Performace products to avoid list

[HCP 65 COUPE]

Do yourself a favor dont buy any products with the name lakewood,quicktime,accel,mr-gasket or anything else from the accel brand group of companys its all total crap.

Why do so many performace companys produce such crap:mad:. I just spent 3 hrs trying to install a starter in my $650 quick time bell housing to no avial.
The starter holes are so far off its pethetic I could have hand drilled them closer. Not only that the material its made out of is total crap too (both bolt holes stripped the theads trying line the starter up).

I should have known better when it needed .011 offset dowels to line up with the crankshaft. I should have sent the P.O.S. back right there.

So any body else want to add to my list of crap performace part vendors so others can avoid these headaches.

[Bob Cowan]

Anything from Pro-Form or Patriot. Cheap off shore copies of American developed products.

[HCP 65 COUPE]

Thats a good one Bob I bought a set of valve covers from pro-form once they where total crap holes didnt line up and they where so dirty on the inside I would not have installed them on a moped.
They where also dinged and dented in places but the box was perfect.

Those went back.

[first time builder]

MSD stuff is junk , and I mean there own stuff not the knock off stuff.

Kenny

[HCP 65 COUPE]

First Time can you elaborate I have heard that the MSD cam sync distributors are lousy what parts did you have a bad experiance with.

[Hankl]

Gentlemen,

As a Moderator I feel that I need to step in here for the good of all concerned. If you are going to give advice to other builders please make the claim based on fact. I would request that any further post contain facts, and not conjecture or feelings. If a manufacture provides inferior or defective parts, please include the type of part it was, what the defect was, and if you attempted to have the manufacture replace the part or refund your money. Also include what parts you found to be worthy of your hard earned cash, and manufactures or providers that have supplied you with the needed parts and services. That way we can help one another stay away from those only interested in taking your money and not providing a worthy service.

Thanks,

Hank

[skullandbones]

Using MSD as an example, they have quality distributer caps, wires, coils, etc....... I haven't used their electronic boxes but some of the talk about them and the troubles people have had on this forum make me a little less likely to purchase one. A lot of people can't afford to buy and re-buy products 'til they find a good one. It's only natural to use references from friends and acquaintances. But bashing the whole company product line is not really fair. IMO, WEK.

[Russ Thompson]

I have to disagree with you on the Quicktime bell housing, I LOVE mine. I had no alignment starter problems and it was a breeze to intstall and I think it was a well made piece. I went to th QT bell housing after removing the Lakewood which took 2 people 3 hours to do, the Lakewood one was a pain because you can't keep a socket on the bolts because the holes are so close to the bell bends. What's worse are the install instructions, done 15 years ago by a 3 year old!

[HCP 65 COUPE]

Russ,

Maybe your bell housing was a differant part # or was made before Accel bought Quick Time not sure maybe they always owned them, But Accel Group owns both Quick Time
and Lakewood.

Hank

Im stating a fact the holes did not line up even close they where off with a true position over .06 I know this because I opened up the holes on the starter to 7/16 the bolt is 3/8 and
it still did not fit.
The bolts had .062 clearance and still did not go.

I got the top bolt to fit but had to use a 5/16-18 over long cap screw and nut on the bottom hole. And this was a brand new powermaster starter not a crap china rebuild.

I did contact quick time about the issue but have gotten no response as of yet.

[HCP 65 COUPE]

Quicktime did respond to me after I called them, they never did respond to my service ticket e-mail.

At first the customer service person tried to blame my starter saying I had to use an OEM ford full size starter

After I asked him why and what was the differance between a OEM full size 157 tooth 3/4 offset and a powermaster mini 157 3/4 offset starter.

He said I have no idea but he knew it was the starter, Which I knew it was not so I asked to speek to his boss or someone that could give me an answer that was correct.

The customer service person had Ross Mccombs call me back he said that it was not the starter before I even said a single word besides hello.

Apparently a large group of motor index plates had been lazer cut with the center locating hole way off location and he told me that he would send a new one out right away

He was very appologetic and understood why I was so upset. We had a long conversation about the state of american manufacturing among other things I could not have been happier
with his kind help and understanding, especialy since the bell is almost 2 years old.

So over all Im happy, they did take care of the situation, even if it cost me a major pita in pulling out the Tranny. They could stand to train there customer service reps better tho.

But buyer be warned check and double check everything before ploping the engine and tranny into your coupe, cause once its in it will be a pain to change anything on the tranny/bell housing.

[Hankl]

Glad to hear that they resolved your problem. Now other members know what to expect and how to handle it.

This is what our community does best, thanks HCP!

Hank :cool:

[tirod]

There is a track record of certain parts from makers which apparently have a significant number of failures. Enough to concern the larger group of ongoing builders who have yet to finalize a buying decision.

And while they may avoid those products, the companies are doing all they can to reverse course and reestablish consumer confidence so that sales can continue. The problem is we don't and won't hear about them until years later because it's now a non-issue with nothing to talk about.

One notorious example from my experience is Fram filters. I and many others lost a motor from the use of one, they were even taken off the shelf by Autozone for a year, and have slowly regained the confidence of the consumer public. And exercising some fairness, my limited span of their difficulty was based on the Ford filter specifically. Most of rest seemed to be little trouble. That also goes to the specific filter being made in huge quantities, where the rest are in much smaller batches.

That was years past, I still no longer use or recommend them, but I don't make a deal of it unless a customer has specific problems with his oiling system. It is of note that a crate motor builder recently had a failure they say was caused by the owners' use of a Fram filter. Again, a Ford. Well, Ford does use a bypass oiling system to relieve cold start pressure buildup, where others don't. That is an important fact in the discussion, and builders need to take note. Another - at a dollar a filter difference in cost, it's going to take 1,800 filters to recover the rebuild costs if one fails. Do the math, you get what you pay for.

Same as running oil lines to a remote filter - there is a recommended minimum size due to starvation issues. It does no good to claim the engine builder puts out crap when small hoses and a known poor filter design combine to kill a motor. It takes a lot more forensics to discover the real issue. One could point to a certain inexpensive imported aluminum rocker arm as well - having it shed needle bearings to get pumped thru the mains isn't good. But it also goes to two other issues - first, aluminum rocker arms aren't long term durable units, they are racing parts designed for more performance and trading off 100,000 mile durability to do it. Second - a major issue with builders - you get what you pay for. Paying a third to half less means in many cases you get a third to half the durability of a part already compromised in it's design.

This is the reason some point to imported heads and manifolds as being "junk." They may be cheap copies, but in the hands of those who double check the dimensions and do the final deburring - i.e. add the labor the maker didn't perform, they get decent results. But it still goes to you get what you pay for. It's no different than the old problem of porting stock heads and seeing the final costs in the ball park of those expensive ones in the catalog. They may even flow the same or better, but it takes money to get those results. Regardless. You get what you pay for.

This is why there isn't much worth in trying to compile a list of what's bad on the market. First, we have to discern exactly what the builder combined in a working system to see what the real cause of the problem is. I can't in good conscience say that one electronic ignition system maker is putting out bad units when in the the light of day the wiring systems they are connected to aren't engineered - meaning all the subtle rules of their connections and routing were followed. Wiring can and is subject to misunderstanding, back feed from other components, and simple age. Donor harnesses aren't the optimal choice if they have been dragged out of one (wrecked) car, "dieted," and then reinstalled in another. It's a lot of manhandling of a critical part. If MSD units are going under in that situation, I have to point out the one constant is that the wiring isn't factory grade, reviewed, and fully "rung" out to remove issues that may exist. And I note the replacement units in some cars fail, again.

When that happens the industry view is that it may not be the parts fault, but what it's installed in, especially when it's not a factory engineered and built car. Even if your specific car was overseen by a staff of $100,000 a year engineers, assembled by highly paid labor on the line, and tested for months to ensure the parts work in cooperation, the track record shows otherwise. Hundreds of recalls, quality issues with source makers, and dynamic incompatibilities nobody forsaw. Who would hang two pounds of key chain accessories off the ignition switch? The average consumer, who expects their purchases to survive their use and abuse regardless. And when they won't, they call the stuff crap.

When I hear that, I hear someone who doesn't understand the complexities, and determine what they need is a time out. So - I back away, put the repair aside until I research it some more, and gain understanding to make sure my conclusion is even on solid ground. Which, many times, it isn't.

Just yelling and pointing fingers doesn't solve the problem. If things are out of line and they aren't supposed to be, sorry, but at least with nuts and bolts the problem is obvious. That is easy to fix. There are a lot of other things much harder to discern - and the For Sale forums full of broken expectations that a part would be the best answer. If things were working right at all, there would be no hot rod parts being swapped. They'd all work to their owner's satisfaction. They don't, because our expectations are often unrealistically out of bounds. And the proof is when they don't work or fail.

[HCP 65 COUPE]

Ti rod,

I agree with almost all of what you have said, you do get what you pay for, and most of the time this is true. In my case with quicktime I most certainly did not get what was paid for
but quicktime did make good on thier mistake even if it really is a super stupid one. The bell housing itself is perfect but the block plate stater location hole is off in the ball park off
.060-.08in.
Now I dont know about you but if I shipped parts to my final customers with any hole off location .06-.08 no one would ever step foot on an airplane ever again cause they would
be falling from the sky left and right.
It's obvious to me that quicktime either never checked the part-or the lot of parts that where run or they did check it and the specs on drawing where no good period,
its the only explination for what has happened and after some research not just to me.

The reason airplanes dont fall from the sky all the time is attention to detail and good quality control standards and lots of inspection at all stages of manufacturing.
I should have checked the starter location before installing the bellhousing I freely admit that. It just was not something I have ever had a problem with after
building and installing quite a few small block ford engines and transmissons all be it never into a FFR.