[Pete Schaible]

Old bearing installed, the gap is smaller but still there.  I hope SwedeTech can save me.  I’m not having any luck with motors this year.

 

[Pete Schaible]

Steen,  It didn’t really take much to remove the bearing… I was quite cautious removing it.  SwedeTech has asked that I send them the case to look  at and go from there.  I am trying to heat the case now and put in an old bearing.  I will probably just send it to SwedeTech and see what they say.

 

[Pete Schaible]

Thank you again.  I’ve been freaking out over this for days.  I’ll let you know how it goes

 

[Pete Schaible]

Thank you so much Steen,  I didn’t realize they were dissimilar metals.  I did not heat the case to remove the bearing and just tapped it out gently with hammer and bearing remover,  could that have caused this?  It is a SwedeTech motor and I emailed them about what happened and what to do but I am currently waiting on a response from them.  Would heating just the sleeve area with a torch work, or does it have to be an oven?  I was only replacing the Main bearing and don’t want to cook the current bearings for the trans shafts.  One company I spoke with recommended just replacing the case but the $1000 for a case is my entire yearly racing budget so I need to keep things affordable.

[Pete Schaible]

It’s not visible from the outside so there shouldn’t be any vacuum leak.  It’s more the strength that concerns me.  I’m going to have it looked at by a welding shop to see what they think can be done.  Autocross shouldn’t put too much of  a strain on it as a season of autocross is probably the equivalent of 1 race weekend.  However fixing it now would be much cheaper than letting it fail and it’s already all apart.

 

[Pete Schaible]

Walt, the crack runs around the perimeter of the pocket itself.  I don’t know about ‘re-pocketing or how to recognize it.  In the picture it looks like a shadow but it’s a split that runs from 11 o clock -1 o clock of the pocket with the picture’s orientation.  I really just don’t want to blow it up.

 

[Pete Schaible]

Brian, I really feel that is what happened.  Tom has always been helpful, polite, and has worked with me since I got into karting.  I talked to him at length today and he REALLY has put a lot of work into trying to resolve this with UPS, including having someone he knew actually looking for the package in the West Chester shipping hub,  Only problem was he never told me, so it looked to me like he wasn’t doing anything.

Hopefully this can be a learning experience for us all.  Sellers and Builders, insure your stuff for full value and pass that cost onto the consumer.  Consumers, don’t beat up the company over shipping charges.  Let them do what they need to protect themselves.

[Pete Schaible]

Tom will be building me another motor and I have complete faith in his knowledge and his abilities.  He really is a nice guy in a bad situation and I’m sure the frustration got to him.  It’s easy to look from the outside and say what should have happened but as a small business owner it has to be hard to take a loss like that.  Tom is very passionate about karting and the TM series of motors.  When things go wrong that passion can cause a momentary lapse in judgement and I think that is what happened with his post.

I WILL continue to do business with him as I think his passion for the sport motivates him to do his best all the time and to see his products and service be top notch.

[Pete Schaible]

Jim, I thank you for your perspective as a business owner.  Without the experience of owning a business I can only imagine how I would handle things.  I didn’t mean in any way that this post puts suspicion on any business or builder’s reputation.  That is the main reason I won’t post the builders name , I wish I could talk about how they fixed the problem and did the right thing.  They do still have a chance to make it right and I hope they do.

Brian, I did ask him exactly that question.  I asked him if he would be expected to pay for the motor if I shipped it to him and he didn’t receive.  That stinks about the missing prop.  I imagine I would have done the same as you.  Fix the problem for the customer by getting them their order, then settling up with the shipping company.  As much as it stinks, I assume that is the cost of doing business sometime.

[Pete Schaible]

Walt, if you did have an underinsured motor go missing, how would YOU handle it as a builder?

[Pete Schaible]

Thank you Scott and Brian. This is the real world experience I was hoping for. Brian how did you end up getting things settled?
Scott you have a good point, if it goes to court it will be public record and it may affect the company’s reputation.

[Pete Schaible]

Thank you Walt, I didn’t even think of that.  I assume your saying that because I won’t know what condition the motor I receive is in and I may end up with another blown motor?  I’m naive, I’m an honest guy and expect others to be the same way.  This is also why I will be hand delivering my KT100 to you and NOT shipping it.

Has anyone had something like this actually happen to them?  Walt have you ever had a motor not received by the customer?

[Pete Schaible]

Agreed Paul,  If it was something I bought I would call the Credit card company and dispute the charge.  Because it is my property to start with all I could do is dispute the cost of the rebuild.

Andy, Feel free to PM me anything you wouldn’t want to post publicly.

[Pete Schaible]

I know UPS will only cover what the item has been insured for.  I don’t know why he choose $1000, especially because I paid for shipping.  I  insured it for $1500 BEFORE the rebuild when I shipped the motor.  We never discussed insurance at all, I just got an invoice from them and it included shipping charges.  An attorney I spoke to said the insurance is there to protect the SELLER not the recipient.  The financial responsibility is on the shipper but I’m not sure how to get him to understand that without going to court.

Any suggestions?

 

[Pete Schaible]

Andy, UPS won’t deal with me at all.  All they will tell me is to  “Talk to the shipper”.  They will send the insurance check to the builder.  I just called UPS a few days ago to see if the claim has been submitted with all necessary information and they won’t even tell me that.  Everything is in the shippers hands and I have nothing.

 

[Pete Schaible]

Soo, I can’t answer the question of what happened to the motor. As much as I would love to tell you all what happened, I haven’t seen my motor in 2 months. It got lost on the way back from the builder and wasn’t insured for replacement value. So now I wait to see how the builder will handle it.

[Pete Schaible]

The carb fuel filter was the first place I checked, I pulled the carb apart and all is clean and open passages.  I guess you could call the bog a “shut off”.  If snapped open at idle the motor would just stall, but opened more smoothly would rev fine.  If  I snapped open the throttle after revving it out, response was crisp.  The silencer is clean, I can see straight through it.  What would be the symptoms of a leaking seal at the timing shaft, or intake, maybe even cylinder.  The setup I am running is what Tom Barth had recommended, and is also run by my competitor.  If anything I am setup a little on the RICH side.

[Pete Schaible]

Engine is TM K9B, I run 22:1 which is more oil than some recommend.  The ring is as old as the piston I think.  If you look at the picture, part of the ring is gone, but i don’t know which went first.  I haven’t changed it in 2 seasons but autocross isn’t like open track.  An autocross run is about 1 minute and we get 4 runs per event.  So I may put 1 hour of actual run time on a year.

[Pete Schaible]

The plug looked nice and gray.  Slight leak of oil between exhaust and cylinder but not much.  I had pulled apart the carb and all passages were clean.  I am suspecting either a vacuum leak at one of the seals or a coolant leak at the head dripping onto the piston.  I should have replaced the piston and ring earlier and I am learning the false economy of stretching the time on replacing them.  If anything the engine smoked a little less than usual.  I did drop the needle half a groove but the outside temperature was hotter than usual.  I don’t think it was a lean stick due to the carb settings…. maybe elsewhere but not the carb.  Motor temp was up to about 170, radiator temp 150.  Above ideal but I didn’t think dangerously high, and that was in grid before actually starting my run.  Could an old piston fail in this way or did I kill it?

The one thing I did notice is that when I would spin the wheel to start the motor it felt… rougher…. Like not enough oil.  I was running the same ratio as always, a different brand, but I don’t really believe that the brand would make that significant of a difference.  At the previous event there was just the slightest hint of a stumble when snapping open the throttle.  So I think it was a problem that got worse quickly but progressively.

[Pete Schaible]

I hope you feel better soon Tom

 

[Pete Schaible]

Daryle, I know it didn’t totally disappear but UPS never had a tracking location for it. It said a shipping label was printed and they would update when it reached a UPS facility. After the lost package tracer it listed “West chester” PA as the location, but that was 7 weeks ago. They told me when I reported it missing they would do a physical search for it. If UPS is still looking I’ll wait. UPS won’t tell me anything because I’m not the shipper, and the builder doesn’t know what is going on.

Your perspective and others is why I posted this. I know I’m not the only one that has had an issue like this, and I’m curious how others have resolved issues like this.

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