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I have a very crappy follow up. I repaired this E350 for a friend, his daughters car. He was out of town when I finished the car and begged me to let him have the car towed to his house for her birthday surprise. He said he would come to my place later in the week and square up. I had $2500 in parts into his car and this does not touch the 100+ hours of my time tied up trying to fix it for him. In a month and a half he has not made time to pay me. I can't believe a guy would do this. I gave my time and effort along with all of your efforts to get his daughters car fixed and I can't even recover my out of pocket expenses. This same car passed smog 2 days after he picked it up so the work was done correctly, it ran perfectly.
So what do you do, he lives 120 miles away so it is not easy to knock on his door and say PAY UP. I should keep quiet on this but after all the work and effort I can not believe he would hang me out like this. I am retired, not wealthy and need my money back. I only took on this job because he begged me.
So what do I do, I have no written contract, everything he asked me to do he said verbally not in writing. There you have it, one more therapy request on the forum. I was very happy to have the car fixed but now feel stepped on. I not only fixed the Engine but also the Brakes all 4 wheels, flushed the brake fluid, replaced the alternator which was on its way out and very loud. Replaced the 12v back up battery in the dash, replaced the driver seat bottom with a new leather bottom because the old one was ripped and ugly. Fixed his front marker lights. Every step of the way he called almost daily for updates and encouraging me to fix everything. I guess the statement would be if there is a dollar involved get it in writing or stay out of it. What do I do now? The guys is being a bum and I can't believe it.
Dang, that friend of yours, is he a close friend ?
If I may suggest, if you try 2 - 3 more times asking him to reimburse the cost and he play deaf, do you know his daughter cell number ?
Perhaps get his daughter to talk some "sense" to her daddy.
One advice, don't play rough and rude, your "bad" friend may use that as an excuse to not reimburse.
I have a very crappy follow up. I repaired this E350 for a friend, his daughters car. He was out of town when I finished the car and begged me to let him have the car towed to his house for her birthday surprise. He said he would come to my place later in the week and square up. I had $2500 in parts into his car and this does not touch the 100+ hours of my time tied up trying to fix it for him. In a month and a half he has not made time to pay me. I can't believe a guy would do this. I gave my time and effort along with all of your efforts to get his daughters car fixed and I can't even recover my out of pocket expenses. This same car passed smog 2 days after he picked it up so the work was done correctly, it ran perfectly.
So what do you do, he lives 120 miles away so it is not easy to knock on his door and say PAY UP. I should keep quiet on this but after all the work and effort I can not believe he would hang me out like this. I am retired, not wealthy and need my money back. I only took on this job because he begged me.
So what do I do, I have no written contract, everything he asked me to do he said verbally not in writing. There you have it, one more therapy request on the forum. I was very happy to have the car fixed but now feel stepped on. I not only fixed the Engine but also the Brakes all 4 wheels, flushed the brake fluid, replaced the alternator which was on its way out and very loud. Replaced the 12v back up battery in the dash, replaced the driver seat bottom with a new leather bottom because the old one was ripped and ugly. Fixed his front marker lights. Every step of the way he called almost daily for updates and encouraging me to fix everything. I guess the statement would be if there is a dollar involved get it in writing or stay out of it. What do I do now? The guys is being a bum and I can't believe it.
Sorry to hear, this is unfortunate.
Lawyer up, or plan on writing him a letter with the amount due each month for as long as it takes to get the money. It could be years.
You didn’t disclose that you expected financial compensation at the beginning of this thread. Some of us might have recommended to walk away from this car and project. You were advised to obtain certain resources which you did not do.
Consider in the future not taking on quasi-volunteer jobs for which you expect to be paid.
There is a difference between expect to be paid and expect reimbursement for parts they requested. He approved each and every part purchase along the line. You are correct, he ruined my trust. I will never accept a project without written terms in the future. Each step of the way he promised to pay me back when the car was done. As far as good friend, I had only known him about a year but we hit it off and talked 2-3 times per week for that period so I thought I knew him. I may find out he is going through some tough times and just needed extra time but it does not feel that way.
It is too bad because I was determined to fix that car for him, it was a matter of pride once I took it on.
I have a very crappy follow up. I repaired this E350 for a friend, his daughters car. He was out of town when I finished the car and begged me to let him have the car towed to his house for her birthday surprise. He said he would come to my place later in the week and square up. I had $2500 in parts into his car and this does not touch the 100+ hours of my time tied up trying to fix it for him. In a month and a half he has not made time to pay me. I can't believe a guy would do this. I gave my time and effort along with all of your efforts to get his daughters car fixed and I can't even recover my out of pocket expenses. This same car passed smog 2 days after he picked it up so the work was done correctly, it ran perfectly.
So what do you do, he lives 120 miles away so it is not easy to knock on his door and say PAY UP. I should keep quiet on this but after all the work and effort I can not believe he would hang me out like this. I am retired, not wealthy and need my money back. I only took on this job because he begged me.
So what do I do, I have no written contract, everything he asked me to do he said verbally not in writing. There you have it, one more therapy request on the forum. I was very happy to have the car fixed but now feel stepped on. I not only fixed the Engine but also the Brakes all 4 wheels, flushed the brake fluid, replaced the alternator which was on its way out and very loud. Replaced the 12v back up battery in the dash, replaced the driver seat bottom with a new leather bottom because the old one was ripped and ugly. Fixed his front marker lights. Every step of the way he called almost daily for updates and encouraging me to fix everything. I guess the statement would be if there is a dollar involved get it in writing or stay out of it. What do I do now? The guys is being a bum and I can't believe it.
Really sorry to hear of this turn of events,
Feel free to ignore any of this response.
I would call him and ask him why you he hasn't paid you (does he not have the money himself and he is too embarrassed to admit it?) and pretty much repeat to him that what you have told us ie that you did it as an act of friendship to him and need to be reimbursed for the parts. You can offer to send him a copy of the receipts for everything that you purchased and if need be remind him that he approved all of those purchases beforehand.
It wasn't clear to me what your thinking was relative to your time. My sense was that you were not expecting to get paid for your time but were doing it as a friend and the challenge of it. But of course one might reasonably expect to be shown some appreciation for your efforts monetarily or otherwise. Was that correct?
If he fails to repay you and you are convinced that he can then I suppose that you could ask a lawyer what your luck in small claims court would be. I kind of think that you might be somewhat successful but I don't really know given no written contract.
The biggest message I have is that I would rather be you than him. If he really is stiffing you ie can pay you but is choosing not to, then he is a very weak person and I wouldn't trade places with him as compared to you as a guy who majorly stepped up to help a friend.
Final follow up on this Mercedes Repair. When this guy never paid up, again I was out of pocket for $2500 in parts at his request to fix his daughters car. 6 mos later he has not made any effort to pay what he owes.
I did some investigation to find out more about him. I should have done this first. He is well known in Tracy CA, has been sued many times and it is always the same. He fails to pay up after making promises.
I even spoke to a lawyer that was stiffed by him. The lawyer says he and his Dad have done this in Tracy for years and somehow he skirts the law and never has to pay up. Lawyer called him a Con Artist and Flim Flam man.
He also suffers from Turrets syndrome, or claims to, he has used his Turretts disability many times to get out of paying bills, he will rudely cuss out a person till they call police, when the police show up he claims he has Turretts and can't control his disability. Because it is considered a disability he milks it.
I found out much more but basically he used me and ruined my trust. We had spoken at least 1-3 times per week for a year before this.
His wife was involved in this also and participated in dropping the car at my house for repairs. I am totally willing to share his name and other names he has used in his scams. I want to put it in this note but not sure if that would leave me vulnerable legally to any repercussion and I do not wish to place this forum in a bad position.
This forum was amazing helping solve a very odd repair, I am sorry it did not have the happy ending as planned. I have no idea if his daughter is driving and enjoying the car now or if he sold it. I understand he buys and sells many cars every month so I am guessing this was never for his daughter, just part of his scam. Dang. I can't stand people like that. He belongs in Jail. The lawyer that was involved in a suit against him says he has many claims against him and so far they have not been able to force him to pay. He put his home in his wife"s name, etc. Just a very bad person. Lawyer says he will run the paperwork for a fee of $3500 which would more than double my loss on this car and he was very clear that there is not much hope even with a judgement that he would ever be forced to pay up.
Damn... I don't know what to say other than sorry. Maybe one day someone will go old school on him and prob solved, too bad it wasn't a years ago.
I've known people like that, and every one of them were tweakers. Something about that drug seems to rewire people and they have no issue screwing over others.
You have my sympathies...
Final follow up on this Mercedes Repair. When this guy never paid up, again I was out of pocket for $2500 in parts at his request to fix his daughters car. 6 mos later he has not made any effort to pay what he owes.
I did some investigation to find out more about him. I should have done this first. He is well known in Tracy CA, has been sued many times and it is always the same. He fails to pay up after making promises.
I even spoke to a lawyer that was stiffed by him. The lawyer says he and his Dad have done this in Tracy for years and somehow he skirts the law and never has to pay up. Lawyer called him a Con Artist and Flim Flam man.
He also suffers from Turrets syndrome, or claims to, he has used his Turretts disability many times to get out of paying bills, he will rudely cuss out a person till they call police, when the police show up he claims he has Turretts and can't control his disability. Because it is considered a disability he milks it.
I found out much more but basically he used me and ruined my trust. We had spoken at least 1-3 times per week for a year before this.
His wife was involved in this also and participated in dropping the car at my house for repairs. I am totally willing to share his name and other names he has used in his scams. I want to put it in this note but not sure if that would leave me vulnerable legally to any repercussion and I do not wish to place this forum in a bad position.
This forum was amazing helping solve a very odd repair, I am sorry it did not have the happy ending as planned. I have no idea if his daughter is driving and enjoying the car now or if he sold it. I understand he buys and sells many cars every month so I am guessing this was never for his daughter, just part of his scam. Dang. I can't stand people like that. He belongs in Jail. The lawyer that was involved in a suit against him says he has many claims against him and so far they have not been able to force him to pay. He put his home in his wife"s name, etc. Just a very bad person. Lawyer says he will run the paperwork for a fee of $3500 which would more than double my loss on this car and he was very clear that there is not much hope even with a judgement that he would ever be forced to pay up.
a) Thank you for following up. I and I am sure others were wondering where this ended up.
b) I hate to see a good man like yourself out of your money and hard work however, the only regrets I really have anymore is when I haven't done enough to help others. Doubt that I will be laying on my death bed worrying about who scammed me. It is just a statement of their profound weakness.
So I hope you can let go of any bad feelings associated with this as soon as possible and enjoy your life fully.
I for one admire your skills, industry and willingness to help others.
I should have mentioned, part of his Con Artist game, for the first year I knew him he showed only respect, friendship and spoke of being honorable many times. Setting up his con. Only once he had the car and had a bill due did he flip and show the bad side. I have heard people like this existed but had never crossed paths with one before. So I guess the best plan moving forward is to Trust but Verify before any wallets are involved.
You guys were an amazing source helping solve this issue, I learned a lot in the process. The electrical analysis, loading and tracing wires helped hone that skill. My Dad had a 2015 Ford Fusion, only had 25,000 miles on it when he passed away even though it was 8 years old. It had an electrical issue pop up, the entire center dash would go dead, killing the AC/Heat, Radio, Seat Heaters, and separately the Windows and door locks also went 100% Dead. Engine ran fine, of course the failure always happened when it was more than 90* outside and suddenly you have no AC and can't open a window. Sometimes you would hit a bump on the road and everything would come alive again for a while? I used many of the skills honed on the Mercedes project to trace the wires and bus networks. Had to buy an Oscillisope and learn to read it and although it did not find the problem it helped to rule out some areas. The Fusion had 4 Bus wire systems and several modules controlling the car but they all work in concert to run the car. If one module sends out a failure signal the car can shut down several modules at the same time.
I finally traced the failure to a small wire inside a 50 wire harness, under the front carpets and insulation, the seat had to come out to even access this area. I was tracing wire paths and splices trying to find out where the path was going dead. I found a small spot of green dust under this one wire harness. I opened up the harness, it was partially wrapped for protection and to keep the wire bundle small. In the middle of this wire bundle I saw one small, maybe 20 gauge wire, purple with a white stripe that had a very small bit of green powder on it. Magnified I could see this wire was cut or damaged and the copper wire was making tiny bits of green powder as voltage kept trying to move through the damaged wire. If I did not spot that green dust I never would have found the issue. With a small splice to replace the damaged section the entire car fired up and the problem was gone. I worked on that for over 3 weeks every day, tore a lot of the car apart checking every module and harness before finding it. My guess is the factory damaged this wire at some point building the car. There is no way a driver or owner damaged it because of its location, under the carpet, under the insulation or Jute, and in the center of a 50 wire harness bundle. No shop could have spent this much time but I have to believe that some shops might have a special tool to trace the wire system to find the exact spot where a failure happens?
The funny part after the fact was every time I scanned the system trying to fix this problem when it started the scan said the vehicle has lost communication with the Rear View Camera. Driving the car the Rear View Camera works flawlessly, never showed any issue or problem. I found a Ford Service Bulletin that said on this year car if you have this specific failure code to ignore it, that it won't cause any problems and is just a glitch? Well guess what, once I fixed that wire the Rear View Camera communication code cleared and never came back and that does eventually connect to the Rear View Camera so I could have saved time if I never read that bulletin. Hope all of you are doing well.
Mark
Last edited by Westlotorn; 02-27-2024 at 01:29 PM.
This is terrible to read after you put such an admirable effort into this repair. I'm sorry you had to deal with this. Try not to dwell on it, just note it as a learning experience and move on.
This guy sounds like a certain popular politician who is well known for not paying his contractors, yet maintains a lot of support. I think they say it makes him a smart business man. I don't get it.
I should have mentioned, part of his Con Artist game, for the first year I knew him he showed only respect, friendship and spoke of being honorable many times. Setting up his con. Only once he had the car and had a bill due did he flip and show the bad side. I have heard people like this existed but had never crossed paths with one before. So I guess the best plan moving forward is to Trust but Verify before any wallets are involved.
You guys were an amazing source helping solve this issue, I learned a lot in the process. The electrical analysis, loading and tracing wires helped hone that skill. My Dad had a 2015 Ford Fusion, only had 25,000 miles on it when he passed away even though it was 8 years old. It had an electrical issue pop up, the entire center dash would go dead, killing the AC/Heat, Radio, Seat Heaters, and separately the Windows and door locks also went 100% Dead. Engine ran fine, of course the failure always happened when it was more than 90* outside and suddenly you have no AC and can't open a window. Sometimes you would hit a bump on the road and everything would come alive again for a while? I used many of the skills honed on the Mercedes project to trace the wires and bus networks. Had to buy an Oscillisope and learn to read it and although it did not find the problem it helped to rule out some areas. The Fusion had 4 Bus wire systems and several modules controlling the car but they all work in concert to run the car. If one module sends out a failure signal the car can shut down several modules at the same time.
I finally traced the failure to a small wire inside a 50 wire harness, under the front carpets and insulation, the seat had to come out to even access this area. I was tracing wire paths and splices trying to find out where the path was going dead. I found a small spot of green dust under this one wire harness. I opened up the harness, it was partially wrapped for protection and to keep the wire bundle small. In the middle of this wire bundle I saw one small, maybe 20 gauge wire, white with a purple stripe that had a very small bit of green powder on it. Magnified I could see this wire was cut or damaged and the copper wire was making tiny bits of green powder as voltage kept trying to move through the damaged wire. If I did not spot that green dust I never would have found the issue. With a small splice to replace the damaged section the entire car fired up and the problem was gone. I worked on that for over 3 weeks every day, tore a lot of the car apart checking every module and harness before finding it. My guess is the factory damaged this wire at some point building the car. There is no way a driver or owner damaged it because of its location, under the carpet, under the insulation or Jute, and in the center of a 50 wire harness bundle. No shop could have spent this much time but I have to believe that some shops might have a special tool to trace the wire system to find the exact spot where a failure happens?
The funny part after the fact was every time I scanned the system trying to fix this problem when it started the scan said the vehicle has lost communication with the Rear View Camera. Driving the car the Rear View Camera works flawlessly, never showed any issue or problem. I found a Ford Service Bulletin that said on this year car if you have this specific failure code to ignore it, that it won't cause any problems and is just a glitch? Well guess what, once I fixed that White wire with the purple stripe the Rear View Camera communication code cleared and never came back and that White Wire with a Purple stripe does eventually connect to the Rear View Camera so I could have saved time if I never read that bulletin. Hope all of you are doing well.
Mark
Congratulations on this fix. The fact that you ran this issue to ground (no pun intended) is of no surprise to any of us here.
I should have mentioned, part of his Con Artist game, for the first year I knew him he showed only respect, friendship and spoke of being honorable many times. Setting up his con. Only once he had the car and had a bill due did he flip and show the bad side. I have heard people like this existed but had never crossed paths with one before. So I guess the best plan moving forward is to Trust but Verify before any wallets are involved.
You guys were an amazing source helping solve this issue, I learned a lot in the process. The electrical analysis, loading and tracing wires helped hone that skill. My Dad had a 2015 Ford Fusion, only had 25,000 miles on it when he passed away even though it was 8 years old. It had an electrical issue pop up, the entire center dash would go dead, killing the AC/Heat, Radio, Seat Heaters, and separately the Windows and door locks also went 100% Dead. Engine ran fine, of course the failure always happened when it was more than 90* outside and suddenly you have no AC and can't open a window. Sometimes you would hit a bump on the road and everything would come alive again for a while? I used many of the skills honed on the Mercedes project to trace the wires and bus networks. Had to buy an Oscillisope and learn to read it and although it did not find the problem it helped to rule out some areas. The Fusion had 4 Bus wire systems and several modules controlling the car but they all work in concert to run the car. If one module sends out a failure signal the car can shut down several modules at the same time. I finally traced the failure to a small wire inside a 50 wire harness, under the front carpets and insulation, the seat had to come out to even access this area. I was tracing wire paths and splices trying to find out where the path was going dead. I found a small spot of green dust under this one wire harness. I opened up the harness, it was partially wrapped for protection and to keep the wire bundle small. In the middle of this wire bundle I saw one small, maybe 20 gauge wire, white with a purple stripe that had a very small bit of green powder on it. Magnified I could see this wire was cut or damaged and the copper wire was making tiny bits of green powder as voltage kept trying to move through the damaged wire. If I did not spot that green dust I never would have found the issue. With a small splice to replace the damaged section the entire car fired up and the problem was gone. I worked on that for over 3 weeks every day, tore a lot of the car apart checking every module and harness before finding it. My guess is the factory damaged this wire at some point building the car. There is no way a driver or owner damaged it because of its location, under the carpet, under the insulation or Jute, and in the center of a 50 wire harness bundle. No shop could have spent this much time but I have to believe that some shops might have a special tool to trace the wire system to find the exact spot where a failure happens?
The funny part after the fact was every time I scanned the system trying to fix this problem when it started the scan said the vehicle has lost communication with the Rear View Camera. Driving the car the Rear View Camera works flawlessly, never showed any issue or problem. I found a Ford Service Bulletin that said on this year car if you have this specific failure code to ignore it, that it won't cause any problems and is just a glitch? Well guess what, once I fixed that White wire with the purple stripe the Rear View Camera communication code cleared and never came back and that White Wire with a Purple stripe does eventually connect to the Rear View Camera so I could have saved time if I never read that bulletin. Hope all of you are doing well.
Mark
The sad one..........
Don't give it anymore thoughts on that Con Artist aaz-hole, better to accept it and forget it. Less headache.
I myself been conned a few times and the big one caused me to need 8 years to pay off my debts . that was 1996 to 2004 because the amount
was so much more than my available cash savings.
The happy one..........
That was so awesome on the small corroded wire found !!
Intermittent and hidden and chaos kind of effect to other devices including dead devices is VERY VERY tough to find.
What function is that wire ?
You are correct, my loss just pissed me off, it did not affect my life at all but it is just wrong. Sorry you were hit much harder and took so long to recover. Hope all is better now.
The failed wire in the Fusion was a feedback wire that communicated with the Can Bus systems. What got me on the right path was discovering I could create the problem by grounding one of the can bus wires at the OBD2 Port. Of the 4 Can Bus systems, each communicate with 2 wires, you can recognize the Can Bus wires because they are always braided or twisted together. They say twisted wires have less negative feedback than straight run wires??? Once I found which Can Bus system could shut down the exact components of the car that I was having failures on I started tracing that system from origin to its last connection. A common failure on these systems is having one module fail and stop communicating. I checked all modules and found no problems so I started searching the wire harness itself. Ford uses many splices in the harness so I was tracing these splices, sure I was going to find a splice that had failed. I was looking for a splice that the schematic showed when I saw the green dust on the floorboard. It was minute but it sure did not belong there. The floorboard on this low miles car was very clean under the carpets and that helped me see it. I will look to see if I can find photos to share.
Off topic but for those that have chased electrical problems here are the Fusion pictures and my memory failed me. Wire was Purple with a white stripe not white with purple stripe.
This is just part of tear down, trunk and trunk lid were totally taken apart, engine compartment wires were all traced . All wires under the carpets were checked. Getting into the driver side wire harness under the carpets. In this reduced size photo it is hard to see but there was green dust, small bit laying on the floor in this area. Wire harness lifted off the floor to start searching. Opening up harness to search Wire spotted but cant get there yet Digging to pull damaged wire out of harness Purple wire white stripe with small mound of green dust is the failure. This is a 20 or 22 gauge small wire in the harness. There were no copper wires still connected so the dust was forming as the voltage tried to cross the gap??? No way this failure was caused by driver or owner error, it was built in at the factory. Shows area where wire was failed and needed to be spliced back to repair problem. Sorry no photos of the actual repair. I soldered in a short replacement wire to fix this.
The sad one..........
Don't give it anymore thoughts on that Con Artist aaz-hole, better to accept it and forget it. Less headache.
I myself been conned a few times and the big one caused me to need 8 years to pay off my debts . that was 1996 to 2004 because the amount
was so much more than my available cash savings.
Under then heading of tales of woe... Last year my son had over $100K worth of tools stolen from his storage locker. Insurance only covered a small fraction of his loss.
08-22-2023, 01:38 PM
