Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 22:32:26 -0400
Reply-To: John Anderson <vwbus@MINDSPRING.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <Vanagon@vanagon.com>
From: John Anderson <vwbus@MINDSPRING.COM>
Subject: Re: Price breakdowns On The ECO/Rocker "KIT" and Comments about
ZOOMIN!
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>I have dealt with Kyle and find him to be professional, courteous and
>gives excellent customer service. I will suggest that all of us
>Vanagoneers think twice about possibly flippant derogatory remarks
I just want to say that I don't think the origional question was entirely an
attack on Kyle but rather an observation of the ludicrous pricing. I had
thought the same when the opportunity presented itself, but I guessed
exactly as Kyle expounded that in fact the cost of the parts was a major
part of it with only a reasonable profit for him. Yes $450 for a set of
rockers is outlandish, pure highway robbery, I could have them carved from
billet for less, yes $50 to cut some push rod tubes is insane as well, and
yes those are believeable prices from Berg. $250 for a $5 prom that for any
other application would be $100, ludicrous as well, BUT this is a rare
application with a very narrow sales base, and to recoup the investment in
designing the prom (assuming there was one, and we all aren't fooled and it
isn't simply like a Digifant Jetta prom or something) $250 becomes
reasonable. This is all sort of like the G60 aftermarket was in the first
year or so, for the Corrado it amazingly came down, even with a relatively
minute sales base, compared to Vanagons, but there were a lot more G60
owners (who mostly actually wanted to be driving M3's or 944S's but couldn't
afford them) who were likely to want to modify their vehicles for power as
compared to Vanagon owners, and the cars were newer. I don't figure there
will be a rush on Vanagon performance kits, competition from Neuspeed,
Autotech, Autothority, and Superchips all driving the cost down, so like
every thing marketed to a market niche, if you want it, pay for it, if not,
hey that K&N is only like what $30 :-) And on an aside Mark Stephens wants
a purely ludicrous amount for his worked over performance waterboxer heads
(of dubious quality if my stock rebuilds from him are indication) so the
price of Kyle's bolt ons comes a bit more into line with reality. Still an
ingenious type could probably have those rockers carved out on his own from
bug parts, to me the 2.1 and the bug were interchangeable except for the
screws, but I did no close inspection, merely decided to use a solid shaft
from an old T3 in place of a galled one in the '87 and noted that I nearly
mixed up the rockers a few times. There are a whole crapload of ratio arms
out there folks, hell even the stock VW, one of those crossover T1 guys
should probably start looking into that a bit, I mean use elephant ears and
the screw point is moot. Of course with the kit you are paying for
development, and you gotto get that ECU somehow.
John
vwbus@mindspring.com
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