XV motorsports Level II quality good or really bad? what do you think?????

[studio57]

Wow, where do I start?
Yes, sadly, that was my car at the 2009 Optima Ultimate Streetcar Challenge. I had driven the car all the way from Pigeon Forge to SEMA, then to OUSCI, raced on the road course, autocrosssed and this was my final Speed/Stop challenge. UCA broke welds in two places. I was more than pissed and had to trailer the car home since it not only broke the control arm that we did get repaired but bent an original, virgin fender and bent the lower ball joint to the point the alignment was trashed.
I called XV the next Monday, while I was on the way home and I must say the New UCAs, their "Upgrades" were at my house before I got home. These were billet and much better design. My opinion was and still is, of all the cars they ever sold a frontend suspension to, they should have known I would be the one guy that would actually stress test the parts to the max and surely they knew I would break the original design. They sent the replacements and a return for the old ones. However, never offered to fix the fender or see how things went with the repairs. So, I am out the repair cost on the fender and the ball joint, plus the aggravation of the whole ordeal. I called and left messages for the owner to call three times about the damage, and to this day have never gotten that call returned. I figured if that is the way they do business, I would mark it up as experience. Sometimes it isn't the sale, it is the service after the sale that really counts to get future business and referrals. I am not bragging here, but I did put 14K miles on this car last year, raced it all over the country and saw alot of folks asking about the frontend and how I liked it and the company. I had to tell them exactly what I have said here, you have to draw your own conclusions on how you spend your hard earned money.
I will say this, I am very happy with the frontend in general, other than the weak parts. The geometry is great and the car is totally different than any Mopar I have ever driven. Are their parts worth the extra cost over other options out there? Probably not, but I am very satisfied with the performance of my car. The only other problem I have had, and remember, 14K miles and several of those on road courses and autocrosses, WAO, and way too fast into corners, turns, etc. I did wear out the orignal bearing/hub assembly on both sides, they got to the point they were clicking very bad and at Gingerman, caused brake knockback and I ended up plowing through the grass and dirt sideways at 90+mph, not fun I promise. I upgraded to the new ZR1 hubs, which are much bigger and stronger. I think the factory corvette hubs are just not strong enough when you add the additional 1500 or so pounds a 1972 charger weights over a stock C6. Granted, most everyone that puts a new suspension under their car will never, ever stress test it like I have done, but I am just saying, if you do, go ahead and put the best parts you can on the car, you will be glad you did in the long run.

I have never dissed a company in open forum and hope this doesn't come across as negative, however, it is absolutely what has happened with my car. I have been asked here and other places by pm to say something so here is what happened.

thanks for your reply Bill, i thought you worked at XV but not that i read your opinion about the company i see you don't. your car looks fantastic . did your kit look as bad as mine?

[Bill Howell]

No, my kit was pretty good, fit and finish. It fit the car unibody better than your pictures show also. The rear suspension wasn't even close, but I knew it was not designed for a 72 when I bought it. We basically used the parts and redesigned everything out back. My motor, 6.4 crate motor fit exactly correct and their oil pan, headers were perfect. Actually the headers are the best set of headers I have ever owned, just fall into place and no issues at all. The pita was they did not offer a pickup tube at the time, so I had a high dollar oit pan and had to make the fricken pick up tube. Hopefully, that is not an issue now. I did not buy their brake setup since I have connections with brake companies so not sure about their setups. Plumbing the rack was tedious and required some tweaks but that is hotrodding, nothing is ever bolton.

[suntech]

This is not fun to hear and see at all Guys! I have the XV front and rear sitting in my garage waiting for me to have time to start on my car. Mine looks also a lot better than the one Masi got, so the first thing i was thinking when i saw the pictures of his, was that here must be a new guy at work with the TIG welder. Mine was made 2,5 years ago, and i guess it was the first set that was sold to Europe. Then it got stuck in customs for 2 years!! ( long story). Ayways have been planning to do like Bill all the time, just to use the lower arms and shocks, to make my my own setup for the rear. I am going 4 link. I have also ordered the billet UCA´s before i heard of these problems, and i am going to get the billet spindles/uprights from LG motorsports, with uprgraded bearings/hubs. These spindles also drop the car 1 inch, and was the main reason for my search for them. I see now that I was a little ahead of the game, without even knowing it.
The bearings are one thing, but with Bill´s UCA failure, i think the right thing to do would have been to contact all customers with a warning, and offer to send a set of the upgraded billet ones, and stop selling the style that broke.    But that is just my opinion

[Bill Howell]

The bearings are one thing, but with Bill´s UCA failure, i think the right thing to do would have been to contact all customers with a warning, and offer to send a set of the upgraded billet ones, and stop selling the style that broke.    But that is just my opinion

You are 100% correct and to me this is the rub. If you have a part that is even questionable, why would you sell it and take if nothing else the liability risk? Substandard parts are unacceptable at any price, much less top tier money. Bearings, yes you are right, are probably a non issue with 99% of the people, but my UCA failure was under hard braking,  nothing more than you would do in a panic stop. Why risk your companies reputation over something like this is silly to me.

[Supercharged Riot]

As a prospective customer...

After all that's said and done.  personallly, I will likely steer my business away from them and proably use my saved money on some other suspension upgrade like RMS' Alterkation setup.
If I dont hear anything better about their customer service, I'd rather spend my hard earned money and gamble with someone else.

[Mike DC]

          
RMS seems to have by far the best rep in the area of aftermarket suspensions.

XV's engineering still looks great on paper IMHO.  But with that quality, and that price?  Umm, no.  




The bearings giving out . . . well, I can forgive them for not seeing that coming.  They had 3000-lb Challengers on the brain when they engineered that setup.  And frankly, if I had been designing the setup I would also have assumed that a modern 'Vette wheel bearing assembly would be up for the job too.  Modern Vettes aren't THAT lightweight and the OEMs typically build that kind of stuff with a lot of safety margin.


But there isn't any excuse for breaking control arms.  If they're gonna sell custom-built parts like UCAs then they shouldn't be delivering something anywhere near that close to the edge of its strength limits.  If they can't do OEM-quality durability testing on their pieces then it's their problem to always err on the side of too strong.  Real cars hit curbs and potholes.    

[studio57]

did send them email today about this post, soon i think we will get some replays hopefully they now see  problems on there building quality

[Supercharged Riot]

so hows the project commin along?  get all your issues sorted out yet?

[studio57]

so hows the project commin along?  get all your issues sorted out yet?

they did contact me in Friday, the big chef did talk to me first then Peter. There where again some parts missing from the rear end, they did ship them in sameday but as always it means we have to wait week on those so we will make them our self to save time. i did suggest them to the double check everything in future.
They did offer me those billet uppers arms for 300dollars now witch is bit better offer than the original one as it was 700dollars (retail 725dollars) but i don't think that is a fair offer as we have done lot of extra labor because of missing parts and particle bad building quality.
Now the rear end is almost done, and same on the front.. but the front upper arms still the issue as those where so twisted that we did have to warm those up and regarding to them they cant handle that. we need to make my car ready for Easter on Shows here in Finland and there is lot of to do, make room to the tci 6x speed tranny, build the aluminium Hemi paint the parts, etc etc etc etc.....

in the picture you can see that we need to short the panhard tube a bit and bend it so it would not be attach to dana`s differential cover

[studio57]

still waiting the promised billet upper arms from XV motorports... now we will not get it ready to the shows... well there is allways a next year. it should not take this long to make those.

[RallyeMike]

Ouch. Just ran across this for the first time.

Besides not wanting to throw away a bunch of money, one of my fears was the quality and engineering of this stuff. Hopefully these are not common problems and the results of these issues leads to improvement. If one of the upper control arms broke on me like it did on Bill's car I'd be fortunate to survive.

Good luck. I hope you end up happy with it in the end.

[darrenb811]

still waiting the promised billet upper arms from XV motorports... now we will not get it ready to the shows... well there is allways a next year. it should not take this long to make those.

sorry to hear about this. I can empathise with you building a car outside the US., & it seems like you've had a bad run of luck. I hope it works out for you soon. cheers, Darren

[studio57]

Thanks Man...over 2 months waiting and still nothing.... front end almost done but the billet upper arms not!!.. i would not recommend to buy anything from those assholes..how hard can it be to make 2 upper arms... i really really really hope the desing is way better than the building quality !!!

lot of progress done.. on the car ,
http://www.cardomain.com/ride/3837245/1968-dodge-charger

[Rolling_Thunder]

Man - if It wasnt already on the car I would just send the stuff back for a full refund...    2 months is unacceptable after problems with THEIR products...     once they get your money it seems they don't care about you...    sounds like some other companies i could name...     

[Patronus]

I know to each his own, but why the '69 tail stripe?
2 months!!? No way am I running anything from XV, never! 

[studio57]

I know to each his own, but why the '69 tail stripe?
2 months!!? No way am I running anything from XV, never!  

i like those 69 stripes more and I'm planning to use 69 tail lights as well in future as those i look better to my eyes.
i would not go to XV today if i could go back to last October.

engine partment almost done 

[Mr.Woolery]

Man - if It wasnt already on the car I would just send the stuff back for a full refund...    2 months is unacceptable after problems with THEIR products...    once they get your money it seems they don't care about you...    sounds like some other companies i could name...     

(I bolded part of the quote)
That's been my experience, too.  I've had some chassis stiffening parts on order from them for my '71 since last June.  They kept telling me "2-3 weeks" for months, then "we'll get to it, eventually".

RUN. AWAY.

[Hemidog]

What brand is that PS pump? 

[Rolling_Thunder]

What brand is that PS pump? 

looks like a GM gen II or III pump...   

[Rolling_Thunder]

Man - if It wasnt already on the car I would just send the stuff back for a full refund...    2 months is unacceptable after problems with THEIR products...    once they get your money it seems they don't care about you...    sounds like some other companies i could name...     

(I bolded part of the quote)
That's been my experience, too.  I've had some chassis stiffening parts on order from them for my '71 since last June.  They kept telling me "2-3 weeks" for months, then "we'll get to it, eventually".

RUN. AWAY.

I ordered their body stiffening stuff years ago and got it within a week -    Dude - its been almost a year ?  Ask for a refund and make the stuff yourself - its not rocket science...    their stuff requires modifications to fit anyway....   at least I had to alter the stuff I got to fit my car (variance in production back then)

[studio57]

the upper billet arms are finally now in custom`s so hopefully i get them early next week.. maybe two more weeks and i will let you guys know how it handles..
here is few custom parts we have done 

[tan top]

          .................

[sixty8charger]

I'm staying stock...

[studio57]

some progress... next week might be the first  start up and test drive ... 

[sixty8charger]

is that gauge bezel the original one painted? or a custom billet piece?  That looks amazing! (if its paint, what did you use?)