Lateral-g Forums - Sometimes things don’t go as planned

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You do understand that Ron managed all of my track cars.... for YEARS.... He was my driver coach - car / tire / motor / brakes / set up.... So while you had a few parts from him -- So did I... and everything worked great -- until it didn't.

If you go back and read -- this was not about the hasty build... which wasn't hasty by the way... It was about all the other people that did NOT have a good experience... and there's quite a few.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paul69camaro (Post 683731)

I guess I’ll go against the grain here an post my experience with Ron. I don’t expect this to carry much weight since I never post on this site but have been reading in here for as long as I can remember.

I started working with Ron in August of 2014 after reading about Lances Monte Carlo. I bought a full suspension setup from him for my Buick Grand National. I could not have been more pleased with the results of that car. Since then he has setup and provided the parts for my c5 Z06 and c6 z06 that are track cars. They also kicked ass, especially the c5Z that I used his Stoptech brakes on. In the past 4 years, between my cars and cars I work on, I have spent $30k+ with him. I understand this is chump change vs Greg’s car but the point is that it’s probably been over 20 orders and never had an issue with parts being delivered or small issues being corrected (got wrong brake lines). Yes at times he was hard to get a hold of but always got back to me.

It saddens me to see the issues between him and Greg (who I’ve never had contact with). The way I see it, Ron totally screwed up my saying he could build a car from scratch in 4 months. But to expect a car without issues in 4 months is also unrealistic (I will say that body work is probably the worst I’ve seen).. To me he over promised and under delivered but I’m still not convinced he’s a snake.

Quote:

Originally Posted by GregWeld (Post 683744)

You are over reacting Greg. It's like you think the car showed up a month after the first shakedown day with the same issues.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ron Sutton (Post 679384)

Greg had a great post.

I always like to give a "Good, Bad & Ugly" of our Race days, Tests & Initial Shake Down Day like this was:

The Good:
The car was a rocket. Engine ran great & fast. Car had great grip & turned like a champ. Brakes worked excellent. The little things worked well except 2. :trophy-1302:

The bad:
We had a couple oil spray issues. One from a valve cover & one from the dry sump vent. Easy fixes. Our 16 volt battery died & wouldn't take a charge. Obviously an easy fix to replace. :mad:

The ugly:
Aside from cleaning some oil off the firewall, having to jump start the car had me frustrated. :hairpullout:

We'll fix those two glitches learned from our Shake down & have the car ready go go soon. Here are some photos:

:confused59:

Oh wait. Never mind. It was exactly the same problems but with powder coating added.

No winners here unfortunately, a real shame for all.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thumpt (Post 683747)

No winners here unfortunately, a real shame for all.

Money.

People kill each other over the stuff. I hear chasing it can be more addictive than beer.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FETorino (Post 683745)

You are over reacting Greg. It's like you think the car showed up a month after the first shakedown day with the same issues.

:confused59:

Oh wait. Never mind. It was exactly the same problems but with powder coating added.

Come on Rob, you’ve got to give credit where credits due. It also had an exceptional wrap job, parts falling off and the oh so important sealing of the cockpit.
What a turd!

Quote:

Originally Posted by DBasher (Post 683764)

Come on Rob, you’ve got to give credit where credits due. It also had an exceptional wrap job, parts falling off and the oh so important sealing of the cockpit.
What a turd!

You and Greg need a snickers bar. You become project Divas when you’re hungry.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigBronco (Post 683713)

Nothing on the price scale of some of the people on this board, but I had a person come to me as a second opinion on a braking issue. RS swore about clamp flexing issues and other items along with a potential need to upgrade to a package of his.

In the end, we were able to find out the issue and help get all the braking issues solved without giving him a dime. After that, we felt that if someone we knew was wanting to spend money there on braking solutions, we would send them elsewhere. RS gave us that good snake oil salesman feel, you know what I mean.

Bingo, after talking to RS about it and then not being convinced by the answer (i'm an inquisitive person already, and an engineer as well), I talked to Tobin at Kore3 and got some more insight. I was being told my W6A calipers were FLEXING which was causing my poor braking performance and was told to buy some new calipers which he happened to be a vendor for! Instead I changed a couple master cylinders to get my brake line pressure where it should be, and all was gravy. Spent ~$100 instead of several grand.

I feel bad for anyone that doesn't have a somewhat technical mindset as guys like that pray on those without the knowledge and experience in order to make a sale.

William

I don't know how much clearer of a picture a guy could try to paint.... When "wrong parts" means your engine internals aren't what you paid for.... When you use big words like "optimized" and then sell stock off the shelf stuff.... When you use big words like "secret sauce" but someone else has to explain to you that they had to give him a class on how to do stuff.... the secret part means it's just "BS".... When you've been sued in the past for scamming people.... and you're doing it again..... just in a different place and with a different twist..... I don't care how many of you had good experiences in the past - you were just the lucky ones "this time".

I don't see how anyone can dispute it at this point.

These guys have to treat people right for a while to get the connections and their foot in the door. Really, Greg was romanced for years and that engendered a trust that I'm sure led to a bunch of new business.

I was one of the main guys for Frank. He always treated me right and delivered a quality piece to me out of his shop. I'm sure that led to all kinds of opportunity for him.

There will always be naysayers. Those in denial who refuse to believe that they could possibly get took by a person who treats them so well. They figure that since they’ve spent a few grand with someone, that makes them friends. And a friend would never steal from them, right?
I watched the end of the Prodigy deal come down, and I saw several people claim that they could not believe that a guy like Frank would do this to them. They were “friends”...
I feel like we are seeing version 2.0 unfold, and when the dust settles, there will be many hurt “friends”. It hurts to watch.