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Sun Jul 26, 2009 10:39 am

If any of you are thinking of getting a motor from tencent, don't hesitate!
I was on a recent trip, 3 hours from home on a brand new, broken in tencent motor when the unthinkable happened. Saw my coolant light start flashing, and temp start to climb. Pulled over thinking a coolant hose came off when I saw something a little surprising, I was missing a head stud nut!
:shock:

I called tencent and told him about what happened. This was 5:30 on a friday night, by the way. We talked about what to do next, and while I was waiting for the tow truck, he did a little research and called me back while I was getting a tow to the home depot parking lot.

Gotta love the look on the dog's face! :lol:

Tencent called me back and walked me through what I needed to do to patch the head so I could limp home. Turns out a 1/2" tap fits the hole in the head perfectly. This was discovered by tencent on a head he had at home, less than 20 min after my call. I picked up a tap set, socket to fit the tap, and some high temp gasket maker.
Here is what turned out. (upper left corner)

This worked to get me back home (after a couple days of camping in hood river)
Tencent kept in touch with me the whole time making sure that all was well with the motor and even walked me through an unrelated problem I was having with my starter (loose wire from install, :roll: )
When I did make it back home, tencent came up and fixed the problem at Rocky Jennings' shop.

Bottom line is that the customer service that comes with one of tencent's motor is unbeatable. I am very pleased with the motor, and all the time that tencent has taken to answer any questions I had both during install and break-in.
Cheers,
noah

Sun Jul 26, 2009 10:49 am

Yep. 10cent is one helluva doude. Knowledge is enough, the willingness to share is noble. Word to 10cent's mothership connection. Props doude!

Sun Jul 26, 2009 10:52 am

I'm not surprised. I've been working on a strange beast to me, a 2.1 WBXer, (I'm a subie convert), and every topic of interest I've researched on this forum contains useful info from Mr. Dime. Amazing stuff, amazing amount of time and brains this guy DONATES to this forum. My thanks go out to him for all the help I've gotten from just reading. Saved me many $$$$'s. So I'm not surprised that this dude would treat you so great after a motor purchase. You just know he didn't sleep until it was fixed, and fixed right.

Cheers, Joel

Sun Jul 26, 2009 10:54 am

That's one pretty cool dude...

Sun Jul 26, 2009 10:58 am

What 10cent did for you really does not surprise me, if you read his posts and look at the way he answers folks. I only wished I had of heard of him before I got my engine, no problems with mine, but his engine would have been in the running!

Sun Jul 26, 2009 12:46 pm

Yes, thumbs up to Chris for the excellent customer service. Traveling from New Mexico to Washington state to personally fix the problem speaks alot about his commitment to his customers and his product. Very impressive!

David

Sun Jul 26, 2009 2:49 pm

What were the results of the post mortem? Did the stud break and fall out of the engine taking the nut with it?

Sun Jul 26, 2009 3:17 pm

one question.
Why was there a head stud missing? maybe i'm missing something here but it seems like that would be something obvious that was missing.

The other day i clicked on the feedback tab by one of 10cents posts. And nothing came up. So maybe this should be moved to the buyer and seller feedback forum to show good customer service.

Sun Jul 26, 2009 5:33 pm

stud snapped next to the case. Took nut with it.
Worked out for me because the stud was not in the way for threading the head for a bolt.
I think Chris might have kept the culprit as a souvenir...

Sun Jul 26, 2009 5:45 pm

Quote: Why was there a head stud missing?

Well, hell, it was there when I built the thing. Now where did that thing go?

The stud broke off down at the root in the case. It's just a risk you take when rebuilding this old stock. There aren't any credible tests established to assess the head studs (although you can be damn sure I'm trying to figure one out!); you inspect them for corrosion or damage, and run with them if they look OK and take your chances. The alternative is to replace them all at over $200 the set, and an easy full day's labor to R&R, if you're lucky. That would raise the price of an engine $500, for every one, whether it needed new studs or not. I don't think I would sell many engines if the price went up $500 but there wasn't $500 more performance, so this is just one of those calculated risks one takes in business. Lots of things are this way; you'd be surprised. The only downside is you have to be prepared to deal with the consequences should they arise.

I had been wanting to travel up that way anyway to meet Rocky, since we've been collaborating on some projects, and to take him a load of valuable old engine parts I won't use but he can recondition and turn into money instead of selling them for scrap. The genius here was Mr. Jennings; once I got the engine out and the head off, he took a look and thought we could make a go of getting the busted root out. He and I spent about an hour and a half hand drilling thru the root, and he had the tools and knew the tricks to get that thing free! I had brought a complete prepped case and was ready to reassemble the entire engine on it to get the owner back on the road, then deal with the stud afterward to salvage the case, but Rocky's know-how with these things saved me an easy day and a half of work. My luck that my customer lives in the same town as the guy who pulls more studs out of wbx cases than probably anyone in the country. And just a great guy on top of that; I had a wonderful visit and it didn't seem like work at all. The van's fixed, I had a fun road trip, made new friends and saw some old ones along the way, and everyone seems to be happy in the end. Drank some great wine, too.

Rocky could have dealt with it, but he's busy with his own business and has walk-ins and everything, and I would have had to compensate him fairly with cash, so it was a money vs. time question: I could drive up and deal with it myself for far less money, if I could just take the time, which at that moment I could. Add the other reasons to go and I undertook the trip without reservation (I mean who needs reservations when you travel in a van?).

It couldn't have worked out any better than it did.

Sun Jul 26, 2009 9:32 pm

Criminey, the things some people will do just because its the right thing to do.

I'd like to buy you a beer, or a nice glass of wine, one of these days, sir.

8)

Sun Jul 26, 2009 9:34 pm

This isn't "good" customer service it's, ah well, is there even a name for this?? Something beyond exceptional for sure.

I have always stated in the various "swap" threads to just install a 10c or GW engine, well that list just got shorter by 50%.

Sun Jul 26, 2009 9:43 pm

I'm pretty impressed by much of what I've read.

Sun Jul 26, 2009 10:22 pm

i wish we could have a online donation box for tencentlife, i mean i barely have enough money for fixing my vanagon but i would totally give him a couple bucks here and there. and if everyone did that too i think it would work out great.

his posts are like 5 times as long as others and tell in exact detail how to fix a problem, i like bookmark his postings just for later on reference. (not excluding everyone, there are some other really smart guys on this forum)

Sun Jul 26, 2009 10:22 pm

I plan on going with a tc engine when my time comes.

Sun Jul 26, 2009 11:55 pm

If tencent don't rock, ain't nobody rockin'. Assuming I am around long enough for me 2.1 to kick, the next powerplant will be a tencent deluxe.

Mon Jul 27, 2009 6:17 am

Bravo but i wound's expect anything less from him :-)

To tenc, i sometime test the strength of the stud by putting a very strong metal bar with a hole in it across the water jacket, put the stud in the hole and over torque it to 42-3. On a old case that i didn't care about i was able to but 55 before the stud stripped.

By the way noza, i see normal hose clamp on those injector!!! And i see original hoses on the injector.... you don't want that beautiful engine to burned down!

Cheers, Ben

Mon Jul 27, 2009 6:20 am

[quote="tencentlife"] Quote:
...I had brought a complete prepped case and was ready to reassemble the entire engine on it to get the owner back on the road, then deal with the stud afterward to salvage the case...

10c,

Do you need core cases (or any other engine parts)? I have a couple that I'd be more than happy to send you.

It would be only a partial payback for all the advice and, more importantly, the confidence that you've so freely given us over the past couple years.

When we know that we have an expert willing to help us if we get in trouble, it allows us to be much more adventurous when diving into these old engines.

Lawrence (Colorado)

Mon Jul 27, 2009 6:30 am

Even if you did replace all of the studs with new ones, who is to say one of the new ones couldn't break. Stuff happens. The space shuttle is a good example of this. The best of everything, tested and retested and the thing still breaks. Stuff happens.

Mon Jul 27, 2009 7:06 am

That's exactly right: stuff happens. Rocky has built more of these than I have, even, and he said he has had a few studs break after some time in service. It's just one of those things that's hard to control. I would think the odds would be improved by use of all-new ones, but the increased cost of a blanket approach would mean I would sell very few engines at all. It doesn't do much good to build a perfect product that no one can afford.

Ben, the overtorque test is a good way to assess the threading in the case, because aluminum threads will shear or not shear, pretty much, but I'm afraid that overtorquing studs like these might just stretch them and put them closer to potential failure even though they don't break under the test. Their construction seems to be a stretch type, and there's no doubt that as the engine expands they are put under much higher tension than the basic torque applies. So I'm thinking that an accurate length measurement as is done for other stretch-shank bolts might be the way to weed out the ones that have given up some of their strength already. Because they are not seated in the case at consistent depths, it would require making a tube of accurate length that could be slipped over each one until it bottoms on the root flare. There would have to be three different tubes for the three lengths of studs. This will require some more investigation.

Sanchius, since you're not far away, I'd like to talk with you about those parts. I've had offers of similar but from so far away the shipping cancels out a lot of the potential value. I'm not hard up for good cores, but the Albuquerque VW wrecker where I score a lot of my working stock is going to go out of business at the end of '09, so I should try to get ahead somewhat. Look for a PM.