Very bad experience with Engine Dynamics of San Jose CA

[JAGraff]

I just want to say sorry in advance for this long letter, but I need to let everyone in on this engine shops lack of morals. When I first called the shop, Engine Dynamics Inc. of San Jose CA they gave me a quote of $1250.00 for the engine and heads to be machined and balanced and all the rest of the goodies. I specifically said a 3 angle valve job, since I read about it on here just make a point of seeing what I was going to get. I had gone to the shop several times to gather data to see if I wanted to let this shop do the work on my newly acquired 351C engine, after all, it did take forever to find the stinkin thing. Well, when I finally got there he told me he didn’t realize I wanted him to do the heads too. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, but when he told me that the engine was going to cost $1800 for the machining alone and $3000 for him to do the whole thing, I didn’t know what to say. He also told me on several other times that it would be about $160 – 170 to have the engine magnafluxed (neat name for checking for cracks) and to be degreased and to have the engine all cleaned up. I went as far as to tell him that I wanted to get the engine painted after he was done cleaning it up before he did the engine work. When I was there with my engine the price was raised to $237 for the job to be done and once again he told me that he didn’t realize I wanted the heads done. Ok, fine do all the work we spoke about for $237 so I can find out if the engine and heads are good or not. I dropped off the engine and everything I had for the engine and was told by, I think his name was Mike, that I should leave the dampner, intake, pistons and rods to see if they were any good too and so they could clean them up. Needless to say, the couple day job turned into over a week and several trips over there. When the engine was finally done, I got off work early with a friend to pick it up and when I arrived the block went from a greasy POS to a rusty POS (POS = Piece Of Shit). I had to fight with him tooth and nail till he finally told me, “since I am such a nice and caring guy, I will keep the engine till tomorrow and take the rust off it for you.”. Like this was some big favor, I mean what did I pay all that money. He also told me that one of the heads was bad so he didn’t bother cleaning it off and when I asked him if he was going to deduct it from the bill, he told me that I didn’t understand how little business works. He continued to tell me that the money I would have gotten back, I spent by asking him all of my questions. That was the first time I have ever heard of an engine shop charging for questions personally!!!! Please, correct me if I am wrong……… Didn’t think so. You thought I was over, but I am not. When I went to go pick the engine up the second time (mind you I had to take off from work four times so far because of this guy) he had cleaned the sand off of it from when he sand blasted it and then covered it with some gray paint and finished it off with some sort of oil. All I am trying to tell you is make sure you really know who you are dealing with when you go to get something done. This guy was the nicest guy you had ever met, till he heard he wasn’t going to sucker me into the larger bill and then he turned into a supreme jerk. He went as far as saying that he would have done a better job if I was going to get the engine done by him!!!! Talk about lack of morals and common sense!! One more thing, get EVERYTHING in writing and read it more then once so you really know what you are getting since as I found out, word of mouth isn’t enough. Warren, the owner, and his worker, Mike, told me so many lies of what they were going to do and when it came down to it they were all lies. Warren told me that Mike would never have said that stuff and that nothing is for free in his shop. The best thing is that I had my roommate with me the entire time I was there. I was never there alone and he was trying to tell me I was wrong. Sorry for being childish, but, what a moron!!!!!! Thank you all for listening to my blabber.

Racin’ Jason

[Sounds like a bummin' situation Jason. Chalk it up as a 'lesson learned' and consider yourself lucky that you got an engine back at all. You are more than welcome to repost this in the Blue Oval Lounge or Performance Industry forums where I'm sure others will share similar experiences. --Jeff]


[Note: This message has been edited by jchambers]