Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2007 02:15:34 -0500
Reply-To: Bostig Eng <syncrolist@BOSTIG.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Bostig Eng <syncrolist@BOSTIG.COM>
Subject: Our warranty WAS: RE: Boston Bob engines - Use caution
In-Reply-To: <45AD4E66.50703@videotron.ca>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Ben Wrote: "Company like Vanaru and Bostig are looking for installer, the
have good warranty, i'm ready to install for them, if the engine breaks
after 8 months and they go out of business... who will be responsible, the
installer or the conversion company?"
Had to comment, and I warn in advance this thing is LOOOOONG, and I wandered
a bit... Hopefully something good for you guys in here though... At least a
glimpse into my mania anyhow ha
Anyhow we took this into account when putting our conversion together,
because this is something one should consider when evaluating any large
purchase. This is from our website: "We felt that if we were to buy an
engine conversion kit, we'd want to be able to maintain it without always
needing to go back to the kit "manufacturer" as it's not always possible to
do so. Instead, it made more sense to us to utilize the massive parts and
support-infrastructure already in place for the Zetec engine. We have spent
extra time to develop our kit with this "exploitation" idea in mind, and we
are very proud of the results."
Say for example you have your worst case scenario, and we either don't make
it or say you've driven the 100,000 miles and you're out of warranty and you
break a rod with a 150 shot of nitrous(unlikely, but a fun what if). You'll
have to buy your own engine. We thought of that when looking for engines
since that is what we planned on doing on Brady's van anyhow(not the
nitrous, although the more I think of it the more fun it sounds). We knew he
would eventually need(or just want) another *younger* engine at some point
for some reason if he is going to beat the crap out of it for decades to
come.
We chose an engine which saw such high production numbers to base the
conversion on, that the engine is inexpensive to replace *as well as* being
very well designed and very well built. Ford made 3,500,000 zetecs. To put
that in perspective, if you take every Subaru engine from every displacement
and engine family from the 1.6L to the 3.0H6 from the 15 years 1990-2005...
You are *still* a half million engines shy of zetec production numbers.
That's a massive difference. As a result, the high quality of the engine
itself and the development that went into it are had at bargain basement
prices for the zetecs. These economies of scale are what the OEMs are all
pursuing in powerplant, drivetrain, automotive-electronics, and platform
development now. It is the BEST way to deliver ultra high reliability(and as
a result a great warranty) and high performance/quality, while
simultaneously being low cost. This is the principle which is also allowing
rapid advance in many disparate areas of automotive development, don't put
all your eggs in one part of the car so-to-speak. It seems consistent with
general investment advise I've always heard and risk management books too,
I'll stop since I must sound stupid to the wicked experts we likely have on
these things on the list right now. Anyhow there aren't any economies of
scale to be had in just about anything vanagon, let alone conversions that
people may not be "brand comfortable" with but we cared about the benefits,
results, and potential more than the brand.
The average price paid for zetecs is $400-$500 with less than 8K miles,
SHIPPED. This is what allows us to use awesome materials, fasteners, best
practices, and new parts(like brand new wiring harnesses) since we don't
have a $2000-$3000 high mileage rebuilt engine sitting in the middle taking
a huge chunk of the conversion cost. There is more money to spend on the
other details of the conversion, manufacturing, and for ongoing development
as well as support. We leverage a brilliant little engine, that can be had
at such a price as the engine itself is almost disposable. We always joke,
need new spark plugs? Buy a new engine. This is also important, because
total reliability is negatively impacted by any rebuild, rebuilds will never
be as good as a factory engine no matter how good a builder you are. For
example a factory robot or assembly machine can torque all the headbolts or
main caps simultaneously to many many decimal places more accurately than a
human, and the same applies to almost all aspects of modern engine
manufacture and assembly. Our approach is always deal in factory longblocks
or complete engines of excellent design and manufacture. We side with the
OEMs in wanting engines cheap/plentiful/robust enough to never require
opening and never require rebuilding, and engines that will outlast many and
be many times more reliable than those engines that are worth rebuilding
because they are otherwise unavailable or too expensive to get new/low
mileage.
But there are other things to consider too. What the subie guys have is also
cool. THEY have the benefit of a loosely organized open source project. This
is another aspect which is important to consider. Centralized development is
great for rapid consistent development if you have high quality developers
and enough resources to keep them moving, but there is a safety net in
decentralized development since it can't be taken away from everyone at the
same time, even by one or several vendors going out of business. So to also
provide our customers with the same safety net that the subie guys have in
decentralized development, we also have a "Bostig Defcon 1" plan. Which is
simply the full and organized release of all of our development and
proprietary information to the protection of a GPL, and "open source" status
if the business itself were to fail. We are already getting some practice
and are getting ready to release our LMU mass air meter conversion
development info. We are going open source with it, and we're going to hand
over to Jon that's been working so hard on the same area recently. I think
an open source approach for this project, and in particular within this
community, may be a really great way of getting the maximum benefit to the
greatest number of folks, as cheaply and quickly as possible. It is also
going to serve as our first foray into the whole open source and GPL idea,
since we've often talked about making Bostig a non-profit anyhow. It would
be cool to have a non-profit that could organize resources for doing
something as specific as providing high-tech, high quality solutions to
"vintage" vehicle owners. Anyhow, the bottom line is this:
Needing a new engine is not the end of the world, and actually should be
expected and planned for if you are a "long haul" type of vehicle
enthusiast, or if your wring every drop of usefullness from stuff you
own(ahem, Brady). A good warranty is good, and those that stand behind them
also wonderful, but it's even better if even in the worst case
scenario(which is the person that is standing behind the warranty is taken
out of the picture) *still* isn't catastrophic to your wallet. I've been
powned too many times by companies that can effectively shield my efforts to
get them to honor their own promises to not try to make my own efforts not
nearly as dependant on us as an entity to still provide value long after a
failure if it were to happen. I/We take every step possible to do the exact
opposite of screwing anyone to make sure we don't. Definately not
intentionally, but also not through lack of foresight, even if we happen to
end up totally screwed ourselves. Consider the worst, enjoy the best, such
is everything.
Sorry for the long post,
Jim Akiba
P.S. nobody mentioned that Bob's computer and outlook email totally sh*t the
bed recently either... If you don't get a reply, try a good 'ol telephone
just generally speaking... Most people have some trouble with their email at
the perfectly worst moment possible at some point or another. Bob is a
great guy, with loads of integrity, and an absolutely outstanding engine
builder if not the very best and most knowledgeable out there. If I had to
go back to a boxer I'd trust him with my rebuild.
________________________________________
Bostig Engineering
Engine Systems Voodoo
http://www.bostig.com/
617.272.3800
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