[traction_issuez]

I was going to buy a S3L block this summer. That is a big lost for Crawford because many people I seen on the boards was going to go that route. That's hundreds of thousands of dollars could have been gain if they just did a better customer service. Seriously, one fix could have gotten them more service.


-MIKE

[Chris05STi]

I honestly believe that if a failure in the engine in result to the engine poorly being built or something was over looked by the company, fixing that problem quick and painless would bring a better image to Crawford than not helping the problem and fixing it, giving them a bad image to potential customers. They would have prob brought more MORE clients if they showed to everyone how effectively they corrected this problem, showing potential customers the great support and care they have. Honestly, what they did *or lack of doing nothing* with this case, has severly hurt their business, they may not notice the impact now, but prob later down the road. I personally would have done everything to help a customer out. Because a customer who tells their friends about how great they were handled goes a long way.

[SoJDM.com]

I think that the undersize pistons are the show stopper (assuming that's not in dispute). Open and shut. All subsequent events may or may not be logically traceable to the undersize pistons, but initially a major error was made which probably makes the vendor liable.

[Cossey]

Dammit, I read through all the posts hoping to find ONE post by Crawford. What a *****.

[Rdrcr]

Originally Posted by SoJDM.com

I think that the undersize pistons are the show stopper (assuming that's not in dispute). Open and shut. All subsequent events may or may not be logically traceable to the undersize pistons, but initially a major error was made which probably makes the vendor liable.

Agreed!

......I hate to see situations like this happen. I hope everything works out the way it should.

Mike

[X2Board_No1]

Well now, I guess I won't be having a Crawford block in either my STI or Legacy wagon, I'm glad I didn't scratch that itch as soon as I got it. Bruce you just saved me over 10 grand, I feel like sending you a c-note.

X2

[Neanderthal Racing]

Originally Posted by X2Board_No1

Bruce you just saved me over 10 grand, I feel like sending you a c-note.

just pm'd my address (insert one of those really sincere smiley faces here)

['05 STi]

Originally Posted by BruceChapman

shocking oil consumption cause identified:

introducing – the new “crawford bobblehead piston" design and warranty program

if you are familiar with me from iwsti or nasioc, you have probably made a couple of observations about me personally.

• i may be funny but i don’t bs
• i don’t whine when things break or go wrong. no crying. no histrionics. fix it and shut up.
• i’ve been crawford performances greatest advocate. (i can be observed spontaneously blurting, “god bless quirt crawford” in my article on how to do a big project build). i have done everything i could to direct people to a crawford motor. i have probably motivated more people on iwsti to look into crawford motors than anyone else. in fact, i’ve sold more motors here for quirt than quirt has.
• it is safe to say my cutn edg project is one of the most followed high performance projects in the us.
• this season we will be campaigning the car at englishtown to get the project in shape for the evo challenge this year. last year, representing subaru, the bv team won, and the element tuning car came in 2nd for subies with an 11.6 or something, i hope phil does well but i can tell you the cutn edg car will be in the 10's by the shootout. if i don't have the talent to do it, my friend mike glasser will be the driver. he's a 100 lbs jockey who will also have a 6 sec pro modified ride this season. locally he is very accomplished.
• by the end of the season we will make an effort to get cutn edg in one of the tuner mags. it shouldn't be that hard.

now, given all that, even if you are a complete weasel, you should at least have enough business sense to do almost anything to avoid the abject humiliation that is about to hit you in the head when you realize that a fairly decent writer is about to expose a major technical problem with your motors and, this is much worse, a major character flaw in your personality. unfortunately, quirt does not have it in him to acknowledge his f**k ups and "own" them as a man should. it is about to be his downfall.

it's like having someone accidently break a vase at your house and you have it captured on video. he says, the dog did it. you say, but i have it on video. he says, it wasn't me...it was the dog. talking to quirt and his business partner, chris, is just like that. what makes the episode so shocking is, if he will do this to me, you know he will do it to anyone else and that is exactly why i am posting this in the manner that i am. There is at least one more motor out here in exactly the same condition as mine. Most of the people buying crawford motors are kids compared to me. Quirt’s problem with me is that i am as old as he is with a lot more resources and my own law firm. i sue state attorney’s general for sport. quirt's not a pimple on my ass. that's not a threat; i would never threaten legal action because that is illegal. it is simply a cold hard fact.

i have done everything i can to telegraph the disaster that quirt crawford’s character flaw is about to create for himself and, unfortunately for the people who work for him. this breaks my heart and that is no exaggeration. this is going to haunt crawford performance throughout the subaru world. they are about to become the motor building equivelent of vivid racing (vivid is cringing right now from the association with crawford performance). you can forgive someone for a mistake. it is harder to forgive someone when they lack good character.

So here it is; this is the story that has been going on behind the scenes. You haven’t been aware of it because i have been protecting my vendors the entire time. i even went so far as to pm people who were asking "what about the oil consumption issue?" on my thread to ask them to remove the question so i didn't have to answer it. only a handful of people know what the process has been. the last thing i reported two weeks ago on my cutn edg thread was that we were tearing down the motor for renovations.

<OThe problem:
since sept 13th when we started my beautiful cutn edg motor for the first time, roughly 100 quarts, of oil have been consumed, to the tune of about 65 miles per quart. That’s right, for me about a quart a day. my motor has deep gouges in cyls 2 & 4 and scratches in 1 & 3 in a distinct pattern at 12 o'clock on all 4 cylinders. my heads, which were rebuilt and fit to eat from when we installed them look like they have 150,000 mile on them now after only 6,000 miles.

What we did to find the problem:<O</O
Everything (and at considerable expense). We ruled out everything until the moment of truth when we started tearing down the motor looking for the cause.

What we found:
<OThe cp pistons in all four cylinders are...too small for the bore. That’s it. I have pictures and some pretty remarkable video.

<OWhat quirt will say (if he has enough balls to come here and say anything):<O</O
</O</O<Oit’s phil grabow’s fault. his tune detonated the motor. he tried to sell me an engine rebuild - seriously; i’ll rebuild it for you for a couple thousand dollars. he talked about abuse. he talked about detonation. he talked about the pistons swelling up and damaging the cylinder walls which is laughable once you've seen the bobblehead video. damn that phil grabow.

last night i wrote quirt, "if phil was a lesser gentleman he'd punch you in the mouth for blaming that mess on him. youre trying to take his reputation and that's much more dispicable than taking my money. money's much easier to recover. for me the pen is mightier on the sword." the conversation i had with quirt and chris yesterday was as retarded as any conversation i’ve ever had. it's stupefying. that was yesterday.

he must have listened to me overnight. in anticipation of this post (and i sent it to him before i posted it), this morning he is taking a different approach on the crawford webpage by shifting the blame to me today instead of phil yesterday. now phil is the hapless victim of me not bringing the car back to phil early enough. my disassembled motor is on the crawford home page entitled, "what happened to my motor" complete with photos: http://www.crawfordperformance.com/home/index.shtml

after you go there, go take a look at "bobbleheadavi_2. when you see that ask yourself, could detonation cause that? all 4 pistons look the same all 4 pistons bobble like that. by comparison, my stock block with 40k miles doesn't bobble at all (shhhh....that's because suburu actually checks tolerances).

his motor detonation story sounds plausible until you are reminded that with undersized pistons - 100 quarts of oil were blended in with the combustion process. any detonation events were secondary to quirt dropping in undersized pistons by mistake. any damage after that is secondary. also, hydra has an most advanced knock detection system that pulls timing before a significant event. quirt's explanation it is complete and utter bs.

quirt is famous for, and in fact i have read him justify his habit of not checking clearances on his motors, on nasioc. he reasons out loud that subaru's shortblocks tolerances are so good and the production tolerances of the cp pistons are so good that he doesn't have to check piston to wall clearances when he assembles them. he just drops them in and he's ok with that. most of the time he can get away with it. however, when you've got a brand new piston design it might be a good idea to check clearances on that first batch but he didn't. my motor received the first set of the new piston design. do i care whether he gave the wrong specs to cp or that cp shipped the wrong pistons to crawford. no. in the end, crawford din't check and right now, i'm not ok with that.

the truth:
So ladies and gentleman, i bring you the “new crawford ‘bobblehead’ piston design” in all its glory. It is surpassed only by the crawford performance “we break it - you pay for it crawford performance warranty plan."

63M bobbleheadpiston_1.avi
88M bbbobbleheadpiston_2.avi
28M bbbobbleheadpiston_3.avi
107M bbbobbleheadpiston_4.avi
35M bbbobbleheadpiston_5.avi
102M bbbobbleheadpiston_6.avi
493M bbbobbleheadpistonssss.avi
these should download faster. thank you everyone.

The links don't work for me, Bruce.

Anyway, that sucks, man.....

['05 STi]

Originally Posted by BruceChapman

this is my e-mail letter to crawford outliining what steps i thought they should take to offset the 3k or so in damages to my project. if you find anything terroristic about it let me know:

hey quirt,

we're not sure what is wrong with the shortblock since, at your request, we have not inspected the pistons but, based on the pattern of gouges, the defect clearly involves the pistons of all 4 cyls. your original response to my oil consumption issue indicates that you may have been aware that at least one motor went out without oil rings or installed improperly. it has taken nearly 4 months, many hours of diagnostic tests performed and a lot of oil to get to where we are now. if you actually knew (and not just suspected) that was the case, it would have saved me a lot of aggravation if you had said so more definitively. i can't help thinking you had some extra oil rings unaccounted for during the week in may you were rushing to get those motors out.(edit: the oil rings were not the problem)

as you know, i experienced extremely high egt's with this motor from the very beginning. based on the damage to the shortblock, it is entirely reasonable to conclude that the excessive egt's were consequential to the amount of oil moving into combustion and ruining the tune the entire time. looking at the heads in their current condition and in consideration of the extreme temps involved here, i could not safely use these heads without a complete rebuild.

with regard to what you need to do to make this "100%" right: i want to remind you of my value to you as a customer.

i have been a persistent ally on the attack threads on nasioc and have offered public relations advice to handle attacks more effectively. the fact that (redacted) has been so low key lately is directly related to an exchange i had on one of those threads. on iwsti, i have nearly 40k hits on my project thread. my opinion is sought out on a daily basis on iwsti and have worked as hard and have probably been more effective at marketing crawford motors than any other customer you have. i wrote a post that was made into a sticky on iwsti that i was asked to convert to a technical article that will be featured on the "hspn network" (the one where i exclaim, "god bless quirt crawford"). no one, with the exception of the bv team has given you more positive internet press. in short, in every respect, i have behaved as someone who has been sponsored by crawford and have never asked for anything in return.

despite the enormity of this oil problem, i have been deliberately protective of you on my project thread and have underplayed the situation knowing that it might come back to embarrass you in the end. i've covered for you in every respect. i now expect the same from you.

here is what i am asking you to do to make this disaster right:
- i want to return the motor to you with the heads
- the gouges are deep enough in the 2/4 cyls to require an overbore. i do not want an overbored motor. i want a completely new shortblock that is brought up to current crawford s4 production standards, i.e. S4 Short Block - 2004 Ultimate Street Car Challenge Short Block 2.6 L New Semi-Closed Deck, Billet Monster Crank, Forged Pistons, 4340 Rods
- the heads were completely rebuilt 4 months ago with a lap job, crower springs and ti retainers. they cannot be safely used again without a new rebuild, to include new crawford valvetrain components to replace those which may have been structurally compromised or weakened by the extreme temps they were subjected to. so far, your defect has cost me about 600. in diagnostics and 2000. + to remove, tear down and reinstall the motor again, after only 4 months. i have accrued nearly 3 grand in expenses to date. i should not be expected to pay for the damage to the heads caused by your defect.
- i want the process expedited to mitigate further damages.

i believe a complete rebuild of the heads, with a complete crawford performance port and polish appropriate for this project, is in order. the head rebuild should include new valves, and all other components with the installation of the new dpr stage3 cam i just ordered (and paid for already), returning the heads to the new shortblock and shipping it back to me as a complete longblock. this will go a long way towards offsetting my damages to date and regaining my confidence in you. i believe any reasonable person would view my request as entirely fair and anything less by you far less so.

meanwhile, i will continue to do my part as the most outspoken non-sponsored advocate crawford performance has on nasioc and iwsti. i look forward to hearing your reply.

respectfully yours,

bruce chapman

what was quirt's response back?

Hello Bruce,

Did you fall and bump your head,,,,,,,,,,,, or is someone brain washing you

Great way to respond to a customer that has spent $1000s through their company!

I hope to see this sleazebag on Judge Judy.

[2LTL2L8]

Bruce, I will start by admitting that I have not read every post in this thread, but I understand that it boils down to a customer service issue....people in genearl make mistakes, and what seperates the men from th boys is how we handle ourselves in said situations. Taking into consideration how much trouble you have had with Crawford, I gave Cobb Tuning a call last week after I blew my stock block. Pooh and the sales crew at Cobb couldn't be more pleasant to deal with. I mean seriously it's like they would have drove my new engine to my house personally if I would have asked them to. I purchased a Cobb Tuner Series stage2 block from them with piston coating, ARP headstuds, and professional series main and rod bearings all as options. I can't wait to get this thing assembled. And the amazing thing is that they call me to let me know the progress, instead of me calling them for updates. I've never dealt with Crawford before, but the kind of customer service that Cobb has been offering to me, is every bit of what I would expect from a company when I just spent $4,200 on one of their motors. I wish you the best of luck, and I doubt either one of us will be disappointed.

-Jason

[Seranin]

products entice customers, but service definitely keeps them. that's good to hear. I can't say I'll ever want to put the money down for another block, but I'll know where to go if I do - it's nice to have some communication

[Neanderthal Racing]

Originally Posted by '05 STi

The links don't work for me, Bruce.

it is possible that the guy who volunteered to compress and host them took them down without telling me. if anyone else has the same problem, let me know.

[Neanderthal Racing]

Originally Posted by 2LTL2L8

Bruce, I will start by admitting that I have not read every post in this thread, but I understand that it boils down to a customer service issue....people in genearl make mistakes, and what seperates the men from th boys is how we handle ourselves in said situations. Taking into consideration how much trouble you have had with Crawford, I gave Cobb Tuning a call last week after I blew my stock block. Pooh and the sales crew at Cobb couldn't be more pleasant to deal with. I mean seriously it's like they would have drove my new engine to my house personally if I would have asked them to. I purchased a Cobb Tuner Series stage2 block from them with piston coating, ARP headstuds, and professional series main and rod bearings all as options. I can't wait to get this thing assembled. And the amazing thing is that they call me to let me know the progress, instead of me calling them for updates. I've never dealt with Crawford before, but the kind of customer service that Cobb has been offering to me, is every bit of what I would expect from a company when I just spent $4,200 on one of their motors. I wish you the best of luck, and I doubt either one of us will be disappointed.

...does this make us related, somehow?

[eatV8]

Originally Posted by BruceChapman

...does this make us related, somehow?

Blood brothers... Go the cobb shortblocks! I see big things ahead for Cobb engines

[EngineerX]

My apologies. Didn't mean to demean or be prejudicious.