Here is a history of what happened from my original post

"About 2 weeks ago I started to hear a small ticking noise from the valve-train on the driver side. Now I know LS1's do typically have some valve-train noise, my car did even stock when it was cold. This noise though was a bit louder and did not disappear once the car was warm (see my profile for all mods but basically AFR 205 heads not milled, comp cam 113 LSA 228/232 .588 .590).

I have about 1,500 miles on my set up (car itself has 37k on it)

I called the shop who did the install, and he said come on by right away,,, upon pulling the valve covers etc... he checked all the rocker arms, maybe one came loose, nope, they were all perfect. Next we removed the Rocker Arms, and boom there it was. Apparently one of the Valves was not hardened(i bought them fully assembled) and the rocker arm(stock rockers) had beat down the top of the Valve at the tip where it comes up through the top of the spring and it was gone .... hence the noise..luckily by looking at it, and listening to the car,(and today pulling the head) we could tell I did not drop the valve thank god! Had I not brought it in, I am sure I would be looking for a new motor

Anywho- the shop sent pictures to AFR of everything and got on the phone with them right away and we are sending the Head back tomorrow and have Return Authorization, they will either replace it all together, or re-work it. Now I just have to play the waiting game for my head to come back.

I'll post pics when I get them and update this thread. "



Fast Fwd to today:
They are fixing the head that we sent them, and sending new valves for the other head, even though there was no damage. ..no charge okay fine.,
The thing that pisses me off is they are not going to pay for any of the labor in this mess. They have had the shop I am dealing (the equivalent in talent and knowledge of ECS or LG) with measuring valve geometry and all sorts of other tests..and they have dragged this process out for 4 weeks!!
Turns out they are asking us to shim .050 off the rocker rail..... okay, it would have been nice for that to be in the instructions!!,, anywhere you see AFR advertise heads, they say direct bolt-on replacement for stock heads (I did not mill the AFR heads at all or alter them) look at their website and it mentions nothing about check valve geometry or rocker rail etc..
I have never seen this issue come up before, and only read good things about AFR Heads.
The shop I am working with is working with me on the labor to figure out something fair. I guess I am just pissed that I spent 2k on what were supposed to be some of the best heads out there and now this BS
Bottom line it was their part that failed and is a result of the extra labor!!

 

I hate that for you. That is a good example of when a vendor should pay for labor. A valve that missed the hardening step? Serious quality control issue there...

 

EXACTLY they are admitting it was their issue...that's why they are sending another set of valves for the other head , even though so far they are not damaged.

 

Sorry to hear you are having trouble, I hope that everything works out in the end. *passes FrankTank an e-beer* If they won't cover the labor, maybe they will give you a partial labor refund. Worth a try. Best of luck to you and keep us posted.

J.

 

Thanks

 

I'd like to know who you got the heads from.

 

I would like to here the other side of the story. Not that I doubt you a bit but there are always two sides. My question is with everything documented is there any way to take them to small claims court? I for one am getting very tired of companies not standing behind their products. All it seems is they want to sell it to you to get your money and then the first problem comes up you won't even get a sorry about your luck. This makes it very hard for the vendors out there who's word does mean something to you and to themselves. Several of these vendors on this web site get nothing but good remarks from everyone, don't you think somewhere sometime they have made a mistake? I am sure they have but they very obviously must have made it right at the time and I feel sure it cost them some money. Thats the vendors I want to deal with.
To you good vendors out there thank you for your hard work and commitment

 

Hope you get things straightened out, and thankfully you did catch it in time. Curious if the installed looked at the wipe pattern on the valves at all?

 

Unfortunately, thats part of the game.. as they say..

How many of us have had bad torque converters, only to be replaced by the mfgr, but meanwhile WE were on the hook for the labor..

Everyone stands behind their parts, but alas, its US who ultimately bear the brunt of the cost in order to REPLACE that warrantied item...

 

I know of a coupe of everyday parts stores that I personally have seen pay for labor when the parts they sold did not hold up. Sorry but that is just good business.

 

Good post and insight. And I agree with your comment about 2 sides to the story. My installer/tuner was dealing directly with AFR, he said at first they flat out denied this could happen...then once he sent pictures they started to play ball (understandably) we also sent pictures of the rods and rocker arms, all is in good shape, no abnormal markings etc.. My installer talked with 2 other very well known companies that work on vettes, and showed them the pictures, and everyone came to the same conclusion and only explanation, the valves in the heads I got were not hardened.,, hence a QC issue...this is why I believe AFR is willing to send me a whole set of new valves for the other head that is in perfect shape. I also trust the person who is doing the work on my car, he searched to try and find anywhere where it was documented re special instructions regarding the install. Unless AFR has updated their website today, there are non. It says bolt-on replacement for stock heads.

 

Note to self:

DONT BUY AFR PRODUCTS.

I don't care what they say, if they sent a head out w/out hardend valves they sould eat the total cost of the repair. You already paid to have the product installed. AFR, if you are reading this you need to step up, this kinda press will not kill you but it will hurt your bottom line more than eating a little labor for this dudes install. It already cost you my money, I'll buy EPT.

-Ken

 

I do understand where YO-EL is coming from also...but end of the day,, their fautly part caused the labor to be needed,,and they made us go through a number of different tests, hence running up the labor...they should at the very least pick up some of the labor.

 

Thanks for your support. You know it's ashame too, they are a great set of heads, and I have never seen this happen before with their heads, read nothing but great stuff so I decided to spend the extra$$$$ on them. All they had to do is step up to the plate wiht the Labor. THe parts replacing costs them virtually nothing...so why not complete the whole job and make it right.

 

Curious, if the valve was that soft, was there any mushrooming or damage at the seat end of the valve?

Also, sorry for all the questions, is that particular lifter pumping up enough oil? Was the valve stem checked for hardness?

What I am confused about is that with adequate oil and a stainless steel valve, would that occur? I believe the valves are forged, not sure if they undergo a hardening treatment per se but someone can correct me if I am wrong.

 

I am going to speak more with my installer in the next day or 2, he dealt directly with AFR, and they dissasembled the head back in CA, we just took the head off the car and sent it back. I think the oil PSI was fine,, this happened after only about 1500 miles...never even pegged the rev limiter, have not tracked the car etc.. I'll post more tech info when I have it.

 

Stay tuned for the "other side of the story"....

 

I guess what I was curious about was whether perhaps this particular pushrod might have been restricted and reducing oil flow. Just seems odd only one valve since the manufacturing process is all the same. Sorry about your problems and hope you get it straightened out so your car is good to go, but problems like this always intrigue me and I like to understand and learn from things like this. Of course you realize I have learned a lot from my little projects the hard way

 

I figured you would pop in Tony. Interested to see what you have to say. Understand I am not trying to bash AFR, I do appreciate that they are replacing the parts free of charge and sending new Valves. But for the money I paid I expected more.

 

I think everyone is jumping to conclusions pretty fast here. AFR started shipping heads in what... February of last year? This is the very first time I have heard of anyone having any problems in this forum or the LS1tech forum with their heads.

It sounds like AFR's first reaction was "that don't sound right," and ya know... it doesn't. But they are repairing the head plus sending along an extra set of valves for the other head just in case. Since there are any number of reasons this could have happened it sounds to me like they are being pretty reasonable. It sounds like they are trying to help solve the problem and that they are not playing the finger pointing game the way lots of others do.

It could be that the folks who supply AFR with valves simply shipped them a bad valve. It could be a lifter problem that created lash in the valve train. It could be blockage of oil flow through that lifter. It could be lots of things. AFR appears to be doing everything they can short of paying the labor for repairs.

I don't think it's fair to start bashing AFR just yet. For the last year and a half their heads have been top performers on the LSx in both quality and HP. And as far as service goes consider this:

Tony Mamo and AFR have taken the time to help a whole bunch of us find the right setups for our cars. His time has included one on one assistance in many cases. In addition he and AFR have done loads of dyno testing with two LSx projects plus they have another one in the works. In each case Tony has supplied us with details of what their testing uncovered, what works and what doesn't. This has saved all of us time and money by providing us with valuable information.

I ask you, has anyone else who makes heads for the LSx done as much for us? It's tempting to jump on the band wagon and start kicking AFR but considering what their customer service and products have done for many of us thus far I think they deserve some time to sort this thing out before we all start kicking them.