.
This was the gas gap on the exact same car. This is what it should look like.
This is what it looked like after 1 year. Shouldn't it be black ? Yep, that's now an orange ring. this is not the only one I have seen like this unfortunately.
This is where the wire should be to hold it to the car. Broke after 4 months.
This is the last straw. There are MANY MANY stories like this.
My own car got a new regulator. Worked all of 10 ten times.
AC units with leaking hoses. This we found out after we were able to actually get it filled. Bad valve wouldn't let the charge in. 40 bucks, plus the R+R WE had to pay. We are left paying the bill. They washed their hands of it. Car was charged 3 times. It leaked again 4 months later and the customer gave up. Another bad crimp. Lost over double what was made off the kit. And lost a customer even though he didn't have to pay anything.
Idler arm that lasted 1500 miles before it's bad.
Chrome lasts about a year.
Replacement ball joints about 4 months if you actually drive the car.]
When they used to ship stuff on there own truck, with their own employees, we got 4 cracked R valances. We were told "this is the last one." Like we had something to do with it getting cracked BEFORE it got here. They FINALLY looked in the box before shipping, and we got a good one.
I have a rear qrtr here mis-boxed. It's a 67 when we ordered a 68. Guess what, they told me it was my responsibility to ship it back. It's not a small box.
Make sure when you order KYB shocks, you don't want their off shore brand. They'll call and ask after you put the order in online. Tops are made too short and will slip right past the tower cap and into your hood.
The conversion boosters for the 4 spd. Those don't come with aluminum bowls anymore. They come chromed. The chrome flakes in the bottom of the bowl are free. Same setup MP sells. I returned SD's stuff and talked to MP about it, told them the story and theirs were "different." Got their "different" one. Same part, along with chrome chips. No one does QC anymore I guess. A shame considering that master cyl's hold other peoples lives in the balance.
They used to have good speedo cables years ago. New stuff bounces more the the 40 year one that came out.
Ever try to stick a repop inner grill molding on a 65-66 ? If you get it in without destroying the thin metal, you will see the passenger side lip sticks forward a good 3/16-1/4 out too far. But "it fits our jigs" they say. the driver side fits fine. Showed the customer once he got back from deployment and he obviously didn't like it. Uh, too late. It's been longer than 30 days. Can't send it back. I ate that and the labor,too.
I can go on and on and on and on....literally, all day. But I'm sick and tired parts and being blamed for someone elses inferior over seas parts. The absolute kicker is to play so coy as to act like you've never heard someone say your quality is lacking ? Give me a break. I can give 5 numbers off the top of my head of people who won't touch it.
So hopefully you guys will have better luck, and have it break within 30 days so you can send it back with less hassle. Otherwise you'll be told to sell the parts to someone else for a loss.
As for Drake, you should see the p.m.'s I got from their rep after I said "all currently available fuel senders are crap" (except the ones G/N had specially made). Apparently the SD ones that weren't any better than Pep Boys last winter have been improved. I must have missed the announcement. Or there wasn't one, since it would have implied their previous product was no good.
This was the gas gap on the exact same car. This is what it should look like.
This is what it looked like after 1 year. Shouldn't it be black ? Yep, that's now an orange ring. this is not the only one I have seen like this unfortunately.
This is where the wire should be to hold it to the car. Broke after 4 months.
This is the last straw. There are MANY MANY stories like this.
My own car got a new regulator. Worked all of 10 ten times.
AC units with leaking hoses. This we found out after we were able to actually get it filled. Bad valve wouldn't let the charge in. 40 bucks, plus the R+R WE had to pay. We are left paying the bill. They washed their hands of it. Car was charged 3 times. It leaked again 4 months later and the customer gave up. Another bad crimp. Lost over double what was made off the kit. And lost a customer even though he didn't have to pay anything.
Idler arm that lasted 1500 miles before it's bad.
Chrome lasts about a year.
Replacement ball joints about 4 months if you actually drive the car.]
When they used to ship stuff on there own truck, with their own employees, we got 4 cracked R valances. We were told "this is the last one." Like we had something to do with it getting cracked BEFORE it got here. They FINALLY looked in the box before shipping, and we got a good one.
I have a rear qrtr here mis-boxed. It's a 67 when we ordered a 68. Guess what, they told me it was my responsibility to ship it back. It's not a small box.
Make sure when you order KYB shocks, you don't want their off shore brand. They'll call and ask after you put the order in online. Tops are made too short and will slip right past the tower cap and into your hood.
The conversion boosters for the 4 spd. Those don't come with aluminum bowls anymore. They come chromed. The chrome flakes in the bottom of the bowl are free. Same setup MP sells. I returned SD's stuff and talked to MP about it, told them the story and theirs were "different." Got their "different" one. Same part, along with chrome chips. No one does QC anymore I guess. A shame considering that master cyl's hold other peoples lives in the balance.
They used to have good speedo cables years ago. New stuff bounces more the the 40 year one that came out.
Ever try to stick a repop inner grill molding on a 65-66 ? If you get it in without destroying the thin metal, you will see the passenger side lip sticks forward a good 3/16-1/4 out too far. But "it fits our jigs" they say. the driver side fits fine. Showed the customer once he got back from deployment and he obviously didn't like it. Uh, too late. It's been longer than 30 days. Can't send it back. I ate that and the labor,too.
I can go on and on and on and on....literally, all day. But I'm sick and tired parts and being blamed for someone elses inferior over seas parts. The absolute kicker is to play so coy as to act like you've never heard someone say your quality is lacking ? Give me a break. I can give 5 numbers off the top of my head of people who won't touch it.
So hopefully you guys will have better luck, and have it break within 30 days so you can send it back with less hassle. Otherwise you'll be told to sell the parts to someone else for a loss.