Quote:
Originally Posted by unruhjonny
I don't mean to get on the "let's knock Ames bandwagon", but when I got my car, I remember that Year One was the industry leader because they had a reputation for only selling good parts - none of the garbage that everyone else was known to have offered.
I am all for offering different parts, but if they don't work as the purchaser might expect, then maybe a disclaimer, or suggestions on how to make the park function if the purchaser has no other option.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by unruhjonny
I don't mean to get on the "let's knock Ames bandwagon", but when I got my car, I remember that Year One was the industry leader because they had a reputation for only selling good parts - none of the garbage that everyone else was known to have offered.
I am all for offering different parts, but if they don't work as the purchaser might expect, then maybe a disclaimer, or suggestions on how to make the park function if the purchaser has no other option.
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Would disagree Year One was never the "Industry Leader". Y1, simply from the beginning (mid 80's), offered numerous different marquee catalogues. Y1's GM marquee catalogues were filled with many early repro & GM Service parts, but not near the volumous amount of parts of today's Ames catelogue or Inline Tube website listings. Ames had been on the scene along with Kirban, Bob Antelman, as well as a few others that just distributed many suppliers lines. . Ames catalogue, for decades, was better at calling out the wheat from the chaff (aka Crap). Steve Ames was also putting $ back into the hobby through tooling up & producing items. Personally, I preferred PY's catalogue & service much better than Ames. Chris seemed to not carry a reproduction part if it was really horrible. If several quality levels were avail of the same part, PY's catalogues noted the difference, same as Ame's.
Something to keep in mind, many of the late '80's GM Service parts offered at the time were, & are today, incorrect for a serious restoration. GM parts bin battery trays, inside door handles, side terminal battery cables, '68-72 A-body door sill moldings (w/o small rivetted Fisher emblem), Service Replacement Qjets, SR Delco alternators & distributors, GM water pumps, Delco concealed wiper washer motor/pumps.... All are good examples of hundreds of GM "Service" parts (still avail through a GM dealer at the time) which helped fill out Y1's catalogues. I still have in a cabinet, a few such catalogues from 30-35 years ago. At the time, I used to make notations in the Y1 catalogues concerning what we easily recognized, & what I'd discovered was the glaring issue with many of these parts. As a result, I turned to different avenues.
Reproduction wise, there have sometimes been multiple different manufacturers of certain parts. Many other reproduction parts come from only one source. Many of us can remember the early repro '69-71 hoodtachs. Late 80's, an old friend ordered one '69 hoodtach & received two from Y1. Both were so crudely built, the bases were totally incorrect, & the seam between the outer case & the base was slathered with silastic sealer. My old friend figured either one of them were worth about half what he paid for one, so neither ever replaced his Judge's original hood tach. The junk was sold off at a swapper. '70-71 "Judge" rear spoilers... I bet there have been 5 different designs/manufactures since the late 80's. The first version were fiberglass & crude. Then, there was a better one. Then a light weight plastic formed one w/o the joint lines for the pedestals & w/o the weep holes. Even that one was introduced near 25 years ago. I cant even keep up on those. During that time, for my Judge projects I tracked down nice original rear spoilers, very glad I did.
Personally, am happy there is a wide selection of reproduction parts to choose from. Often times it forces me realize how much better a nice used piece is. Or it kicks me into high gear to track down a phenomenally nice correct used or NOS part. Last, if a part is a great reproduction, & you need it, buy it & put it up. Can think of a few very fine reproduction parts that are not available anymore & I only bought a few, or missed the boat.