I have been on Land Rover forums for along time 12+ years and have become jaded to people complaining about getting ripped off at shops. I quietly thought too myself it was there own fault for not knowing what was needed or going there in the first place.
As some of you know I recently traveled from Dallas to Colorado Springs towing a truck for my sister to borrow. Upon arrival my truck stopped running. Try as I might to repair it I had no luck. It was stuck on a street and my sister has no garage. So against my better judgement and because I had to get back to Houston for work, I had a local dealer tow and repair it.

After having the truck for about a month here was the outcome. This was an email sent at the request of the owner on Saturday:


George,
Here is the information I promised.

The truck has not been driven or touched since I brought it back from Colorado Springs. On the trip home, after it taking several hard starts to get it started, I just kept it running even in gas stations and drove straight through to get it home. It was pulling horribly to the left as well.

This is what I found when I opened the hood:

No vacuum line to the distributor




That is supposed to connect this port to the distributor is capped off with a rubber plug




The main feed for the vacuum line is not connected (Minor issue, just a glimpse at the quality issue):







The grill has been smashed on the top of the engine compartment:






The dome shaped dash shroud over the instrument panel was pulled off with the screws still in it, cracking it and rendering it irreparable:



Outside view from front window:





Inside view (Notice how the screws have been pulled through the plastic):







I was originally told the steering was free spinning when the car came in, which I was not surprised about because the threads on the steering have been stripped for about seven years and I just tighten up the u-joint coupler and use thread lock on them from time to time. There was nothing wrong with the steering box (Hydraulic pump) however, as it had been rebuilt last year. So I was surprised to see a entirely new or salvaged on it. Even more to my surprise was the part that was bad/stripped had not been installed and was sitting in the return parts box with salvage yard marker and ATP (Auto Tech Plaza?) written on it:

This is the Rave shop manual diagram to be specific of terminology:
















Then there is the brand new set of valve cover gaskets, I have no idea what this was about but, they to where in the box with the bar-code tag still wrapped around both of them.






I was told to order injectors and send them because the schrader valve was bad, most likely some injectors as was the fuel rail. I ordered the injectors from Ebay and had them delivered 4 days later as requested. I then get call saying the new fuel rail came with injectors and they did not need to be replaced, which even at the time I thought odd. I truck with that many miles and the fuel rail being replaced, why not update the injectors?? The injectors where supposed to be sent back by Roberts and to date have not been returned.





So imagine my surprise when I look in the parts box and the fuel rail that was supposed to be the old one was a 1997 part from my 1994 production truck (1995 actual model). Other clues that became apparent after some viewing were permanent marker numbers on the fuel rail and injectors, that was in truck at present that I had written right before left as I had pulled the entire top on the engine off to replace push-rods and hydraulic lifters. (Well documented on Land Rover Forums)
https://landroverforums.com/forum/ge...erating-76468/



So here are the two most damning pictures concerning the non-replacement of parts:

The rail supposedly taken out of the truck was manufactured two years after this truck was manufactured. The truck has never been into a shop before and the rail was original.







AND....see next pic.. The number three written in permanent marker on the fuel rail was written by myself when I disassembled the truck for the above mentioned work:




Last of the pictures, I was told when the truck had to be towed back into the shop for second time, that the distributor shaft had to be replaced. Before I had left on the trip there had been a question of whether or not I would have to adjust the timing. Although that did not end up being done I did mark the shaft and the port that the distributor fit in, so I would know where it was originally. That mark is still there. It was hard to see in the photo so I drew a circle around it:

Same distributor shaft







I was very excited to get my truck back running with some upgrades and instead I have a week of work ahead of me and more broken parts than when I started (That will have to be sourced out in East Texas were parts are hard to come by for Land Rovers) and I am out $1,450.00 + $129.00 for the injectors and the 3 hours it took to put this report together. Obviously this is very disturbing. There is a Land Rover shop literally less than a mile from your shop that I had the choice to go to. I instead went to your shop because I trusted Mike.

This truck is not a difficult truck to work on, it basically has a Buick 3.9 with a coil and distributor so I would think any mechanic worth his weight would be able to handle the non ECU/Electrical issues.This work was horrible. I am hoping that you realize that as well. I have been patient and polite about the entire ordeal and would like to keep it that way. .

Please advise,
Anthony

This was added to the email string today:

George,
I left this out of the information I sent you on Saturday. I told you about it so I want to make sure you know all the issues.

This is a picture of the Land Rover sitting in the garage where it presently resides, with the wheels facing exactly forward. Notice how the steering wheel is 45 degrees off from center?




I am not naming the shop in this email as of yet because I hope they will be doing the right thing and refunding most or all of my money before I reverse charges on the credit card.

I have owned this truck forever and this was the first time I have ever taken it into any shop. Other than a known Land Rover Forum shop like Don Trudeau with Anarchyfabworx up in New Hampshire or another shop known to work on Land Rovers it will ever go into a shop again.

Tex

 

Wow I thought cannibal was bad, who is George? Is this your email to him showing what you found? Little confusing

 

Hey Tom,
I should have been clearer, yes this is the email sent at the request of the owner to him. I have left the name of the shop out of the thread at this point in hopes he will do the right thing.

I was supposed to receive a call back from him yesterday and have not to date. If I haven't by tomorrow I will move forward with further action.

Sadly the things listed in the above email aren't even all the issues. It seems I keep stumbling on more everyday directly related to this work that was and was not done.

 

An update to this posting, I just got off the phone with the owner of the shop and after an hour of going over the email sent above, the owner was mortified by the work done. He reversed all the charges on the credit card $1450.00 and is sending me the missing injectors as well as a $300.00 check for damages. I already confirmed with the Credit Card company that the charges have been reversed.

He said that the documentation that I provided was irrefutable, that he was embarrassed that work went out of his shop like that. He Fired the Service Manager and after speaking more in depth with me about the specifics in the email that I did not include , was going to fire the tech that worked on the truck.

Moral of the story:
Give people the benifit of the doubt that they will do the right thing before going all postal on there asses.

Always pay with Paypal or at the very least a credit card

Document all the work you do on your truck for both historical information and situations like this.

Tex

 

Bit of a result all around. Well done mate!

 

Sounds like a good result!!
I don't trust shops with my truck. Aside from resetting adaptive values there's really no job on these trucks that can't be done with basic tools in your driveway.

 

Hate that you had such a terrible experience at a shop. It is really too bad that so there are so many shops out there that have no idea what they're doing and end up giving all independent shops bad names.