I Had A Bad Business Transaction With Cartech!

[bryan manduley]

I would like to advise all potential Cartech customers of the deceitful manner in which I was treated in a recent business transaction. I first ordered all my Cartech parts through Brian Bossone (the owner) of E.L.D. Performance. Brian Bossone was a Cartech dealer (he is now so disgusted with Cartech that he longer wishes to be a dealer for them). It took Cartech over six months and dozens of un-returned phone calls for me to receive my parts from them. I ordered a twin turbo kit from them. Along with the turbo kit I also received a large air to air intercooler with an approximate value of $1800.00. This intercooler was not on the invoice, nor was I billed for it because I did not order it. Cartech had no record of sending me this intercooler. I called Cartech and brought this error to Corky Bell's (one of the owners of Cartech) attention so they would not be missing an intercooler that had not been paid for. One day, I was looking at the pair of T-70 turbos and I noticed that one of the turbos had a .85 A.R. exhaust housing and the other turbo had a .69 A.R. exhaust housing (the A.R. numbers are stamped in the exhaust housing entrances), so I decided to measure the exhaust wheel and the compressor wheel of both turbos in order to compare them to each other. Upon measuring the two turbos, I discovered the turbos were different from each other (both turbos were supposed to be the same). At this time I sent the two incorrect turbos back to be exchanged for a correct pair of matching turbos. The headers that I paid $1650.00 for, were of very poor quality. The exhaust port openings inside the headers flanges were full of jagged welding slag and spatter. I had to pay the person who ported my heads to grind this welding slag and spatter from the header ports. I feared the slag and spatter would not only disrupt air flow, but possibly break loose and go through my turbos. I also had to pay for two of the primary header tubes to be T.I.G. welded, because Cartech did not fully weld the mandrel bends together that made up the primary header tubes. Next, all of the flanges on the headers were warped from when they were welded to the primary header tubes. None of the flanges had been surfaced after this welding had been performed . I ordered the headers with E.G.T. fittings installed in each primary header tube. It was impossible to have the E.G.T. probes installed in the headers with the valve covers installed on the engine. You could only put twelve of the sixteen header bolts into the heads because the bolt holes were drilled in the wrong location on the header flanges. I sent the headers back to Cartech to have these problems resolved. At this same time, I also discovered that the wastegates they suggested and sold to me were not big enough for my application. When I originally ordered my turbo kit, I wanted a pair of "Turbonetics Racegates" but the Cartech sales person said, "the Cartech wastegates would work fine," which was not the case because they were too small and not able to bleed off enough exhaust gas for a progressive boost controller to work properly (I wanted to be able to leave on a low boost level and increase the boost level throughout the run), so I sent the new and unused Cartech wastegates back to Cartech to be exchanged for bigger wastegates ( the UPS tracking number is 1z2y9y050341848045). Corky had told me that he would exchange the smaller Cartech wastegates for bigger wastegates. The Cartech wastegates were delivered to Cartech on March 26, 2002. I waited two weeks for Corky to check pricing and availability on the new replacement wastegates, which he never did. During that two week period, I called Corky several times to see if he had checked on the price and availability of the new replacement wastegates. He kept telling me that "he did not have time." After the two week period, Brian Bossone and I conference called Corky and asked him to issue E.L.D. Performance a $530.00 refund for the incorrect wastegates and the shipping charges since "he did not have time to check on the new wastegates." At that time, Corky agreed to pay the $530.00 refund. During this conference call, Corky also stated that he was tight on money and that he could only afford to refund $300.00 at that time because he had just paid some people that he already owed money to; or if we would wait 3 weeks, he would be able to refund the full $530.00. We (Brian Bossone and I) told Corky that we would wait three weeks for the full $530.00 refund since that was the full amount that was owed to us. Corky agreed that in three weeks he would issue E.L.D. Performance the full $530.00 refund on the new, unused Cartech wastegates that Corky had in his possession. Five weeks have passed since Brian Bossone and I last spoke to Corky, so Brian Bossone decides to call Corky and check on the status of the $530.00 refund. During this conversation, Corky tells Brian Bossone that he never agreed to the full $ 530.00 refund (which is a lie) and that he was only willing to issue a $300.00 refund. After this conversation with Corky, Brian Bossone and I conference called Mike Montgomery (one of the other Cartech owners) at Cartech to ask if he could do anything about the $530.00 refund and Corkys' unprofessional business practices. Mike stated that, "his hands were tied and that he could not do anything." The next day I called Corky and during our conversation, I asked him why was he going back on his word. I also reminded him that I was on the phone during the conference call to him and that I also heard him say that he would issue the full $530.00 refund in the three weeks. He proceeded to tell me that he never said that and why would he say that in the first place. I then told him that he must not be a real Texan, since he was not a man of his word. After telling me "to go screw myself," he hung up the phone. In the mean time, Cartech has had the Cartech wastegates since March 26, 2002 and we still have not received a refund on them.
Bryan Manduley

[GodStang]

Thanks for the warning and good luck with everything.