Complaint Review: Auto Sports Unlimited - Internet

purchased used salvage engine 2002 2.7 liter 5 cylinder Mercedes turbo diesel Sprinter engine.  Anthony Nelson the sales person said the engine had 90,000 miles on it and that it had been tested and was a good running engine.  purchased 2008_04_28.  the engine arrived WITHOUT a compression tag attached to the engine...this is a common practice in the salvage industry.  the engine also arrived with broken belt/pulley wheels on the front of the engine, a broken valve cover, and the oil pan was cracked with a hair line crack.  the injecters were rusted and very "ugly" according to the mechanics at slipstream auto care in boudler colorado.  the engine was installed and now it runs very poorly.  i had to pay the Ferrero Dodge dealer in Loveland CO $600+ to do diagnostics ... Mike Windika was the tech ... on the engine and the compression test came back as follows...

cylinder #1 340 psi

cylinder #2 300 psi

cylinder #3 320

cylinder #4 10

cylinder #5 320

leak down test...

using 100psi cylinder #4 at TDC measures 95% leak down, the air is escaping through the oil cap and oil seperator...crank shaft is rotated 10 degrees and now much of the air escapes through the intake valve...the crank shaft is rotated back to TDC and then 10 degrees the other direction and now much of the ais escapes through the exhaust tail pipe...thus showing that the valves are seating/sealing when the engine is as TDC.  the dealer believes an engine with only 90,000 miles should have compression values above 400 psi for each cylinder in a diesel engine...they recently compression tested and engine over 140,000 from Florida that was put in a FedEx Sprinter and all the cylinders in that engine were over 400 psi.

presently we have paid a mechanic at slipstream autocare ... http://www.slipstreamautocare.com/about/ ... 303-449-9843 ... ask for Bill ... in boulder colorado $3500 because the engine was in such poor shape many of the parts(injecters, valve cover, etc) from the engine that was removed from the vehicle had to be moved over to the engine from AutoSports Unlimited...a new oil pan had to be purchased...now all the labor to remove this defective engine and put in a useable engine has to be redone. 

After attempting to have the charge of $2,901.00 reversed on our SamsClubDiscoverCard and subsequently being denied by GE Money(DiscoverCard Network), we concluded this was an expensive lesson learned the hard way.  We had to park the van in my brother-in-laws field up in Greeley CO for months because our vehicle repair budget had been exhausted by the defrauding we believe we had suffered because of AutoSportsUnlimited.

filed a case the BBB case# 37011***on 2008_08_20

Auto Sports Unlimited failed to repsond the BBB complaint so the BBB closed the complaint 2008_09_26.

 We also had to wait and save up money to actually do the engine replacement ourselves a second time in our own  garage.  We finally did find a company in TX that sold us an excellent working engine and we finally did get the van working this last September ... the great company in TX is Grand Prairie Auto & Truck Parts or Dakota Auto Parts ... http://www.dakotaautoparts.com

Joe Rodriquez at Grand Prairie Auto & Truck Parts was so honest and treated us like family.  .  They could tell I was burned and would call me back repeatedly for months attempting to get me to purchase one of their used engines.  I kept telling them I had to wait.  They gave me references to call.  I called them and they gave me assurance that the engines that came from this second TX company were working engines and these references would for sure do business with the second TX company again.  I remember one of the references was a mechanic who was responsible for a shuttle company that uses Sprinters to transport people to the airport...he said that this second TX company's word was good..."the engines they send are just as they describe them."  I still continued to wait.  Then after the 2nd second TX company gave me a youtube video of the compression test on the engine and a lifetime warranty in writing...I finally took the risk and bought their engine.            

Then one year and 3 months later2009_12_03 someone named Kirt Koeller who described himself as "General Manager" responded to the BBB saying "We refunded the money of the engine as the law requires."  This is an out right lie.  We never received any refund.  We attempted to reverse the charges on our cc but Auto Sports Unlimited refused to agree to have the cc charge reversed.

Why all of a sudden did AutoSportsUnlimited get concerned about their C- rating with the BBB and Kirt Koeller say this ... "THE YEAR WAS BECAUSE I  HAD NO CLUE THIS HAD WENT ON IN THE FIRST PLACE." ... The BBB gave 3 clues ... email notice to AutoSportsUnlimited 2009_08_25, email reminder to AutoSportsUnlimited 2009_09_22, and email inform to AutoSportsUnlimited 2009_09_26.

Grand Prairie Auto & Truck Parts in TX treated us like this ...we actually bought the engine from them for 3500 and we payed 1000 for the lifetime warranty.  OK so we spent more with the Grand Prairie Auto & Truck Parts in TX but they sent us a beautiful engine...it fired up right away and ran wonderfully...until the harmonic balancer with two pulley wheels that I transfered from our AutoSportsUnlimited boat anchor of an engine to the beautifully working engine walked its way off the end of the crank shaft...we then called the Grand Prairie Auto & Truck Parts and they replaced the engine even though it was what I believe was my fault on how that harmonic balancer was placed on their engine...they said that they could not prove that and that harmonic balancers have broken off of other Sprinter engines because of fautly woodruff keys so they gave us the benefit of the doubt and sent us a second engine...we returned their beautiful engine with a messed up harmonic balancer...they sent us another fire up the first time it was tried engine with a harmonic balancer with two wheels on it that they installed...all we had to do was buy the harmonic balancer part and pay for shipping an engine both directions...that is why I said they treated us better than family!  Paying a little more for a relationship with an establishment of integrity was WAY WORTH IT compared to loosing $7000+ compared to dealing with an AutoSportUnlimited establishment that hides behind the fine print after what in my opinion is an obvious act of defrauding .

AVOID Auto Sports Unlimited like the plague !!!