1953 Willys Aero Wagon Design Studio RUINED

I had this shipped to where I work at for the sole purpose of the driver standing there till I opened the Package. He Bolted for his truck saying theres a 1 800 number call with with your concerns a the tracking numbers on the box.. I was on the Phone with UPS , 2 minutes after the driver left and the box was opened.. its Still at the Shop.. There rules for out of Country shipments are Tough.. you have to follow there guide lines.. Funny how that works.. they cant deliver what they Sell themselves out to be.. In order for any package to be insured it has to be packaged by UPS.. and it has to go to a Business , Not To a Household.. I had that all figured out.. from Past Guitar shipments.. I did Not want this dropped at the Front of the House like they normally do.. to cast blame somewhere else..

 

Unbelieveable. That is all I can say. (Other than, I am really sorry...) What the heck did they drop on it?!? An anvil?

 

Sickening, sorry Bro!

 

bummer man thats a piece of history that needs to be saved hope it can be fixed an the lousy shippers pay ,

 

I'm really sorry to hear this. I hope an experienced model maker is able to repair this to it's original state.

I refuse to do business with UPS after having nothing but problems with them, mostly damaged packages due to incredibly poor handling. Since you had it shipped to a business and you had the UPS store package it, you should be solid for insurance purposes, but it's not like you can take the insurance money and buy another one either.

You might consider sending this story to Consumerist.com or a similar blog, they might want to pick up on it and it would draw some much needed attention to how poorly this was dealt with. The historical significance of the car makes this as interesting as it is tragic.

 

Strange that the Kaiser community is being tight lipped about it. I'd say either they don't think you know what you have or they really don't know anything. Larry Barker lives here in town and I know him really well, he is one of the premier Kaiser collectors in the country, he might know something about the history of that thing. If he doesn't know he might know somebody else who does.

 

Thanks Squablow.. Money will not replace this item.. because there are no others to be had..
The Historian of the Kaiser Club provided me with the Picture of the Concept room.. from the Archives. and he has been thanked many times over... I did join the KFCLUb and posted in the Forum.. just so I could share this with them.. after all its part of Kaisers history also.. Im not sure if its in the right forum.. maybe thats why.. there is one that wanted to buy this.. But I didnt get this to resell..

 

I bought a large 18th century bronze statue while in Cambodia and had it shipped to my home. It too was broken badly in transit and I thought things were hopeless. I took it here:

http://www.artrestinc.com/

and they repaired it flawlessly. Unbelievable work. Plus, all work was highly documented with photos, process, materials, etc. listed in detail. This helped the statue retain value.

After seeing what they did for my statue I'm certain they could fix your car, too.

dka

 

I'm not going to defend the people who packaged, handled, and trucked this package, but I will say this: UPS treats it's people pretty poorly, if my employer did half the crap that I know UPS does I'd give him the finger, along with the rest of my fist. I don't have anything to do with the brown trucks nowadays. Maybe at one time they were decent, but as a corporation they have really blown it in human resources.

Don't bother writing back to me and saying how great they are, maybe you haven't dealt with their wonderful investigative department, the one based out of Cali??? Creeps

 

I know I wont be using the Service again.. No matter of the outcome.. I cannot put my trust a Service that cannot provide quality Service.. this has been a wake up call.. I paid alot for shipping, and packaging.. and if they required or needed more.. I would of Paid more at the time....

Now its figuring out what the next step is.. All your help as been much appreciated.. I will be exploring all avenues to put this back to its Original state.. I know its going to be tough..

 

That is really a shame. I hope it can be repaired. Sadly you were at the mercy of the seller to package the item and he trusted the UPS store. I agree with the the previous post about a double box. I was sending a trunk lid UPS and I bubble wrapped it inside a box tight, then wrapped it in newspaper and built another box around that. While I'm sure that the UPS guys are not purposely playing football with packages, accidents can happen.

 

I used a UPS store in sacrament and shipped dirty laundry, tin signs and bunch of unbreakables, and a bunch of peanuts was all they threw in the box and the stuff , I was not impressed with the packing job and its hard to break dirty laundry, they wont let you watch when they pack it up

 

I agree , Accidents do happen when a UPS Truck Crashes, Or a Plane falls out of the Sky.. but not at the UPS Store Counter. I dont and wont ever have a problem with young kids willing to work to make ends meet if thats the case.... But I think its more a training issue on how to do the jobs Properly.. whether its a Picture, Car Parts, Or even a bag of cookies.. I put my trust in UPS to carry out this task.. and they failed.. .

 

bttt

 

Man that makes me want to throw up after seeing what happened to your car. To some dork at UPS that is just a piece of plaster, but to anyone involved with vintage autos its a priceless piece of history!

I have had things destroyed by professional packing services, mainly vintage sewing machines. They think that a average cardboard box and packing peanuts is all you need. If you see what it takes to ship a sewing machine and have it get to you in one piece some people would shit a brick! I ship them all over the world and it takes a sheet of the blue foam board, plastic wrap, expanding spray foam, and a double box. And thats just for a piece of cast iron!

If I were you I would collect the insurance money from UPS and take the car to someone that restores and repairs priceless antiques. In my opinion that is what it is and needs to be treated as such!!

 

I know a woman who works at one of the large shipping companies. She said NEVER NEVER NEVER put the words fragile or extremely fragile or "please don"t drop" etc on the packages.

Employees who are having a bad day or who are disgruntled will hurt these packages on purpose.

 

For all of youz that are here.. I cannot let this slip by.. It wont go forgotten..
Good service is hard to come by as it is.. and this has been a topic before..

UPS will pay up.. I would like to see the Restoration costs paid by UPS.. the Insurance pay out is what I paid and a Drop in the bucket to what it will cost to restore. The Money at this point means nothing.. I already spent that, and I can earn more when needed... I have emails out every where waiting for responses..

 

bttt

 

man, that sucks, i hated reading that, good luck with everything, i do have one question, why do you keep, btt posting?

 

I keep taking it to the top because this is Something the Shippers are doing to all of us.. Not caring what they do.. Im not concerned about the car at this point it will get repaired.. but the point is , Just bad Shipping and Not Caring..

Sorry if Im doing what I shouldnt do..

 

The people doing the packing, must HATE
the people who pay out on the insurance claims.

I've used UPS; they usually refuse to insure the contents
because they didn't pack it. I understand the logic, but my stuff arrives in one piece.

A wooden crate and foam would have been justified on that model.

 

The best thing I have found for packing things is the big 4`x8` sheets of polystyrene (styrofoam). You can cut it up to fit snugly around whatever your shipping,or line the inside of the box with it like I do when I ship cylinder heads.

Before I started using it,it seemed like 1 outta every 3 heads I shipped was BROKEN,yes a cast iron cylinder head...broken.

Now I haven`t had a problem yet,and get compliments such as "Seller packed the cylinder heads in bomb-proof enclosures."

 

BTW,if UPS pays for the damages,they will want back what they are paying for....just an FYI!

 

SO what's the news. It's beeen a few months.

Any headway?

Jeff

 

by the way our ups handles stuff going into the truck when they pick it up were I work, doesn't surprise me. Some guys are cool with the stuff, other just chuck it in the truck. Now for the UPS store packing, double bull @#$* ! I hoped they insured it for replacement value, the ups will screw you if you don't declare a stated value. Just learning from the past with them.

 

Contact the Consumerist
http://consumerist.com/

 

Good luck with UPS. It took them 3 months to send me a check, over 3 gran. I crated a Caddy 2 x 4 setup in a 3/4" plywood box. The shipper refused the shipment due to damage. When I got it back the crate was ripped open and taped back together, carbs destroyed. It looked like it was literally thrown off the truck. 2 1/2 months, much paperwork faxing/e-mailing etc I still had no check. 1 phonecall and a letter from a Lawyer friend and I had a check within the week. UPS SUX!!!!

 

It sucks what happened to your model by UPS. After looking at some of the pictures 2 things popped up (1) It is repairable, just the whole model would have to be repainted. (2) It looks like that is a copy of the original model, meaning they pulled a mold on the original and then made a plaster copy for show, or for people that were on the project. Usually the design staff gets them and sometimes the modelers (very Rare). I used to work as a contractor for some of the Car Design Studios in California and Texas as a Modeler. Its to bad that whoever you bought the model from didn't know what it is, even fiberglass or foam models are put into wooden crates for shipping and are secured to the bottom of the crate, then wrapped in plastic, then sprayed with expandable foam. I still do some models but through my Speed Shop. If you have any question PM. Hope you get everything taking care with UPS.

 

Hello, Its the Original. Not a Copy... It has been Confirmed by the Historian of the KF CLUB.. UPS did settle with a fraction of the amount.. Now its time to carry on and figure out if its worth restoring.. Cool cars by the way..

 

I ordered a guitar amp and it was delivered by the brown truck. I was sitting by the window when it was delivered and even tho the box was clearly marked as a guitar amplifier on all sides by the box decoration the brown truck guy literally hurled it from waist high onto my porch. It worked okay but it wasn't the brown truck guy's fault, he really tried to bust it. I do as little bussiness with them as possible. Service sucks!