Z06_Joe

Ok folks, I was not going to post anything negative but I need some help here and I also want to let everyone know about my experience with the Florida Tuner, FRC_TOM. He normally posts over on the Z06 forum but everytime I put a post up there calling him out, they delete it, since he's a moderator. Heres the story...

Last month I paid FRC_Tom $300 to tune my 2007 C6 Z06 after my intake, headers, and QM600 install. I was a repeat customer as he tuned my TT Z06 last year for me. After Tom shows up 2 hours late (while I'm paying for dyno time at a local shop) he simply wide open throttle tunes the car on the dyno while bouncing it off of the rev limiter every time he does a pull, says it's all set and leaves immediately thereafter.

No sooner than he leaves, I go and fire the car up and the CEL is on and the car will not idle. It's puking fuel out of the tailpipe and it has zero drivability. The car at this point is useless and after a quick call to Tom who is now half way home and is not coming back today, I limp my car back home running like complete crap.

The next day I call Tom again and tell him we need to get the car running properly. So I go pick him up at his mom's house and we now attempt to street tune the car. We do this for 2 hours and the car still will not start when the engine is hot. It smells of fuel so bad that you must drive with the windows up and the A/C on recirculate as the fumes will make you pass out. He finally sends me on my way and says just drive it for the weekend and let the computer learn the new fuel trims. I say ok as I'm just plain tired of hashing on the car in afternoon traffic @ 90 degree temperatures. Immediately after all this, the CEL comes on again and the car still runs like crap. I give up for the day and go home.

Next day I contact Carlos from Quality Motorsports and I email him the tune which Tom had in the car. He simply stated "wow, what a mess." Carlos worked on the tune for me the night before till 2am. What a guy. Man I wish I was in Texas to have him tune my car for me. So I now have Tom upload the new tune from Carlos for me. The car runs alot better and starts up now. Woohoo... Now Tom does some more adjustments and once again it's a mess. I say forget. Tom now says the car cannot be tuned, there is something wrong with the car and the cam is in wrong. Now keep in mind at this point the car put down 535 rwhp with Tom's wide open throttle tune. That alone tells you the cam is in correctly as the car has a nice sloping power curve on the dyno.

After a brief discussion with Tom the following day, he states this to me, "Your car cannot be tuned period. If you can find someone who can tune it I will refund back 100% of your money."

I take him up on his offer and call Jeremy from Faster Proms. He comes to my friends shop that very night and tunes my car with me until midnight. The car was tuned to 554rwhp (I have dyno sheets from both tuners including Tom @ 534rwhp) and he then also data logged while I drove for about 30 minutes total and tuned the car to start at any temperature, run and idle without stalling at stop lights. The best thing of all, he managed a total of 20 more horsepower out at the rear wheels.

After all of this Tom now says after a month of waiting he still does not have my money and does not know when he will pay me back. This is after he has avoided my emails, avoided my PM's and now my posts over on the Z06vette website have been getting mysteriously deleted. one after another.

Big thanks to Jeremy @ Faster Proms for all you help
Big thanks to Carlos for all of his help and a great product.
And a big thanks to this forum for being there for the Corvette community and flying straight.

Sorry this post is so long, I hope this does not happen to anyone else in the Corvette community.

Z06_Joe

Joe Ferraro

hulksdaddy

Thanks for the heads up. Sounds like this guy has no business tuning anything.

Glad it worked out for you in the end.

Smoke20

Wow, I am sorry to hear that. I don't know FRC_TOM. Does he have his own shop...or is he a high school kid??
Why do you suppose he acted like this??

Smoke20

Profile says he is an Aquarium mfg.

Let this be a lesson.

pewter99

Never had any problems with Tom....that being said I doubt he will reply here. I will not allow the waste of bandwidth that I deleted from this thread already....

Z06_Joe

FRC_Tom is a well known tuner here in Florida and he has been around for quite awhile. He is in his 50s.
Nothing worked out, actually on the second day I went to his house he was still drunk from the night before and I actually woke him up so I know where all of my money went and why he cannot pay me back, the liquor store has it. Initially I had no idea he was this way. Another member just filled me in today as to how this man carries himself and conducts business. If I knew then what I know now I would have never used him... What a complete waste...

Joe

Smoke20

Somebody is watching....remain professional.

pewter99

well he has also done alot of tuning and probably done more with the C5 Corvettes than alot of folks ever dreamed about

that being said I am not taking sides nor am I gonna allow bandwagon posting to bash someone who is not here to defend himself.

This post can stand on its own...glad the OP got his car running and hopefully he will get his issue resolved to his satisfaction.

pewter99

Its not so much that as we don't need to have crap posted like what I removed...it solves nothing do you not agree??

Smoke20

What was removed was stupid.

Z06_Joe

Thanks Robert,

I appreciate you leaving the thread open for me. This has been a complete nightmare for me with the tuning and Tom really dropping the ball on me. He used to be a really good tuner but it looks like things have changed. Yes he has tuned many C5 Corvettes, mine was one of them but he burned me this time.

Joe

pewter99

if he keeps it up he will follow

thread is staying open for now...

biggums

Sounds like you ran into the worlds worst tuner!

This is my fear having kids and amatures work on my Vette. Even dealer oil changes can be dangerous (stripping drain plugs, getting oil on the floor mats, 18 year old test driving my car after a oil change etc.)

pewter99

no worries as I said in the PM

pewter99

this wasnt always the case.

as with everything do your research before you pay your hard earned money. I have 2 favorites in my area to tune/work on my cars.

One is Mike Norris and the other is not a forum vendor but should be

Z06_Joe

In the past Tom was the man. He tuned everyone in our area and was very well known throught the Corvette Community. He also helped STS develop their first rear mounted turbo system. It just looks like he has put his priorities in a different order, the customer is at the bottom of that list...

Joe

cerino2000

One thing I do find interesting about tuners is when one sees the other's tune, it's always "Oh geeze..what's this" I swear I think that's why you have so many tuners locking their tunes. They don't want some other tuner ragging on what they have done just cause they do it differently.

Hopefully he will make things right with you.

TrackNoob

Sounds like you got a chance to air your experience, he had a chance to come speak to it (and declined) and in my mind, the thread has served it's purpose -- ought to be left up, but locked, IMHO, to prevent piling on or other non productive stuff.

This forum is terrific, and I am glad you got a chance to be heard, if not made whole. Sometimes the price of experience seems steep right when you first pay it; but in the long run, maybe not so much.

Best wishes.

Z06_Joe

I do agree with you to a point, but when the first tune makes the car run like complete crap and the tuner blames it on the parts you installed (QM600 cam which is tried and true to perform) then the second tuner makes the car run great and says the cam as awesome and makes great power.... Thats a no brainer.

TrackNoob

I am not up on the 'tuner' world, but certainly has been true forever with various other hot rod areas -- welding, carb set up, front end set up, etc.

No one genius ever likes the way any other genius goes about it. Sometimes you have to bounce around until the odds, dame fortune, or [rarely?] skill leads to the fix.

You pays yer monies and youse takes yer chances...