I had work done there as well: Cam/Gears/Stall/DTE brace/tune. Big Mike seemed like a cool guy and was nothing but professional with me. The tune is spot on. I think every shop has there share of horror stories but it's how they handle those situations that keeps them in business. Not taking sides here, just stating my personal experience with them. Hope everything gets worked out.

 

I had my A&A Vortech installed there and when Mike was tuning it, he let me watch and ask questions. Never once did he get frustrated and tell me to go pack sand. He answered all of my questions like a True Professional!

I went with them originally because they are less than 5 minutes from my house and it was the middle of one of our Beautiful winters, but having dealt with them, I'm glad that I did because if I have any problems, they'd take care of it!

 

I guess since this hasn't been addressed yet, I'll try to make the point to cover it.

I'll start by stating some of the facts that were stated by the customer in his posts, then go into a few things that were not mentioned.

The car was on our dyno, and I did tune it. I started with the file that was in the car when it arrived which had been a mail order tune by somebody fairley well known in the Midwest. That being said, the orginal file came in with 30 degrees of timing.

The car was also on our dyno all day, and it took a few attempts before we were able to make a full dyno pull. The car did leave our dyno with 30 degrees of timing.

Now here's what was not mentioned in the orginal posters post. Three hours were spent trying to purge the coolant system because coolant was being pushed out through the overflow cap. By the time the car had been backed on to the dyno from it's parking spot, the car was already burping some coolant out the over flow. After adding some coolant and being strapped down, the ECT was also in the 240 degree range while the car was just cruising on the dyno. At this time in the tune, no wide open throttle attempts had been made, and the car had not seen more than 3600rpm. Since the customer was present during this time, he elected to fix this problem on his own (while still being on the dyno) to save the expense of having us fixing it. For three hours, every time the car started up, within 2 to 3 min, the vehicle's ECT would sky rocket past 220 degrees, then start bubbling over again.

Once this was presumedly fixed, I continued to tune the vehicle. I finished the part throttle tuning, and was then ready to do WOT tuning. Timing was changed to 26 degrees for the first pull. It took a few attempts to get the AFR within range without the trans downshifting during the pull, that is why it took so many attempts before we were able to complete a pull. Plugs were checked twice during the WOT tuning, and according to the timing marks on the plugs, and the dyno results, the car saw a noticable gain with the 30 degrees of timing, yet looked well within the safe range on the ground strap. Since the car was now pulley'd for 15lbs of boost, as opposed to 13lbs of boost where it was with the old pulley and tune, I made the judgement to keep 30 degrees of timing in the car, since it responded well to it with no indication of KR.

The customer then called a few days later saying that a head gasket had been blown, and immediately blamed it on the fact that it had 30 degrees of timing in it. I asked him how the plugs looked, he said he had not taken anything apart yet and did not know. I asked him to atleast do that. He called back the next day and said that the plugs looked perfectly fine. Since the plugs are the only thing that we can look at to see how the motor was running, I found it difficult to assume that the a motor with great looking plugs would blow a head gasket.

I asked him if he would send us the plugs so we could look at them, he said that he wouldn't because how would he know if we change them for some other ones. I then offered him two independant parties to send them to in order to have them looked at. He once again refused. I told them that with out inspection of atleast the spark plugs, I couldn't help him any more.

The next day he called, and told me that he had talked to somebody who "practically invented supercharging" and he said that 30 degrees was way to much timing for the car, and asked if I would talk to "his" guy. I was more than happy to talk to this guy, and when I spoke to him, he definitely knew superchargers, but by his own admission was not an "engine" guy and couldn't offer any more help.

At this point, not being able to see or inspect any parts from the car, I told him that we were not going to be able to help him once again. As a company we have no problem in admitting fault when it's our wrong doing, but we are not going to admit blame just because somebody says it's our fault.

One part of our conversations that struck me, was when the customer said that 30 degrees of timing was to much for his car on 15lbs of boost, and that it should be closer to 20 degrees or less in his mind. We then asked him how much timing in his mind should his car see with the old pulley making 13lbs of boost. He said something like no more than 25. So then we responded, the car came in with 30 degrees and 13lbs of boost, how can we be sure nothing happened then? Let alone when the ECT was 240 degrees due to an air bubble in the coolant system.

The customer then brought up the idea that our "tuner" (i.e. me) had no idea of what I was doing, and was "learning" how to do so on his car. The fact is that the software that was being used, TunerCats RTT Pro, is on that has been around for a very long time, having using it for the past three years myself. We itterated the fact that we atleast need to be able to see some of the parts, such as the spark plugs before we could do anything. He once again said that he would not be sending anything to us to inspect and brought up the notion of taking legal actions. At this point we informed him that we will no longer be in communication with him if he feels the need to take legal actions. No other communications have been made by either parties.

Two more points I'll bring up. The customer was very threatening in the last communications, bring up how everybody is going to hear his story and that no body will ever come to Straightline Performance when he's done with what he's going to do. I did ask him if he knew what Slander and Libel are, no mention of Lisa Madigan was ever made.

As far as the difference in the quoted bill and the actual bill. Upon first conversation with the customer I mentioned that I do do WOT only tuning for $250. But after having the car on the dyno for 8hrs that day, and having changed nearly the entire fuel maps due to the fact that the Cat Over Temp Protection was still active on his car, this is no longer a WOT only tune. The customer's bill in fact was only $412. $400 for the dyno tune, and $12 for coolant. $400 is our regular tune price, but a boosted applications are $450.

This will be our only response to this subject matter in any public capacity. If anybody wants any further details, they can contact us privately.

 

I would also like to point out that I have had quite a bit of experience with the guys at Straightline and would just like to say that these guys have gone out of their way to help me and the rest of the ShockerRacing.com Crew!!! They are always willing to answer our questions, and help with anything possible. They have done everything from cams to superchargers to rear ends to clutches for us and have always turned out awesome! They have even delivered one of our members cars to him on a Sunday!!! Name one other shop that you can say that about? They are stand up guys and ShockerRacing highly recommends Straightline Performance! My car will be going there soon for a pulley and a tune.

 

I'd bang her, even if she is a democrat. Something about those glasses. Kind of reminds me of Tina Fey playing Sarah Palin. I would also bang Tina Fey and Sarah Palin. I'd actually really like to bang Lisa Madigan, Tina Fey and Sarah Palin all together in one vile, obscene, political/entertainment orgy.

 

In a dirty sort of way.

 

This is back from the dead or is it still 2008.

 

My desire to bang hot librarian looking chicks is as strong now as it was then.

 

F--- it lets bang em all!!!

 

 

I'm with you on that buddy, Bring them on.

 

Whoop!!!!

 

I am sure the guys at Straightline would love to hear they were in a thread about hot chicks.

Used Straightline before and will again as soon as my Yank arrives.

 

You said hot chicks and yank in the same post.

 

LOL Ok Beavis.

 

LOL, I just mentioned the other day that it would be great fun to have a Tina Fey/Sarah Palin 3way. Good call

 

This is the best thread resurrection EVAR

 

Whats an EVAR? And if it looks like a school teacher keep it away from Perfectly Frank. LOL

 

I hope this is Evar.

 

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=evar

That picture should put an end to this thread (thankfully)!