Seller Feedback Jake Breyck, uza70.com, a.k.a. quantum-auto.com 1UZ flywheel purchase, what a joke!

The 1UZFE EGR Delete Kit is available for sale here.

sniper

Super Moderator
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814
Location
USA
I paid for my flywheel on 6/10/09 and it took 4 weeks (received on 07/14/09) for me to get a flywheel that looked just like the one marked "A" in the photo below. It was light and of an acceptable quality for the price. Only problem is, it doesn't work with 7M pressure plates like I was told. It only works with the pressure plates uza70.com sells on their site. I spent weeks talking to numerous clutch sellers, trying to figure out why the 7M pressure plates I had didn't work. I finally came to the conclusion that the pattern on the flywheel was incorrect. After showing photos of the clutches uza70.com sells on their site to those retail clutch stores I was talking to, the only comment I received from them was, "That pressure plate seems to be some type of cheep china made unit, and we would not recommend you use it." After numerous unanswered emails over a few weeks of trying to contact Jake, he finally said quote, "hey man, sorry, i had a lot going on an i just forot. i dont reallyhave an excuse. again sorry about that..." in that same email, 13 weeks after I first paid for my item, I finally had a refund offer from him and an address that I could send my flywheel back to, and I did so on 09/14/09. I have sent 3 more emails, one week after I mailed my return back, asking to confirm he got it and that he was sending the new one out, just as he said he was ready and able to do. It has now been 16 weeks since I first paid for this item and all my emails since having sent my return back have been unanswered. Over 16 weeks and I have nothing to show for the $620 I send to them on 6/10/09, in good faith that I would have a light, high quality flywheel for my 1UZ project. I hope that anyone who is looking to do business with uza70.com aka quantum-auto.com will find my experiences with them informative.

 
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Sniper, sorry to hear about this, and thanks for airing it in a non-emotive way.

This would be a great opportunity for Jake and/or Red Phoenix to step up to the plate and sort this out, and show everyone what they're made of.

It's easy to run a business when things are going well, but the true measure of a business and its owners is how they handle their customer service problems.
 
Thanks for your comment, I am trying to lay out the facts in an objective manner so that anyone who reads my post may draw their own conclusions.

I will also point out that every email I sent was to and from Jake, and so I'm under the impression that he was the only person I have been dealing with over all these months. I never talked to Red Phoenix other than when I PMed him asking about which pressure plate he used in his car. His response was that 'they' (I assumed he was referring to quantum auto) use their own pressure plates. I was never given a brand name for the pressure plates by Jake, I was only told the lbs of clamping force of the pressure plates they sell, and about the two options they offered. At one point he asked if I wanted to just buy a pressure plate from him, and I refused. This was because the flywheel was sold with the claim that it would work with any 7M clutch, not just the ones they sold.

I took a look at some of the photos of the pressure plates on uza70.com and searched the few part numbers that could be seen. All myself and each clutch retailer I talked to came up with when searching these part numbers was that it was some type of unique China made unit. Here is what I came up with as I was searching to figure out why my clutches weren't working, and trying to determine what they were selling on uza70.com,



I used the part numbers I found in photo 'C' which is from uza70.com. After numerous days of searching, I only found one photo of one pressure plate that matched which is shown in photo 'D'. The site I found it on listed a multitude replacement pressure plates. When you visit the site (http://www.toeflex.cn/clutchpats/clutchcovercatalogue.htm) you will find this "47607" unit. I sent this photo to the clutch retailer I was talking to, and I pointed out the double bolt/pin pattern of the "47607" They specifically pointed out that the one with the double bolt pattern was some type of unique China made unit that they did not recommend I use. They were also the ones who confirmed for me that the ACT T021 that is shown in photo 'E' is the proper 7MGE replacement. It does not have the double bolt pattern and it did not work with the flywheel I received months ago.

Another thing that really shocked me when I first brought up this mismatching clutch issue to Jake, was his first solution to the problem. He said that I could drill out the holes to make it work, or if I was not comfortable doing this on my own, i could have a machine shop do it for me. This was right after I had just received the flywheel.

I also feel it's prudent to point out that I was never offered any type of compensation, or other gesture of any kind from Jake to try and make up for this whole ordeal. This would include such things as a quick refund or swap of the wrong part, some type of % discount on a $600 flywheel for the time and headache, or SOMETHING else that shows some type of want to correct the issue. Not to mention that I still have yet to get my item...
 
Damn, sorry I missed this thread.

I can see where you are coming from now.

Seems like a lot of bad communication and its hurts to hear it because there have been about 100 customs in the last 6 months, all with postive results. Yes shipping is slow, but you have to realize that everything is built to order. Basically we rely on the time it takes the machine shop to make the part and then we ship it. We usually get about 2-4 week time frame on how many parts we need them to make.

Now granted, I also see some bad communication. Where I cannot make excuses for Jake, I know he is ultra busy and this is just a side business to help out the community. I personally helped him out over the summer between my classes by shipping out and picking up parts so he wouldn't have to because of his busy schedule. Like I said, its no excuse for what happened.

Putting aside the bad communication. I remember your emails awhile ago. We both were having a hard time understanding what was happening at first with the issue with your flywheel. I can see what happened here.

We had the flywheel made with my pressure plate. The machinist had my pressure plate and made the mounting holes from 2 of the best holes he saw fit. What we all did not know was that my pressure plate had holes for 2 different styles of flywheels. Since my pressure plate was bought for a MK3 application, that is what is was advertised as. It also did not help that when we tested it on another MK3 pressure plate, it also had those extra holes in it.

Now looking at it, it is quite obvious that MOST of the MK3 pressure plates use a 2 hole pattern vs 3 hole pattern. This was brought to Jakes attention with your flywheel. Since it was modeled off 2 different pressure plates that both happen to have all 3 of the mounting holes, it was assumed by the machinist to use the 2 obvious holes, the ones that would equally balance the mounting pressure in relation to the guide pins.

On other note about the pressure plates. It is not a cheap Chinese knock off. The clutches and pressure plates are hand built by a clutch shop that has been making clutches for decades. They are hand built in America. Now where THEY get there pressure plate casings from is beyond me. I do not know, nor is it any of my business on where they order their parts from. However what I can say is that their clutches/pressure plates are second to none and what is nice is that they will build ANYTHING... Hell if you wanted a Kevlar, metallic, with some organic and bubblegum clutch disc, they will do it.

Now after talking to Jake today on what was going to happen with this order. The flywheel is being taken care of by the machinist. It will work with the MK3 pressure plates.

And from now on, this problem has been corrected. So if anyone else had this issue, PM me, I will forward it to Jake.

On further note, he does plan on giving compensation for this painstaking issue.

Time frame? Hopefully he will be able to chime in on that.


I hate that you had this trouble. It sucks reading about this stuff... and furthermore, sucks that I am partially involved (but not at the same time I guess). However despite Jakes ultra busy work schedule, this will get hammered out. I will make sure of it.
 
Your absolutely right, communication was an issue early on. For the first week most of those emails were written in broken up sentences. He was trying and we were passing emails readily, and then it just all kinda fell apart. If it takes 2-4 weeks, then say 2-4 weeks + shipping, not “please allow 2 weeks for delivery”. Would it be better to post that broad amount of time and have it get to the customer's door step early, or be practically guaranteed to be late? What would you want for your business. And while you may rely on the machine shop as far as product and shipping time goes, does the customer see it from that point of view? Would the proud owner of a successful business waste his time passing blame of slow turn around time on to a supplier, or would they take steps in communicating their honest expectations to the buyer, and work on minimizing or eliminating the lag time.

I'm happy for Jake in that he has work and is keeping busy, and that he wants to offer parts for retail sales. I hate that my flywheel was such a burden on him and his work schedule. What does a busy schedule have to do with the stack of cash that I sent him for his product? Was he doing all this for free, at an unbelievably low low price, or am I asking for some type of favor from him by paying for this flywheel that he has for sale on his site? I may be able to understand taking up his time if one of those 3 things were true, but surely I'm not someone who's bothering him, and wasting his time by doing business with him. Any shop that takes on the duty of sales has to be responsible in making sure they are able to handle the extra demand.

I came to the conclusion that this flywheel must have been modeled just as you said, off a pressure plate that just happened to have a different pattern, and I'm glad it's finally take care of, and that no one who buys one in the future will have issues like I did. It's understandable, and it still doesn't take away from everything I am having to try and do to make this right.

It's great there is a shop there that has been building their own clutches for a while and has a reputation built up. And it's only my personal taste, that I wouldn't choose a shop that is willing to even make clutches with bubblegum, to make a sale, rather than offering just the best race proven stuff. And what's the name of the shop that builds them, surely they have a brand name? The fact that they assemble them in the USA is fantastic, the parts are are coming from somewhere else and all my research, and that of shops I talked to, think that's China. But as I said, people have their own personal preferences on the parts they use based on the experiences they have had in the past.

I'm glad he's finally taking care of my item over 3 weeks after I shipped it out to him, and after you stepped up to help out. I do however find it very disappointing that Jake told me he has another flywheel already done, ready, made, complete, with the correct pattern, ready to ship out as soon as he received my original one as a return. And now, I am hearing that my item is at the machinist, to be re-drilled I assume. Is this another result of bad communication? Perhaps I miss understood his offer?

Hey, no one likes it when this kinda stuff happens, I know I sure don't. I really believe that people would rather see a string of good, strong, reputable shops getting good comments, rather than problems and issues. I waited, and waited, and did what I could to avoid bringing this into the public light, but here it is.



One thing I want to say and put out there, away from this topic, regarding favors to the 1UZ community, the 1UZ family is not a tiny band of people, made up of a few decrepit enthusiasts. This is a new, vigorous and growing market force that isn't weak, and doesn't ask for favors from people who feel sorry for it, nor does it have time for wishy-washy supporters. The 1UZ market is getting big, and it challenges those who want to support it to be honest and dedicated.
 
There is still nothing new on this, still no emails, I even tried to contact Jake via AIM with no response yet. A simple email message letting me know what is going on, or telling me he got my item and is shipping another one, or is working on mine, or letting me know that he isn't going to just forget about me once again would be nice. What ever happened to customer service? It's been MONTHS!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
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Hello Sniper,

I am extremely upset that people in here try to make a quick buck and unable to be a professional about it. I AIM Jake also and I told him get back to me when you are online. So far he never did. Now it makes me wonder the true story of Redpheonix/Jake and Chris situation. Our supermoderator contacted Chris and would like to hear his side of the story and he was a gentleman enough to let the thread go even his reputation was being ruin. So we need to take a second look into the situation between them.
 
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True story of the Chris situation? Very true. In fact he did everything to get away from it, including he just sold his car so the the trace of the MK3 1uz does not exist anymore... You can believe it all you want, Chris will deny it 100%. There are plenty of people locally who know the truth of the story which still leaves me $600 out of my own pocket.


Your flywheel is at the machine shop. I told you that it is in the machinists hands. I called him yesterday and he said he was working on Sunday to finish up extra orders he had to work with. I am pretty sure that entails the flywheel.

I didn't want to update until I had it in my hand, seems like false hope to keep telling you, its coming soon. I am swinging by there today to pick it up if its done so it can go out.
 
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Thanks Matt.


I finally got the flywheel. The pressure plate popped right onto the alignment pins. Take a look at the photos and judge for yourself what you think of the craftsmanship.

1uzalumflywheel026.jpg








 
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And last one, which happens to be my favorite,



Each person can decide for themselves what they think of the flywheel.


So now that I have my product it in my hands, what are my thoughts, feelings, opinion, and viewpoints on this flywheel, Jake, and UZA70.com?

Did I ever hear back from Jake since the last time he emailed me the return address for my flywheel? Nope.

Did any of my return-due-to-defect shipping costs get refunded or covered? Nope.

Did I ever receive an offer for some type of "compensation for this painstaking issue"? Nope.

Do I think the item I paid for is a good value, or worth the money? Nope and nope.

Do I feel as though Jake was straightforward, honest, and gave a genuine effort to resolve the issue? Nope, NOPE, and nope.

Would I recommend someone buy the 1UZ-FE Aluminum Flywheel from Jake Breyck, or uza70.com / quantum-auto.com? Nope.

Am I happy with my flywheel? Not really. I'm bitter, and I feel like I'm going to just cut my losses. I think that is an understandable attitude seeing how I finally have a usable item in my hands 5 months, yes Five Months, after I originally paid for it. I really wish I had gone with another item from someone else.

Best of luck to you guys over there in Florida.
 
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Uhhh, looks like those holes in your pressure plate are a little off there, Sniper ;)

Sorry, not to be making light of the situation; we all feel your pain, because anyone who hotrods has been in a deal gone wrong at one time or another.
 
Sniper I just PM'd you about your post. I'm glad you posted your story about the uza70.com. Sad to hear these stories but at least you have saved some other people the heartache of going through this.
 
Personally I would have been P'd off big time if it didn't go together first try.

Looks like a copy of lots of other flywheels.
 
Sniper when I clicked to open your first pic, my virus scanner stopped it and detected a virus. Thought I'd let you know to check the pics and the links.

Ryan
 
Thanks for the heads up, everything is on imageshack so I assumed it should all be clean. I'll look into it
 
I sent the flywheel back a few days ago after Jake said he would refund my money. I am still waiting to hear from him. There are some other issues that we are talking over. Ill post an update when it happens.
 
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I was reading that thread, and remember thinking, why are people getting all excited over a product that already is offered by a few other vendors, that have a proven track record. Personally, if you like your limbs, I wouldnt be inclined to use a flywheel thats not balanced and of good quality.
 


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