Problems with Total cost involved....

Ok this is getting ridiculous, One of my customers bought a TCI frame for his 57 Cameo. First problem encountered was the core support did not fit, 3" to far forward, mounts welded in wrong place, problem #2 front body mount perches welded on backwards and hit the body mount not letting it line up for the bolts, Problem #3 boxed frame and no holes or nutserts for the bed. Ok so back it goes along with the original frame so they can measure everything and correct their blueprints. pick it up and paint it and the guy takes it home and assembles it while i finish up painting the cab and parts, calls up saying the rear end is leaking fluid, no biggie will worry about it when we do the final assembly on it. Well today we dig into the rear and they put the wrong retainers on it so the seals and bearings are not seating in the axle housing, call up 1:00 and what do you know no one available to talk now, will call back, well no call back today by closing time so maybe tomorrow if i am lucky i figure. last week i called them to find out where i can find 4" 7/16 button head stainless bolts since they put the wrong size nutserts in and no one has them that i can find. 2 days later they call and i already made some adapters, good thing as they had no idea. Ok so on to a 28 A bone my brother in law is building, he bought a TCI frame for it and more problems! WOW what a shock!! On his the rear coil overs sit on the wrong spot on the frame and hit the frame on the body, need to cut a C notch in it to clear the shocks. go to mount the front fender braces and WTF the front suspension is in the way! now we have to make new braces to go around the crap, he called them and they never heard of this problem but did say we would probably need to make new ones to fit. also no nutserts for the splash aprons were drilled or installed. then this morning at the local get together a guy starts talking about his kid building a 29 A and guess what? he has the same problems as my bro in law. I cannot believe that these guys shelled out 8-10 grand for these things then have this amount of problems and nothing for support from them! I guess this is the way of the land now a days, bend 'em over and break it off! Sorry for the long rant i just can't see how they can preach all the garbage they do about their products then be this way and treat a customer this way when their is a problem.

 

Im not lukcy ether....

On the most of the frontend i buy, i can´t ajust the camber angel enougth..
It was from + 2 degres to 0 dedree.... in my world i want from zero to minus 2 degree
So i cut it up, and veld it, where i want it...

The caster angel was zero to 2 degree, and if yuu want more, the coilover hit the upper triangel... but it´s easy to held the front end backover before you weld it..

But the complete chassis to a 40´Ford i built have the same problem... but i can´t see the point, to cut up and weld a brand new frame....

So now, i built my own frames, with C4 Corvette frontends...

 

It's all the same every where you go now days. As my problems are not as bad as yours, I have a set of headers that I sent a email out about on Monday and still no reply, bad craftmanship from the start. I'll give them one more week to reply, if no reply by then I'll be here telling my story on them.

 

I've paid a lot of money for parts that "should work" over my time building cars.

I know better now. If I need to spend several hours measuring, cutting, welding, and grinding... I'll just build my own.

 

TCI'S customer service sucks. I would never buy from them again.

 

Never buy TCI stuff directly from them. Never. If you want to use their stuff go through a reputable dealer (like Yogi's). I ain't endorsing Yogi or any one else but TCI just don't seem to take individual customers seriously. The folks I know that have had no problems or quickly resolved problems with them used a third party.

Personally I won't use their stuff, a bad experience with a Model A front end many years ago, but your results may vary.

 

For what it's worth, I have used their stuff for years without any issues. I worked with them on the development of their F1 frame using our stocker a few years back and found them to be great to work with. My latest dealing with them was a triangulated 4 link for my Falcon and it worked out very nice.

 

I find the name "Total Cost Involved" sort of scary. That was enough for me...

 

I toured their shop once, my buddy used to worked for them. Seemed like a good business. I bought one of their IFS kits 6 years ago, it fit really well and the alignment shop had no issues setting it up.

 

Hmm.. I've got a TCI under my '36 Ford project with the ultra low front crossmember and bags at all four corners. The front shockwaves rub when it's aired out for some reason. I've gone over how I assembled it several times, but maybe it's something that TCI screwed up.

 

I called them to get new urathane bushings for some of thier coil overs. They said they would be shipped right out.

Never recieved them

Fk 'em. I will never use anything with thier name on it again.

 

if i was gonna bitch about problems from a supplier for sure i would have tons of pictures of said problem. some suppliers have damm good pitch but nothing to support their product if they fucked up!

 

I ordered one of there rear leaf kits for my '52 Chevy through JPL Rod Shop on eBay. Been 4 weeks since I placed the order...talked to the Monday and they said it'll arrive tomorrow (Friday) or Monday at the latest. I guess we'll see what happens

 

The first Mustang II I bought from them was a nightmare. The cross member was just over 1/2" too wide to fit between the frame wells. It set about 3" back from axle center. They could not give me the measurements that a stock 40 should be. First they told me to just spread the frame rails and I would be ok. I went through the issues of false advertising that these were made for the backyard builder. Then they wanted me to cut it to fit. I refused because of fitting sheet metal issues later and they finally built one to fit my frame. Putting the thing together I found that the tube arms were not the shorter ones required for 40 Fords. I had to buy another set and wait another 3 months to get reimbursed. When I got the new arms in it was short one bushing. Then I found that the coil springs were the wrong weight for a 40. I had bought it from a dealer and they got things fixed for me.
I just installed another of their units in my 40 Pickup project. It went right in and all is working well.

 

I guess there is a lesson to be learned here.

Dont buy 1-800 Street Rod parts, and build a Traditional Hot Rod instead...

 

Just installed frt and rear pro touring kit in O/T car, Parts and service were a-one, had some very minor issues, all were resolved quickly and professionally.

 

Long story short...
We did an install on a bolt-in mustang II kit from TCI and they sent us 2 left lower control arms instead of 1 of each. 3 days of calls got us to 3 different people who said they'd call back. Nobody ever did...So we beat their phone to death..
the job should've been done in a week..It tied up the lift for 3 weeks.....
We finally got not 1 but 2 lower right side control arms 2weeks later..
Kit was nice and went together really well, but their customer service really sucks

 

Not to hijack the thread but just an observation here.

I've been trying to buy some 16 inch wheels from a vendor here on the hamb ( not an alliance vendor) and the guy cant even bother to respond to my order or follow up email asking if he receivd my order. Good thing he doesnt have my credit card. He's not the only vendor and my money is heading elsewhere.

Seems like theres a trend here. You'd think in lean times vendors would really focus on customer service and the quality of their craftsmanship instead it seems its heading to the shithole.

 

I bought a TCI rear 4-bar set up for my Chev. pick-up. Started to install it as the instructions indicated. Installed the 4-bars and WTF they bind in every direction. Called TCI and they said " well, yes you probably shouldn't mount them as the instructions indicate, and that you are on your own" ... good thing I've done several builds... I had to revamp the "bolt on" brackets and redesign the weld on mounts to the axle so that they worked without bind through the range of motion. Absolute awful design, and I would not recommend thier produdcts.

 

this should apply all the time not just lean times! sometimes folks get "feeling burned" because they don't do their homework, must be a false pride thing?

 

I thought here on the HAMB the rules were you can't bad mouth a business.Why isn't this CLOSED?

 

Sounds like QC has gone down. I have used two front 4-bar kits and two rear 4-bar kite from TCI. All of it was good quality and I had no problems. But it was a few years ago.

 

Actually, I've heard that 'Total Cost Involved'
is a bit of misnomer and that TCI really stands
for "Trouble Comes Included"!!!

Mart3406
===========================

 

You got something against letting people know about a bad business? if you have a problem with it DON'T OPEN THE THREAD!!

 

I can't speak on the manufacturers on a mass scale, but it seems like they all have problems. The chassis' built by the small shops, and back yard guys all seem to work.. What causes this? I can't imagine that the guys with the big $$$ wouldnt take the time to make sure the stuff works, right? OR is it the usual story of the "talkers" not real builders getting the accolades, and the real builders not getting the money cause they build and dont talk, so no getting asked to engineer stuff....

Sorry you guys know I'm a big Extreme Kustoms guy, but not only cause Rick's building my car, but because the man is a hell of an engineer and here's an exmaple: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=380206

This is the only example I know of but I'm sure there are tons of threads with guys on here who have engineered some incredible stuff that actually 'Works'.. I'm just saying........

 

--------------------
Could you please do us all of us a
supreme favor by enlightening and
informing all of us here, as to the exact
and precise rule you are referring to?
Please quote it exactly and than also,
post a link to it, so we can all see it
and be aware of it. Also, while you're
searching for this illusive, secret 'rule'
that supposedly bans anyone from
complaining about any and all actual
"businesses" and/or warning others of poor
quality parts or service from any actual
said "business", you might want to have
a look at the archives too. They're in dire
need of policing and censoring! You'll
find literally hundreds of posts by people
complaining about this or that bad "business"
and about poor quality parts and service from
various vendors and manufacturers etc., etc.,
etc! It's truly outrageous, but I'm guessing
that like most of us, they also didn't know
about this secret "rule" either! But we can't
be ever careful enough, or strict enough
in our interpretation, or in any way.
anal-retentive enough, when it comes to
*precisely* *strictly* and *exactly* following
and enforcing any and all rules, you know
.....even unknown and secret ones! As the
great "Deputy Barney Fife", late of the
Mayberry N.C. Sheriff's Dept. used to
say and remind us all, in his own
endearing. self-assured, 'know-it-all',
'super-authority-figure' sort of way, that
- "Ignorance of the law is no excuse!"
and "Andy, I'm tellin' ya', we gotta' nip
this in the bud before it's too late!!!"....and
he was right!!!

Mart3406
===================

 

MART- I searched and you were right there is no precise illusive secret rule to enlighten you by,LOL. This is a free country, I guess you can say what you want about anyone.

 

Posting problems that we as members may have with a vendor helps us determine who gets our dough. It sends a message to the vendor that we are not going to stand idly by when their product or customer service leaves us angry or fustrated. Keep it up.

 

Not to be off topic, but, if you buy a product and it fits as advertised and/or they give exceptional service, PLEASE, brag away as we need this input from both sides of the coin.
Thank you, now returning to your normal broadcast.........