[1998silverbird]

Well I made a thread a month or so ago about my buddies G8 that got work done @ Powerhaus performance. Here is the update from what he has gone through. He is a good friend and Navy buddy of mine and it pisses me off when people get screwed over especially Military Vets..

He had ARH installed, Circle D 3200 stall installed, lowered, powder coated calibers, and new Rims powder coated and tires..

Currently he is still waiting on the rims to be complete and its going on 2 months now...

The shop said they could modify his Borla Xpipe to work with the headers but when they did one of the O2 sensors was hitting up against the frame and the driverside pipe was about 3-4 inches off the ground. The tailpipes were not level and the D/S one was resting up on the Rear diffuser and it actually melted some of it. He has since went to a real exhaust shop and got it fixed correctly.
With a catback, RPM tune, and vararam the car went [email protected] After the work and tune @ powerhaus the car went [email protected] in BETTER weather conditions with a BETTER 60'. The car felt like the Converter was not locking up at all. The car was surging at cruising speeds as well. He has since reflashed his car back to stock and went to the track 2 days ago in WORSE weather conditions and cut a WORSE 60' and ran a [email protected] So he gained .2tenths and 4 mph going from a powerhaus tune to a stock tune in Warmer weather and ****tier 60'..

 

[Uncko Macko]

Before the mods shut this one down too. It's my car he is talking about and it's all true.

I'll just paste this from a conversation earlier today that triggered this.

"I'm glad to be part of the tight knit muscle car community. I recently had work done by a performance shop and they messed up everything they touched. and screwed me out of a lot of money. It took a while for it to sink in but friends of mine spread the word at the race track and in the online muscle car community. I've received countless private messages and emails from people willing to help solve the problems. Other car guys, shops, friends, and even an attorney(Thought they where all snakes, maybe I was wrong). Some who have had very similar experiences with the same tuner costing them lots of money.

I'm always the one helping friends when they get screwed over by mechanics and I fix friends cars for free. I never thought it would happen to me. They couldn't fix the problems that they admitted to, and made some worse. Denied other problems and even slandered myself and 2 friends who's cars they also messed up in the process. My car still isn't right. Having someone else tune it for more money. Not sure what to do. I've taken the car back 4 times and got nowhere. Do I just keep paying other places to fix it? Go to all the forums with my story and proof? BBB claims? Consumer affairs? Court? Wish they would just make it right. But I've given them too many opportunities which involved me missing work and renting cars. wtf"

Got air in the ABS module because they left the calipers off and didn't cap the lines requiring dealer purge(out of my pocket), installed rear brake calipers on the wrong side(upside down), Put the CAI on wrong over the rad support and shut the hood on it now the hood is tweaked, mangled the Borla X-pipe connecting it to the headers. One side knocked the transmission mount, the other side was entirely below the frame and hit the ground everywhere. Wrong clamps that leak. 2 different clamps on each side for the Non stainless adapters. Entire exhaust was out of place. Tips where googly-eyed with one side touching the plastic. Cost me over $300 for custom exhaust work to fix it. Over filled the transmission. 60 more RWHP and 3200 stall and went slower at the track. Tune was so messed up I'll only type a little of it. The converter locked and unlocked erratically, Down shifted hard enough to chirp tires, some upshifts where laggy, and some hard as hell, turned off all Evap related parameters. A 6L80E calibrator replied to my email with "who the f*@k tuned this"? ... Strut mounts fell apart when they put the drop springs on. Bearing rolled on the floor. But didn't tell me till after I picked the car up. And charged me $115 for a "performance" alignment. Just found out today that they have had my wheels back from the paint shop for a week and still haven't called.

 

[farsighted770]

This is ****ty. And I get why mods lock threads like these but damnit if it isn't good to see the community supporting itself by being vocal about those who would do harm.

Good luck man, hope it all gets worked out.

 

[fengstang]

And I thought powerhaus was a respectable performance shop.....

 

[1998silverbird]

I thought they were as well but ever since my buddies T/A got tuned there and ran like crap at the track, I have been hearing alot of negativity towards there shop and seeing it first hand on 4 different cars. IDK whats going on with them in recent. I would love to be able to take my car to thier shop since its so close to me but there is no way in hell I will let them touch any of my cars now. Hearing people bitch about them getting tuned there then blowing up there tranny in thier G8 or having a heads, cam, intake G8 dyno 388rwhp and a bolt on G8 making 379 on the same dyno after there tune? Does'nt make sense to me.

Why would you not call your customer and let them know that thier rims are finished and ready for pickup? Turns out the rims have been back @ powerhaus for a week now and mike just found out they were done yesterday by calling the paint shop because powerhaus would not return his calls?

 

[Silver Bullet]

I have seen some respectable guys on this forum defend this shop but this is just too much. Macko considering how much money you have tied up in this I might consider the attorney. If their tuner really is that uneducated with tuning they need to get him out of there before more cars get damaged. The fact that they accepted payment for all of this and then won't respond to your attempts to contact them is inexcusable. At this point I really don't care who vouches for this shop because they obviously have some issues. I mean what kind of shop manager would let something leave their shop with exhaust tips touching the diffuser. This sounds like another example of a shop building a good name at first and then getting overloaded with work and letting the quality drop off big time to try to keep up with the work load rather than expanding in the ways needed to handle the workload or simply letting potential customers know that they won't be able to start on their car immediately.

 

[1998silverbird]

This is all what has happened. I was not trying to just talk crap on them. Mike has Pictures, Videos, Emails, everything after he got his car back from powerhaus and after he has fixed most of there work. The exhaust shop said it was crappy work, The people that checked out his tune said it was crappy tuning..

They put his broke strut mounts back in his car and aligned it. They charged him 115.00 for an alignment and told him he needs to get new strut mounts and get another alignment. Why did they not just call the customer to see if he wanted them to replace the Strut mounts since they were busted? They had the car for over 2 weeks doing headers, exhaust, stall, lower springs, and painted calibers, and pretty much everything was messed up.

 

[MGM GT]

Before the mods shut this one down too. It's my car he is talking about and it's all true.

I'll just paste this from a conversation earlier today that triggered this.

"I'm glad to be part of the tight knit muscle car community. I recently had work done by a performance shop and they messed up everything they touched. and screwed me out of a lot of money. It took a while for it to sink in but friends of mine spread the word at the race track and in the online muscle car community. I've received countless private messages and emails from people willing to help solve the problems. Other car guys, shops, friends, and even an attorney(Thought they where all snakes, maybe I was wrong). Some who have had very similar experiences with the same tuner costing them lots of money.

I'm always the one helping friends when they get screwed over by mechanics and I fix friends cars for free. I never thought it would happen to me. They couldn't fix the problems that they admitted to, and made some worse. Denied other problems and even slandered myself and 2 friends who's cars they also messed up in the process. My car still isn't right. Having someone else tune it for more money. Not sure what to do. I've taken the car back 4 times and got nowhere. Do I just keep paying other places to fix it? Go to all the forums with my story and proof? BBB claims? Consumer affairs? Court? Wish they would just make it right. But I've given them too many opportunities which involved me missing work and renting cars. wtf"

Got air in the ABS module because they left the calipers off and didn't cap the lines requiring dealer purge(out of my pocket), installed rear brake calipers on the wrong side(upside down), Put the CAI on wrong over the rad support and shut the hood on it now the hood is tweaked, mangled the Borla X-pipe connecting it to the headers. One side knocked the transmission mount, the other side was entirely below the frame and hit the ground everywhere. Wrong clamps that leak. 2 different clamps on each side for the Non stainless adapters. Entire exhaust was out of place. Tips where googly-eyed with one side touching the plastic. Cost me over $300 for custom exhaust work to fix it. Over filled the transmission. 60 more RWHP and 3200 stall and went slower at the track. Tune was so messed up I'll only type a little of it. The converter locked and unlocked erratically, Down shifted hard enough to chirp tires, some upshifts where laggy, and some hard as hell, turned off all Evap related parameters. A 6L80E calibrator replied to my email with "who the f*@k tuned this"? ... Strut mounts fell apart when they put the drop springs on. Bearing rolled on the floor. But didn't tell me till after I picked the car up. And charged me $115 for a "performance" alignment. Just found out today that they have had my wheels back from the paint shop for a week and still haven't called.

Your the one helping friends fix their cars for free but you pay a shop to install headers? Seems odd..

Didnt Powerhaus refund your money for the tune and flash it back to what you came in the door with? Sometimes its worth firing a customer...

If the tune was so messed up why dont you post it up? I'll take a look at it and tell you what I think.

And I thought powerhaus was a respectable performance shop.....

They are, numerous friends and CCG8 members have gone to Powerhaus since they opened and received excellent service. Off the top of my head at least 6 members have gone there and have zero complaints. Countless cars, literally hundreds (probably thousands) of cars went to Powerhaus coowner/tuner previous shop... its not like he just started tuning, I've been going to him for years.

One of our club members car is there now. I'll have him post a review of their work once complete. He's having a dod delete cam swap done, fuel pump upgrade, and tune... he already had a maggie on the car.

 

[1998silverbird]

Thats great that you have friends that have had good experiences with them. I have had friends that have not.

Mike has been trying to talk with them but they dont return his calls or emails.. The only reason he found out his rims were done is because he called the paint shop that painted them and they told him they were dropped off last week back at Powerhaus!

 

[Uncko Macko]

Your the one helping friends fix their cars for free but you pay a shop to install headers? Seems odd..

Didnt Powerhaus refund your money for the tune and flash it back to what you came in the door with? Sometimes its worth firing a customer...

If the tune was so messed up why dont you post it up? I'll take a look at it and tell you what I think.

This is one of the reasons I'm so upset. I could have done it myself. But I wanted the car done while I was on vacation. That it would be awesome to come back to a moded car and it would have minimized down time.

I've attached the datalog and tune#5. You can see some of the symptoms in the datalog. As soon as the video uploads from my phone I'll post it too. Keep in mind this is after the 4th adjustment to the tune. So the 5th time they had the car. I don't have the first four. And the symptoms with those where much worse.

 

[Uncko Macko]

They emailed me the stock tune along with a 6th adjustment but did not respond to any other complaints or requests regarding refunds and I haven't received any correspondence since then. I have gone to the shop and noone was there. I have a pretty demanding career and can't be going out of my way any longer. They have had more than enough opportunities to make this right. I spoke highly of them even after my first problems. But Stopped when an owner blamed condition of my car and combination of parts. Those parts being listed above you can see that quality is not an issue. And an 2009 G8 with 35,000 miles that ran perfect with no problems except the strut mounts that are a known issue with our cars. What you said about them is why I went to them. He did my tune at RPM and it was flawless. Now not so much. We are going out of our way and dealing with stressful drama to warn others of these issues. Believe me.... I wish they did it right the first time...I'd still have Powerhaus in my signature and a sticker on my car. Now they will never touch my car again.

 

[1998silverbird]

They tuned your car 5 times and couldnt get it correct? I did not know that.. Wow....

 

[01slpSS]

Uncko Macko didnt they also tune out your upstream o2 sensors and evap system!
For every one good review ive heard like 6 bad reviews.
Did you hve a thread on tech too? Should link this over there.

 

[MGM GT]

Did you guys stop by the shop when they were closed due to being in OCMD for hot rod/cruisin week? Pretty sure they posted up they would be closed during that time.

I'll take a look at the tune when I get home... dont have HPT on work computer.

 

[Uncko Macko]

No. We where in OCMD also. It was during normal business hours on 2 different days nowhere near OCMD or any other car show for that matter

 

[Uncko Macko]

Here is a video I shot of some of the problems during normal driving conditions.

http://youtu.be/tUbgPIs7Ahc" title="View this video at YouTube in a new window or tab" target="_blank">YouTube Video

Please see datalog file above to show that I am not playing with the throttle during the RPM bounce and Converter locking/unlocking.

 

[MGM GT]

Here is a video I shot of some of the problems during normal driving conditions.

http://youtu.be/tUbgPIs7Ahc" title="View this video at YouTube in a new window or tab" target="_blank">YouTube Video

Please see datalog file above to show that I am not playing with the throttle during the RPM bounce and Converter locking/unlocking.

Seems odd watching the video, its like your intentionally lugging the engine by running at low RPM in a high gear at low MPH with cruise control enabled. I'm not sure if your just on the verge of the converter locking and the throttle input from the ECM on cruise is causing it to unlock, granted I wouldnt want my converter locking at such low speeds but that could be stock settings. I can compare it to a stock tune later.

I would try it again at a higher MPH and see if it does the same thing, run at 70MPH in the high gear and do the same log in 5th gear. That will be a better indication.

 

[Uncko Macko]

Intentionally? I turned off the traction control, trans in Auto mode, and cruise control in 5 mph increments to show that it wasn't intentional because I was accused of that before. At the end of the video I do slightly open the throttle to show it is not locked when it should be. Please see the datalog file and tune to confirm. I am not guessing or giving an opinion...I am stating facts and showing proof.

 

[MGM GT]

Intentionally? I turned off the traction control, trans in Auto mode, and cruise control in 5 mph increments to show that it wasn't intentional because I was accused of that before. At the end of the video I do slightly open the throttle to show it is not locked when it should be. Please see the datalog file and tune to confirm. I am not guessing or giving an opinion...I am stating facts and showing proof.

I'm not saying your doing it intentionally with your foot... I'm saying the conditions that you setup are prone to failure. Change the conditions of your test at a higher MPH and RPM so your not lugging the engine and that will give a better result. If the converter still locks/unlocks cruising at 1,500, 2,000, 2,500 etc will prove your point rather then trying to lug around in 6th gear at 1,000RPM. I dont even drive my car in 6th under 60MPH and changed the tune to reflect that, car just feels like ass when you do that.

 

[01slpSS]

I rode in the car with him in ocmd even drove it alittle, it did it in every cruise situation regardless of gear rpm and mph. 98silverbird also rode in the car. Now that hes got the tune from the 6l80 calibrator he no longer has the issue.