Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Stealthmode]

Modster, Coming to Phx soon?  Craig

Usually Feb brings the NHRA and an anniversary getaway needed. I'll see what I can do.

[HiProfile]

The fact is the Honda "scene" will get so caught up in the CDM crap that it will reach a critical mass soon. People will realize just how shity that stuff is and either "pay to play" or switch hobbies to painting/etc. Basicly everyone I've known with a CDM turbo or manifold have had it break, so I can't understand why ppl still pay $150 for a turbo thrice vs $600 for a solid piece they can always sell for $250 used. It's actually ecconomically sound to buy a real turbo, due to resale & risk of failure.

IMO the only CDM shit that won't go away will be intercoolers, piping, and couplers. Those parts don't demand much quality to work or endure. I just wish someone would start selling decent BOV's and WG's at a fair price, with fair quality. My older friend has a small side business casting parts in China for old Ford "cammers" (big v8's), and has told me current name-brand BOV's and WG's are hugely overpriced.


The other alternative is that the economy will swing back, people will have learned how to live "lean" (no starbux coffee every day, no unlimited dataplan for their blackberry, etc), and have money left over to put towards their hobby - for good parts.

[Joseph Davis]

I see less china crap on Hondas than I did two years ago.

[ratcityrex]

I see less china crap on Hondas than I did two years ago.

Me too. Ive been trying to tell the local people for years that if you were to buy a good product the first time you wouldent end up spending more money for some crap that you are just gona have to relpace again. THats why my build isnt done yet. I keep saving and buying one part at a time. Yea I could have just bought some crap and thrown it on the car but how long would it have lasted. Ive been building this damn b18/crx setup for over 3+ years. And I have no idea how much ive sunk into it, but when its done, it will be done and I shouldnt have to do anything but just genral work on it.

But back to the subject. Tuner toys has alway been a soild staple here and im sure they new company wil be too. Best of luck to you guys, and hope to see you back. BTW lets see this rsx you talk of..  :yes:

[LS1pwNzJ00]

The fact is the Honda "scene" will get so caught up in the CDM crap that it will reach a critical mass soon. People will realize just how shity that stuff is and either "pay to play" or switch hobbies to painting/etc. Basicly everyone I've known with a CDM turbo or manifold have had it break, so I can't understand why ppl still pay $150 for a turbo thrice vs $600 for a solid piece they can always sell for $250 used. It's actually ecconomically sound to buy a real turbo, due to resale & risk of failure.

IMO the only CDM shit that won't go away will be intercoolers, piping, and couplers. Those parts don't demand much quality to work or endure. I just wish someone would start selling decent BOV's and WG's at a fair price, with fair quality. My older friend has a small side business casting parts in China for old Ford "cammers" (big v8's), and has told me current name-brand BOV's and WG's are hugely overpriced.


The other alternative is that the economy will swing back, people will have learned how to live "lean" (no starbux coffee every day, no unlimited dataplan for their blackberry, etc), and have money left over to put towards their hobby - for good parts.

People have already switched cars/scenes.  The street races back in 02,03,04 used to be ALL honda's, nnothing but hondas.  now its all domestics, usually beat to shit 5.0s, LT1 gaynesses, and a few stock or bolton ls1's with a few cobras here and there (still gay and slow) 

[chris]

Actually most people have stayed in the Honda/acura market but upgraded to TSX's etc.



Not sure if TunerToys plans on giving the Honda thing another try but if you guys struggled to make it why bother trying again in a market that is nothing but falling apart in front of everyones eyes.


When importers for example have no plans of bring over anymore containers for the rest of the year you know the shit just doesnt sell anymore. The reality is honda-tech/nhra/nopi and general whoring of the cars killed the spirit of it.


Every kid thinks he knows it all because they read it. thats the typical Honda owner now and I fuckin cant stand them. RHMT is very rare in that people here know that asking for help is part of life. The Hondas I see now are so thrown together by unskilled people its not surprising people look at most of them as a joke.

[TunerToys]

Wow. Good to see everything is okay craig.

So...  What happens to the vacuum manifolds. I was just about to order one from you. I just bought a map adaptor for $17. I might sell it for $50 when everyone realizes that TT products are obsolute

We can hook you up with some "private stock".  Hit me with a PM and we'll set up the deal.  Craig

[TunerToys]

Not sure if TunerToys plans on giving the Honda thing another try...

Umm ... Nope!

The Honda world went from whored out to dying.  Only those doing real performance are spending any money, and with a ton of companies now competing for those limited dollars, it's a pretty tough battle.  Margins were beat to nothing on most of the brand name products.  In fact, the only real profit margins were on products that we designed and sold ourselves. Sadly, the volume and profit on those items wasn't enough to keep TunerWife paid, so she had to go back to work.  (Throughout the TunerToys lifespan, I have always worked full time as a software engineer.)  With both of us working full time, and no real sales coming in, we just decided to call it quits.

Personally we'll be okay, there will be some impact from filing bankruptcy,  but nothing we can't get through.

I plan on taking it easy for a while, finishing up my 400WHP Vitara MiniMe project, and then maybe looking at some K stuff.  Hell I may even try just doing one off specialty projects.  Would love to build a Bonneville Car, a convertible CRX, a Fiat Spyder with an S2000 drivetrain or a Acura V6, hell the bucket list is huge!


If we do try something again

[Joseph Davis]

Bump



I want everyone to consider the fact that Craig might still be around if we had collectively worked a little harder to steer business towards him.  It's as much our failure as anyone's.

[highroller54]

Bump



I want everyone to consider the fact that Craig might still be around if we had collectively worked a little harder to steer business towards him.  It's as much our failure as anyone's.

+ 1

[chris]

Well I think most people went his way but the retail honda world is pretty crappy and the profits arent that great.



Just not enough volume of buyers of name products. When every person after buying 3 parts wants to be hooked up your dealing with a crowd of douche bags.


People dont get the fact that if you sell them a 200 dollar part your profits are maybe 30 bucks if you buy high volume of the stuff. If its a one time deal it may buy him lunch. hooking you up more means no profit at all.

[turbob16hatch]

idk i can feel for the parts slingers when they say sales are down like crazy. but in the end the blame doesn't fall on the scene being dead. it's the wholesalers that allow ANYONE with a business name getting a wholesale account.

So what you think will happen when someone wises up and realizes he can buy all his freinds parts for cheap by spending $25 and having to do paper work 4 times a year.... 

So in the end it is the wholesalers that fuck it all up but flooding the market with dealers of product.

For instence i was a dealer of work wheels and was the only in the state as that is all they allow. they keep strict distences between dealers. (yes i know the internet doesn't matter where you are for the most part).

So what was ever done about Yo parts selling tial wastegates for $189 or w/e i heard tial was cracking down but after that idk

[malichite]

Craig

I really feel for you and it sucks to see you go out of business, but I can understand you have to do what you have to do.  I will miss doing business with you.  You were awesome to deal with.  Almost every part on my engine came from you.  You went out of your way to look up parts that were nto even on your site so that I could get them from you and I appreciate that.  I hope everything goes well with your future indevors.  I do however have one question.  You were the only person that had the ARP Head Studs for the ZC.  How did you acomplish that if you dont mind me asking and or how can we go about getting those now?  Was it a custom set that you ordered from ARP?  Was there a part number for that or a compliation of part numbers to put that together?

[spoonfedcrx]

Aren't they the same as 87 integra or some shit.  If they aren't they should be/

[malichite]

I'll have to verify that when I get home. I have both heads sitting on my bench.

[90dx]

Craig thanks for all the solid deals in the past its sad to see how things are going these days.Take care.

[CivicOCD]

fuck why cant xenofraud go tits up and craig stay 

lol

to original post...

fuck.

 

[7808]

the problem with honda performance aftermarket is its catering to 17yr old inbreds (and a few of us), most people i know are bored/sick of hondas now.  if i was going to get into the performance aftermarket part sales i would go for bmw, corvette, maybe subaru,  shit like that, yuppie and rich guy shit. i dont do much with hondas now but all the d-bags on bimmerforums seem to still be writing checks for $10,000 turbo kits and $2000 cat backs

[chris]

The thing is you have to have the money to get involved with the more expensive crowds yourself


I deal with alot of the k series/s2000 crowds most are well into their 30's and find drag racers immature and barbaric in their approach to motorsports. Only reason why i got involved with them is due to my relationships i have made over the years. I continue to do K series parts has they truly are the future. For those who want to have a future you have to learn the stuff and empress it. Road Racing is the only thing left worth a damn in the honda community and the cars showing up at the tracks are pretty fuckin amazing. 300+whp all motor k24's on pump gas that drive 5 hour round trips to the track and spend 10 hours on a road course without failure are hands down badass.


Retail for Honda stuff has always sucked. You need to have your own product line and you need to proof it works. if not its a cool side thing to do to make a couple hundred bucks a month.



From my standpoint I will always have my hand in this stuff and have new parts I have designed that will be out soon once I get around to selling them. Im back in school and now I have to get my mechanical engineering degree and be a fuckin dork like my dad behind a desk but Im trying my hardest to continue to just be a smart grease monkey at the same time.

[j.h.christ]

it's still amazing to me with all the brilliant people here that no one is making bolt on shit for volkswagens except for dave. companies like apr and eurojet get away with murder on pricing (like 1200$ for an exhaust, or 4000$ for a turbo kit), and the eurotards eat it up because the parts are shiny and the box has a pretty label with a german sounding name.

[Corey]

it's still amazing to me with all the brilliant people here that no one is making bolt on shit for volkswagens except for dave. companies like apr and eurojet get away with murder on pricing (like 1200$ for an exhaust, or 4000$ for a turbo kit), and the eurotards eat it up because the parts are shiny and the box has a pretty label with a german sounding name.

if a company makes a good quality product, they should get paid accordingly.

[j.h.christ]

it's still amazing to me with all the brilliant people here that no one is making bolt on shit for volkswagens except for dave. companies like apr and eurojet get away with murder on pricing (like 1200$ for an exhaust, or 4000$ for a turbo kit), and the eurotards eat it up because the parts are shiny and the box has a pretty label with a german sounding name.

if a company makes a good quality product, they should get paid accordingly.

ok

[chris]

Tell me what throttle bodies I need to bore and I will build fixtures for them asap.



I know nothing about whats popular in the vw world

[chris]

Im total serious too I have been doing alot of new stuff these days and would love to start to do throttle bodies for vw stuff also.



I have plenty of material around the shop to make fixtures. Does anyone make aftermarket intake manifolds for the vw stuff?


Again whats popular and Ill go buy some gaskets,used parts for those models. Make the fixture for the flowbench get some #'s out of the manifolds and see how large I can go bore wise for the throttle bodies.

[Joseph Davis]

it's still amazing to me with all the brilliant people here that no one is making bolt on shit for volkswagens except for dave. companies like apr and eurojet get away with murder on pricing (like 1200$ for an exhaust, or 4000$ for a turbo kit), and the eurotards eat it up because the parts are shiny and the box has a pretty label with a german sounding name.

if a company makes a good quality product, they should get paid accordingly.

$120 for an exhaust flange for a 16v.  There's a difference between paid accordingly and what Jesus is talking about.  I work with an early water cooled VW guy who clowns the mid-90s up crowd for being the consumer tards they are.

Tell me what throttle bodies I need to bore and I will build fixtures for them asap.



I know nothing about whats popular in the vw world

You'll have to rename your business to Das Polarbear Tuning.  DPT has a nice ring to it, don't you think?

[j.h.christ]

Im total serious too I have been doing alot of new stuff these days and would love to start to do throttle bodies for vw stuff also.



I have plenty of material around the shop to make fixtures. Does anyone make aftermarket intake manifolds for the vw stuff?


Again whats popular and Ill go buy some gaskets,used parts for those models. Make the fixture for the flowbench get some #'s out of the manifolds and see how large I can go bore wise for the throttle bodies.

anything 1.8t/2.0t. vw owners for the most part are fucking ricers to their very core... with one difference. while a jdm ricefan will go to shucks to get a 12 dollar spectre air filter, the vw ricer will go and spend 200 dollars on an intake, when the 12 dollar one will net you the same gains. i see people say it everyday, "it's cheap, it must not be good." that's why abd/apr/whoever gets 1200 dollars for an intercooler, and they all charge 500$ to flash what amounts to a basemap on an ecu.

anyways, here's what abd (a popular company) charges for their 1.8t shit.

http://abdracingwerks.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=ADIAR&Category_Code=TP

here's some apr price points.

http://goapr.com/products/intercooler_fmic.html

900$ for a cat back exhaust? you bet!

http://goapr.com/products/apr_exhaust_mkiv_3.html


Steve, can you beat this price on a 2 foot oil line with gaskets?

http://store.goapr.com/products/Turbo-Oil-Lines-1.8T.html

anyways, that's how retarded it is.

You'll have to rename your business to Das Polarbear Tuning.  DPT has a nice ring to it, don't you think?

holy shit. that is a winner.

[chris]

If I was to do it which I will just need to start crossing part #'s buying gaskets etc I do need to come up with cool german sounding name. Also make sure my last name is never known to the german racing crowd.

[j.h.christ]

$120 for an exhaust flange for a 16v.  There's a difference between paid accordingly and what Jesus is talking about.  I work with an early water cooled VW guy who clowns the mid-90s up crowd for being the consumer tards they are.

he is completely on the money. i got banned on an old screen name there for going on the tech forums on the vortex and through trying to spread the rhmt spirit amongst the 1.8t tech threads. just tried to show people that there is indeed a better way than spending 500 dollars on a 2.5 foot downpipe with a 45 degree bend in it or 1600 dollars on a t28 flanged turbo that bolts to the stock cast mani. i was called a liar and numerous other things, but whatever.

i'm doing a turbo d in a rabbit soon anyways, fuck them.

[chris]

keep them stupid I want  a nsx to go to the track with

[j.h.christ]

keep them stupid I want  a nsx to go to the track with

have fun reading this garbage

http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=4539755