massive zetec turbo kit?

[hksvt_03]

Originally Posted by CatMostFeared

I'm using the spa wastegate it workeds really well

awesome! i was hoping that someone had tried the spa and liked it.

[focusonwheels]

anyword on this kit?

[ProjectSedan]

hows the spol time on the turbos? what sizes are being tested? How does the SPA match to a Tial? Will there be a increase in the intercooler for the want of increase of hp?

[K STYLEZ]

Spool times vary depending on turbo choosen. We tried many different turbos and we hink we have found several great options. The SPA wastegate really isnt ideal, and we have made adaptor plates to fit a Tial, Synchronic or the like. We have used larger intercoolers, but the one included with the kit is essentially as large as you can go without the need to alter your stock bumper support.

[ProjectSedan]

how much hp can it support and which turbo options do u have as of right now?

[Chiwestburb]

Buyers beware.

Early last year we had our 2000 Focus to Massive and to repair. In testing the engine blew up including an oil fire. Over 4 plus months and two proto-type turbo and engine builds later we had a car that was delivered with numerous oil and coolant leaks and a turbo that would not spool. Subsequent to that the entire motor and turbo has been rebuilt or replaced by another shop.

Currently we are replacing the entire bottom end do to a piston failure on cylinder number one. Mind you that was the second set of pistons that were installed in the original build last year as the original pistons installed by Massive were faulty.

The T3 SPA turbo had an exhaust side seal failure just one month ago.

All of this is documented from original build errors like missing bolts and seals, etc.

This is not intended to be a flamer but is ment as an overall caution to buyers, we were and continue to be very unhappy customers.

Caveat Emptor

[hksvt_03]

Massive is a sponsor of this site, and many people here have been very satisfied with their products and services. I haven't heard of anyone else having issues, and from what I have seen, their customer service is excellent.

Also, K STYLES, glad to hear that you made up an adapter plate to use other wastegates besides the spa.

[DougoeFre5h]

Originally Posted by Chiwestburb

Buyers beware.

Early last year we had our 2000 Focus to Massive and to repair. In testing the engine blew up including an oil fire. Over 4 plus months and two proto-type turbo and engine builds later we had a car that was delivered with numerous oil and coolant leaks and a turbo that would not spool. Subsequent to that the entire motor and turbo has been rebuilt or replaced by another shop.

Currently we are replacing the entire bottom end do to a piston failure on cylinder number one. Mind you that was the second set of pistons that were installed in the original build last year as the original pistons installed by Massive were faulty.

The T3 SPA turbo had an exhaust side seal failure just one month ago.

All of this is documented from original build errors like missing bolts and seals, etc.

This is not intended to be a flamer but is ment as an overall caution to buyers, we were and continue to be very unhappy customers.

Caveat Emptor

19'd

[thekrux]

Originally Posted by Chiwestburb

Buyers beware.Early last year we had our 2000 Focus to Massive and to repair. In testing the engine blew up including an oil fire. Over 4 plus months and two proto-type turbo and engine builds later we had a car that was delivered with numerous oil and coolant leaks and a turbo that would not spool. Subsequent to that the entire motor and turbo has been rebuilt or replaced by another shop.Currently we are replacing the entire bottom end do to a piston failure on cylinder number one. Mind you that was the second set of pistons that were installed in the original build last year as the original pistons installed by Massive were faulty.The T3 SPA turbo had an exhaust side seal failure just one month ago.All of this is documented from original build errors like missing bolts and seals, etc.This is not intended to be a flamer but is ment as an overall caution to buyers, we were and continue to be very unhappy customers.Caveat Emptor

i wonder what their side of the story is?

[focusonwheels]

lol

[Chiwestburb]

Try to keep an open mind, I wish I would have seen this coming, Karl, my son and I are all un-happy. In this I trust Karl will.

I can copy some of the emails from Karl or pics or of the invoices from the second shop. Just let me know.

In the end its your money and your choice! Good parts sales, terrible builders...

The list is longer, missing gaskets, bolts, incorrect torgue on head bolts, coolant leaking in the head, failure of the new upgraded stage IV Clutchmaster clutch and more but it is just too impossible to believe.

Kudos for not removing a negative post.

I would welcome a reply.

[K STYLEZ]

The car came to us an absolute mess, an abomination pieced together turbo kit installed on it. We put in a new motor and mostly all new turbo system. The Probe pistons failed due to improper manufacture. For 5+ instances of the exact same thing, see this thread here:
http://forums.focaljet.com/forced-in...down-pics.html

We choose, at no cost to you, to provide a NEW block, all the machine work, new SuperTech pistons, new gaskets, bearings, fluids, etc. Not to mention all of the labor for removal and reinstallation of the motor and turbo kit. Thats several thousand dollars we choose to eat because we stood behind our work, and new that the piston failure wasnt your fault, but Probes.

Once completed, the car was given back to you and your son for 500 miles of new engine break in. Upon returning the car, we were regaled with stories of epic street races and tales of great speed. Of course we had given specific and repeated instructions to "drive the car like a grandma". The car also now had a blown head gasket and in turn a damaged head, and I'm guessing block deck. We again replaced the head at no charge with a new gasket, but there was still a coolant leak, as im assuming the block deck was indeed damaged. We advised the car needed more work, but your main concern was to drive the car. Your dismissal of this work and desire to drive a wounded car is on your shoulders.

The car was in no way tuned for abuse or really regular use, but we received several inquiries of "How do I turn the boost up?"

We bled red blood cash wise on your car, and wish you the best of luck with it in the future. You seemed to really need basic transportation for your son, but wanted a built hot rod in a hurry. The two dont really go hand in hand.

We have also received many calls from the shop who is now reponsible for the car, and we were told they needed a new turbo since "the customer hydrolocked the turbo". Could this also be why the engine must be gone through again? Could clutch failure be attributed to improper break in? Could it also be the coolant leak on cyl #1 got on the disc causing failure?

I'm obviously never happy to have unsatisfied customers. I have a great amount of respect for you Dave, but unfortunately I guess we must disagree on this one.

Again, i wish you the best of luck with your project.

[Chiwestburb]

Karl

Thanks for replying and not locking this post. My last comments are as follows.

Here are some of the repairs done to the car by the new builder and invoiced/paid on 10/05/07.

Head gasket leaking coolant
Valve cover leaking oil
Front crankshaft seal leaking oil
Rear main seal leaking oil
Oil pan gasket leaking oil
No sealant found on the exhaust system after turbo

Operator error leads to none of these, builder error does. Offer to fix this, you were glad to see the car go based on bleeding money! We were advised to go to another shop after having left it w/you for almost five months, I ask you how long do this builds take. Three weeks at the new shop!

The repair expense for this was great. Having the car with you for over four months was great. Inconsistent information regarding progress, at the tuner, not at the tuner was strange. The entire bottom end is available for your inspection to see if there was in fact piston chatter, no cross hatching was evident, the block was not new it was reworked. A copper head gasket was installed which solved for the leak.

The items mentioned above have pics for documentation. I realize you lost money, I have lost a lot more, but you need to complete your work if it was done wrong or the wrong parts were in stalled. It’s all about accountability!! None of my payments to you failed, right! You gave up on the project and we gave up in believing in you and Massive Speed Systems.

[pzev04boy]

Originally Posted by Chiwestburb

Karl

Thanks for replying and not locking this post. My last comments are as follows.

Here are some of the repairs done to the car by the new builder and invoiced/paid on 10/05/07.

Head gasket leaking coolant
Valve cover leaking oil
Front crankshaft seal leaking oil
Rear main seal leaking oil
Oil pan gasket leaking oil
No sealant found on the exhaust system after turbo

Operator error leads to none of these, builder error does. Offer to fix this, you were glad to see the car go based on bleeding money! We were advised to go to another shop after having left it w/you for almost five months, I ask you how long do this builds take. Three weeks at the new shop!

The repair expense for this was great. Having the car with you for over four months was great. Inconsistent information regarding progress, at the tuner, not at the tuner was strange. The entire bottom end is available for your inspection to see if there was in fact piston chatter, no cross hatching was evident, the block was not new it was reworked. A copper head gasket was installed which solved for the leak.

The items mentioned above have pics for documentation. I realize you lost money, I have lost a lot more, but you need to complete your work if it was done wrong or the wrong parts were in stalled. It’s all about accountability!! None of my payments to you failed, right! You gave up on the project and we gave up in believing in you and Massive Speed Systems.

When your son took the car for the break in mileage, HE blew the head gasket. If the car was babied and not beat to sh## it would not have failed. The car only had a base file in it to let it run on the 60lb injectors and larger maf. A little timing was pulled out of the tune, but it still was not tuned to be safe for power pulls at this point.

He and you were warned to drive the car like a grandma. Not Go street racing. Erik Called me during the break in period to ask me "how do I turn up the boost?" he even told stories of Racing against a Trans am.

Do you understand what happens with a blown head gasket? Cylinder pressure builds escapes into the crankcase. This can ruin / blow out gaskets, seals, ect, ect.

"No sealant found on the exhaust system after turbo"???? Our kit uses a high temp sealer for the downpipe to turbo. There was no exhaust leak. Sorry.

Ps, Clutches require a break in period too, I'm sure all the street racing action had some effect on this failure as well, or maybe fluid contamination from the blown seals.

Your son did not respect what you were giving him. Not our fault.

I will say this. The day after we replaced the blown head gasket, you kept calling and saying "I need the car", "He needs it to get to work", "Is it drivable?" We said it's drivable, but under boost it still has the coolant problem.

It was our plan in the next few days to pull the head, inspect, and come up with a solution.

But, the next thing we know, Erik Shows up out of the blue to pick the car up. He was told that if he took it now, that he was not to ever bring it back.

We were willing to finish the car, but not with your fast food approach to hot rod building.

That is where we left it.

Since then, We have talked with the Guys at your "other shop" many times. The latest call was asking for a price on a replacement turbo.

They told us your son, sucked up water and the turbo broke. I am assuming if you are having the engine repaired again, that some of that same water must have damaged cylinder #1 since water doesn't compress.

I think you need to get your story straight.

Be realistic.

This is all elective performance work. May I remind you that when the stock motor went, our first suggestion was to put a stock Used motor in, with no turbo kit so your son could drive it. That would have been under 1 week repair time.

Obviously you don't remember the Poor excuse for a turbo kit that was on the car when you brought it to us. The compression across the whole motor was below 100 psi on all 4 cylinders with # 3 & 4 below 60 psi. The car seemed to have some kind of tune in it, the boost gauge showed 14 psi+ at wot, but the car had a really bad surging at even part throttle. Also the car had a big mystery oil leak. Everything under the hood was knock off this, Chinese that.

We called you back after doing a road test and compression check to condemn the whole turbo kit and motor. As I recall You wanted a quote to build the motor, and put in a new turbo kit. You then stated you wanted us to see if there was anything we could do to make the car more drivable in the meanwhile. The plan we came up with was to build a motor on the side and do a swap when all the parts were ready, this way your son could use the car to get to and from work. Constantly we were told to do everything as basic as we could to keep the costs down. Although you did splurge and get new wheels and tires for your son while the car was here.

Not that we did anything of less quality than we normally would. Just a few important things for a high power turbo focus like An in car wideband, LSD, new upper motor mounts, Repair of a torn cv axle boot, ect, ect. There were a bunch of other little things like missing brackets and stuff from the previous owner of the car that you didn't want us to replace either. None of these were completely essential, but I find it funny that the wheels and tires took precedence over them.

Our first actions to Fix drivability so your son could take the car were to remove the China Knock off Boost controller. And second, we replaced the oil fouled spark plugs. The car made the base Setting of the wastegate spring (6 psi) and had no surging. It had good enough drivability that it could have been taken and used for daily use.

The stock motor failed due to a Garden hose turbo oil return line that had a hole in it. It kicked a rod due to a spun bearing from no oil pressure. (Chinese knock off oil pressure gauge did not work, and stock pressure sender was removed from block(low oil pressure light bulb was removed from cluster) I have what’s left of the rod and piston in my toolbox.

Your decision was to ultimately go All out.

If you wanted basic transportation, You should have bought him a Hyundai instead.

[focituner2]

check and mate...
massive has by far the best customer service, prices and services. they dont treat you as just a customer but more like a friend. they do amazing work and dont half ass anything, and in order to keep this high level of quality, it takes time exspecially since it is just the two of them. I have seen the car and it certainly was an abomination. they took that and turned it into something amazing. i dont see their fault in this

[DougoeFre5h]

Just a BIG fyi here - A properly built engine will NOT be damaged by being boosted right off the garage floor. You can go from the lift to the dyno if you choose.

HOW the hell that would cause a headgasket failure, I have no clue. But to blame these failures on improper break-in (aside from the virgin clutch) is ridiculous and wrong.

[hksvt_03]

Originally Posted by DougoeFre5h

Just a BIG fyi here - A properly built engine will NOT be damaged by being boosted right off the garage floor. You can go from the lift to the dyno if you choose.

HOW the hell that would cause a headgasket failure, I have no clue. But to blame these failures on improper break-in (aside from the virgin clutch) is ridiculous and wrong.

yes, a freshly built engine DOES need to be gently broken in to ensure that everything seals properly. beating the piss out of a brand new motor WILL cause things like headgaskets as well as other gaskets and seals to fail! ask any engine builder and they will tell you the same thing.

Alex

[pzev04boy]

Originally Posted by hksvt_03

yes, a freshly built engine DOES need to be gently broken in to ensure that everything seals properly. beating the piss out of a brand new motor WILL cause things like headgaskets as well as other gaskets and seals to fail! ask any engine builder and they will tell you the same thing.

Alex

Also, The car was not tuned. It was supposed to be babied. Not beat to piss.

We could have put it right on the dyno, tuned it, and given it back to the owner, but it would not be best for the motor.

We have done this enough to know that you want to give the motor enough time to break in, rings to seat, ect, before you throw almost 20 psi at it.

We always, always do 500 miles of easy driving, oil change, then dyno tune.

And I typically trust my customers to put the 500 miles on because #1 I usually don't have the time, and #2 you would expect the customer to care enough about their investment to not beat the crap out of the car and mess things up.

This situation involved a young man who's father bought him the car, and was paying for the entire build. He obviously didn't care of the outcome because he didn't pay for any of the car, or upgrades. He just wanted to get in and Race anything on the road. Even though we told him to drive like a Grandma. He was warned to not get into boost either. He knodded and it seemed like he understood the importance of this, but obviously not the case.

[Chiwestburb]

Karl and Steve

Thanks for selling me the tire and wheels - LOL!

Once again my checks to the tune of over $6,600.00 did not fail... Dudes, we paid you to fix the piece of junk, we trusted you to do so in a reasonable time frame per our emails! You got the car the on 04/13/07 on 06/16/07 the build was complete but you informed us of piston damage on cylinder 3 and 4. A second rebuild was initiated and we got it back after the second build around 9/9/07. These are the facts, they can not be interpreted… I have pics if anyone is interested.

Folks, who of you would feel good about that, heck yes we wanted the car back… Karl, you told me to deal with Steve and yes not to bring the car back…. Your argument about time is right on, but four plus months is way over the top.

How do you explain away these facts: your second head gasket leaked, even after you took it to the tuners in Elgin, Illinois for a week and in the end never got it tuned? The answer is use the copper gasket and torque the head correctly and you get no leak....

So I ask you again how do explain the following:

Valve cover leaking oil?
Front crankshaft seal leaking oil?
Rear main seal leaking oil?
Oil pan gasket leaking oil?
Missing oil dip stick?
How about the two missing bell housing bolt?
Front bumper apron fastener’s missing, zip tied on one side..

Steve at your expense you did repair the CV Axle boot because good god the motor was pulled out three times....

We still use the SPA wastegate you installed!

The block was not NEW, your quote "We just got the block back a few minutes ago. We will begin assembly right away”. I have it if you want it back.

I think we have raised enough questions on this for what its worth.

The work was bad, you and I have the pics to prove it. Let’s move on, or get some one else involved to get our story straight!

Cheers

[EuroAyres]

Weather or not you can beat the crap out of a brand new motor is debatable. I would break it in personally, but have seen many cases in which 20+ psi evo and eclipses who professionally race..sponsers and what not break the motor in by beating it. I would baby it because its my money and what not. Now beating the crap out of it with a temp tune is just dumb. You have a tune to handle little boost and to stay out of the high revs..whats so hard about that? If i got my car back and was told that the tune was a temp and to take it easy the last thing i would be doing is getting into races. The leaks and what not i dont know...prolly caused by the motor failure...or maybe could have been sealed bad..dont know but it sounds like your son has abused the car on a temp tune...and will prolly blow the new motor up too by turning the boost up with out a tune to compensate or something along those lines.

[pzev04boy]

Originally Posted by EuroAyres

Weather or not you can beat the crap out of a brand new motor is debatable. I would break it in personally, but have seen many cases in which 20+ psi evo and eclipses who professionally race..sponsers and what not break the motor in by beating it. I would baby it because its my money and what not. Now beating the crap out of it with a temp tune is just dumb. You have a tune to handle little boost and to stay out of the high revs..whats so hard about that? If i got my car back and was told that the tune was a temp and to take it easy the last thing i would be doing is getting into races. The leaks and what not i dont know...prolly caused by the motor failure...or maybe could have been sealed bad..dont know but it sounds like your son has abused the car on a temp tune...and will prolly blow the new motor up too by turning the boost up with out a tune to compensate or something along those lines.

Thanks.

Yes, the car had the crap kicked out of it by a spoiled kid in the break in period on a temp tune.

They were warned, but it obviously meant nothing.

I'm willing to bet he denies it to his father though. It was funny because like I said, he called me asking how to turn the boost up while he had the car for break in. Then he comes in telling us about all the cars he raced and how he kept up with a "ws7 trans am" I am assuming he meant a ws6 Trans Am because I have never seen a ws7 personally.


My next post has more good info.