Does Anyone Have Vendor Recommendations?
Please Note: It is not possible for the NSX FAQ administrator to verify any good or bad stories about vendors. All reviews are presented unedited and with attribution to the author. The authors are soley responsible for the content of their reviews
Comptech
Review #1
Thu, 02 Apr 1998, [BM]
I will continue to give COMPTECH high points for the products they supply us with. My driver side header cracked at the expansion joint (or whatever that part of the fluted pipe is called) on a banzai run to see my son.
My Acura dealer called Comptech after I had them check it out, and I was told to cruise by on my way home (I live over the hill from El Dorado Hills where Comptech is located), and Don told me to just drop the car off and they would repair/replace at no charge. I appreciate this kind of immediate response, and still think they are great!
Review #2
Fri, 05 Dec 1997, [CCA]
Thanks to Comptech: Bill, Tim, Shad et. al., for their assistance in the diagnosis and such. In spite of the fact that my problem was not related to either the design or fabrication of the headers, they were really willing to pitch in to help resolve matters. Their products are well made and engineered and they clearly believe in customer service and satisfaction.
Review #3
Mon, 5 Apr 1999, [CWI]
I want to let the other list members know how helpful Chris at Comptech was in answering my questions regarding a swap between a stock and resonanted tip Comptech exhaust.
Chris demonstated to me the excellence of Comptech’s customer support. Even though I am not the first owner of this unit, Chris took the time to answer my questions regarding his company’s product. Thanks much Chris!
Review #4
Mon, 10 May 1999, [CWI]
Kudos to Comptech for helping me out with my resonated tip exhaust at NSXPO. Shad from Comptech was even generous enough to get his hands gresey to help me install my new unit…
Review #5
1998?, [DH]
My opinion on Comptech (in General)
I feel that vendors of racing parts, in general, don’t have what I would call "high customer satisfaction" as one of their top goals, as it just ain’t in the mentality of a person who builds unique fast cars, unique go-fast car parts, to also be an exceeding good business person and do the mundane things and extra effort that we may be used to when dealing with an Acura factory service representatives. Vendors of racing parts don’t have the backing of a company with a gizzillion dollars like Acura, so it may be harder for them go the extra effort in terms of "warranty
work" if they have to worry about every little expense to keep the business moving forward.
I feel that Comptech, in general, is a good company, and I am thankful that they make go-fast NSX parts available to us. I wish the parts were cheaper (but they have no economies of scale in their niche market, so can you really bitch they are expensive? Besides, people still buy the Comptech parts, so if people buy them, they must not be too expensive, right?), I wish their customer service would be better, (but I also wish that Phone companies/Cable TV companies had better customer service also.) If ya think about it, Comptech is like the GTE or your local cable company. You basically don’t have a huge selection of vendors with **RACING EXPERIENCE** competing with them on some of their high end parts (R&P, Engine Work, Brembo brakes). When ya don’t have a lot of competitors, there is no motivation for having good customer service to differentiate yourself. Does your cable cable company go out of their way to help you install service, answer your phone calls, or get to your house on time? My cable company sure sucks with customer service.
I will probably continue to buy various parts from Comptech, and I am really thankful that they sent me a new R&P, so they have restored my faith in them. And I guess I will just have to hope that they will improve their customer service.
Review #6
[GW – 2000/7/17]
My recent dealing with Comptech have resulted in a positive experience. The person who helped me was Mike B. I’m very happy with Comptech.
Dali Racing
Review #1
Sun, 17 May 1998
[NM]
Mark has earned my respect (and money) and is one of the few people I would buy from sight unseen. If you are looking for economical upgrades of the highest quality – call him first.
NTB
Review #1
[SB], 25 Apr 1999
Some of you may remember my experiences with National Tire and Battery (NTB) and damages my pristine OEM 98 wheels suffered during a dismount. Now that it has finally been resolved, I would like to post the facts of my case and allow you to draw your own conclusions. I think some may find it important to know of my experiences when tire shopping. As to whether it would be satisfactory to you if the same should happen, only you can decide.
Wheels were clearly damaged during dismount of the OEM tires. Clearcoat was gouged off the rims in several places, with jaw marks on the interior of the wheel. I got attitude from the store manager but he finally reluctantly offered to have them refinished. We had a significant disagreement when I tried to get it writing. I asked to deal with the regional manager. He was very pleasant, but would not even entertain the notion of new wheels. He offered to refinish them,
instead.
At this point, I discussed with him their high cost and associated high value on the used market – in a pristine as new condition (such as what I brought in). As I had already purchased a spare set of 94+ rims for my winter tires (oddly enough so I could avoid mount/dismount damages from repeatedly switching summer and winter tires), I had considered selling the new rims and financing tires with the difference. Refinished rims, although "as good as new" are NOT new and thus fetch about $500 less on the open market. I explained this to the regional manager whose response was an offer of only $200 off new tires and refinishing the rims.
In a subsequent conversation, I then explained very clearly to him what would be satisfactory to me and that I would be posting what he decided to the national NSX Club of America. In case he didn’t know, NSX owners buy alot of tires (he knew).
What I wanted was new OEM rims, but if I couldn’t have new rims, I wanted refinished rims and $500 towards the purchase of tires to compensate me for the loss in value of my rims. He stuck to his previous $200 figure. $200 is likely their margin on the set of tires, so he wasn’t giving me anything, really. Also, the store invoiced me for full retail until I pointed out that I could get the tires in question from the Discount Tire store down the street for at least $300 less. So apparently he was trying to make up some of the wheel refinishing cost as well.
They couldn’t find three separate choices in tires (Toyo Proxes, Dunlop 8050, Dunlop 9000), so I finally bought a set at a local Discount Tire store (Pirelli P7000 Summer), and made NTB send me a check for the $200.
In case you’re interested, I inquired at the Discount Tire. I presented them my scenario and asked what their policy would be. What they told me was that if I wanted new wheels, I’d GET new wheels. That is corporate policy handed down from the owner. Company is still privately owned and run by the man who feels that a satisfied customer is a customer for life so whatever the cost in the short term is outweighed by the long term.
Seems to me that for $300 in the short term, NTB lost MUCH more than that in the long term.
Review #2
Becky Halkard, Fri, 10 Nov 2000
I just read your commentary about NTB. I had exactly the same problem with them, only being a girl, they really ripped me off! I brought my new Mustang Cobra in for a tire upgrade. They ruined every one of my rims in the same manner as yours. I was pretty meek about the whole thing, but did manage to get them to replace my ruined rims, not with new rims, but with some not-so-ruined rims. There was no discount on the tires, about $1,500 worth, and no apology. Needless to say, I now go to the discount store down the street and have been for the past 3 years since the incident. Thanks for posting your note, hope it helps others before they get carelessly marred, scuffed and gouged.
RM Racing
Review #1
Mon, 11 May 1998
Larry Chong, LChong@aol.com
Just to let everyone know, I ordered some springs and brake pads from RM Racing a couple of weeks ago. I never really looked at the parts until I took my NSX in to have the parts installed. To my amazement, I got three front springs and one rear spring.
I made a call to RM Racing and talked with Randy. He apologize and immediately shipped the correct spring to my dealership and they got it the next day. He even called the dealer and myself to make sure everything was OK.
It is sure nice to see a business that will response quickly to a problem. The springs work great and the pads stop better than my stock ones.
I would recommend doing business with RM Racing!!
Review #2
4 Jul 1998
[DNG]
You won’t get better service.
Review #3
Tue, 4 Aug 1998
[JF]
Sunday the 26th of July I set out for Phoenix, AZ, to turn Randy Marchetti of RM Racing loose on my white/black 97′ NSX-T. The next morning I drove up to Randy’s shop about 10 am where he was prepared for my arrivial with NOS Kit, Exhaust System w/dual DTM tips, Carbon Kevlar Brake Pads, Stainless Steel Engine Hose Kit, various replacement Alloy and Billet Engine Covers/Bottle, White Guage Cluster, Seat Belt Harness, and WORK Wheels, all set aside with my name on’em.
About an hour later I was delivered to Sky Harbor Airport with Randy’s assurance that my NSX transformation would be completed by Friday morning. He also volunteered to call me each day with a progress report (which he did without fail).
My NSX was ready as promised and I flew back out Friday morning to pick her up.
Quality of RM Products: absolutly first rate materials and products used.
Quality of Workmanship: Randy is an artist with stainless steel lines and polished alloy. Total factory type install and personal attention to detail. My NSX looks just as good as Randy’s own.
I’ve driven about 500 plus miles in my NSX since RM sent me smiling down the road and everything is exceptional. I’m still pretty frugal with the NOS button but I’m sure I’ll be a full blown N20 junkie in no time at all…
Simpson Racing
Wed, 8 Apr 1998
[GM] I had a bad experience with Simpson Racing over the past few weeks and want to relate the details to fellow listers.
I decided to install the Dali harness bar (GREAT product!) and 5 point belts in my car. I ordered the belts over the phone from Simpson’s HQ in Texas and paid with a credit card. I was told by the woman I ordered from that they would ship in 14 – 21 days. Nine days later I received a delivery notice from UPS that my package from Simpson was COD and to leave a certified check for delivery.
I phoned Simpson that night (Friday) but their message said they were only open weekdays. On a lark I phoned the next day -Saturday- and was pleased to speak to a sales rep. They had no knowledge of my order. They had erroneously sent me a drag racing product but had no record of that shipment either. A man’s name was on my invoice (attached to the drag product) even though I ordered from a woman. My invoice was marked paid but their rep said invoice numbers mean nothing to them – they track orders by phone number. After some time they found enough data to realize the mistake. They were supposed to fax UPS a release form allowing the COD package to be delivered without payment on Monday.
They never faxed this document to UPS. Monday I arrived home to no belts. I phoned Simpson again. They agreed to fax UPS the release form that night. After telling me everything was fixed they failed to fax this document for the second time. UPS phoned me back to say they had not received anything but by that time Simpson was closed (see below).
I phoned UPS the next morning hoping they had somehow received Simspon’s fax overnight. No joy. I phoned Simpson and started yelling. I was again told they would fax UPS. They tried to blame everything on UPS. They told me it would take 8 hours for UPS to reply to their fax and I would not get my order that day. This was not true – after receiving the fax UPS called me within 30 minutes, radioed their truck driver and I finally received my belts.
At no time did Simpson ever say "We’re sorry – we made a mistake." If they had I would have taken a completely different attitude. Every time I phoned Simpson I was put on hold – once for 22 minutes. Often a rep would come
back on the line saying "Who is this? I'm working on 4 customers and forgot what you wanted". The shortest time I was put on hold was 8 minutes which is a long time to be on hold! Their constant attempts to blame UPS did not sit well with me.
From my experience Simpson’s office cannot track an order or run a fax machine, but they ask us to trust our lives to their engineering and manufacturing departments. I think they make good products but I would search a long time for alternatives before using them again. In fairness friends of mine have received good service from Simpson so maybe this was an unusual occurrence.
An interesting aside is that Simpson completely close down at 6pm eastern time. Even their California office closes at this time. This was important because on the second fax attempt UPS phoned me to say it never arrived and if I could have reached someone at Simpson I could have resolved the situation a day earlier. This closing early on the west coast is IMO a blatant attempt to avoid customers with problems.
Tire Rack
Review #1
Tue, 23 Feb 1999, [BHA]
My experience was not a good one with Tire Rack salesmen, but a good one with Tire Rack.
I was emphatically informed by the Tire Rack salesman that I was dealing with that the Michelin Pilot SX MXX3s were identical in every way to the MXX3 N0 and MXX3 N1s (which are Porsche OEM tires) except for the little N0 and N1 on them. After consulting this list (Wolfgang, et al.) and the Porsche list (who looked at it from the other direction and were very helpful) the determination was made that these tires are not identical at all).
I recommend deciding what tires you want, then calling them and telling them what to ship. (I bought Dunlop SP8000s all around and have been very happy for the price and they were delivered right away with no problems). If you want more tire advice, you might want to include whether price is an issue.
Review #2
Wed, 24 Feb 1999, [RR]
I don’t wish to "pile on" the Tire Rack, but as of today, I’m a little less than satisfied with their service. I’ve heard nothing but good things about the outfit (and have recommended them based upon that), although I had never used them until this week. I ordered a set of front OEM Yokohamas for my ’93. I received them today, in record time. Unfortunately, someone in their shipping department is a MORON. The tires were shipped unenclosed, and strapped together in 3 places. This is cool. One of the tires was "packaged" in some very tough plastic material adequate to protect it during shipping. The other tire was shipped naked. The sidewall of the uncovered tire was, predictably, permanently scraped up all to Hell. To make matters worse, the moron who shipped them strapped them together with the "outer" sidewall of the uncovered tire facing outward, thus ensuring that I couldn’t use it. I’m not a very satisfied customer at this point in time.
Review #3
Sun, 14 Mar 1999, [KP]
I went to Tire Rack’s web page and ended up ordering the tires on-line. Interactively, it told me the tires were in stock, confirmed the purchase price, and specified the shipping charges. Oddly, the 2-day shipping charge from Reno, NV to Socal was $.40 cheaper than "normal" ground charges. A few minutes after ordering, I received an e-mail confirmation of my order which, amoung other things, informed me that I would receive another e-mail when the tires actually shipped. About two hours later, I got the second e-mail confirming shipment. As stated, the tires arrived in two days. They were strapped together with one of the outside walls facing out and one facing in. It didn’t look like anyone paid particular attention to the way they were strapped together in terms of outside edges. Nevertheless, they arrived in perfect shape with no scraps or scuffs.
Review #4
Thu, 25 Feb 1999, [JR]
This is the way I’ve received all of the tires I’ve bought from Tire Rack. Strapped together in pairs, FEDEX label stuck on them. I haven’t encountered any problems with that method of shipping, and I assume that is the way they ship all tires.
I have only one complaint about the Tire Rack. I ordered a set of Hoosier’s R3S03’s for 15/16" wheels. Had them mounted and used them at a track event. When I took them off I noticed that one tire seemed to be more worn than the other three. When I looked closely, I noticed that this tire was a A3S03, not a R3S03. I guess I should have looked closer when I received them.
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