Hey guys,

So I heard a little talk about this seller and their IFS on here before and one user said he installed it was happy but for the most part not much information. It ended up fitting some very specific needs I had but with the lack of information on it I did take a gamble on buying it. Its now delivered and I don't mind taking pictures and giving any specific information I can about it if people are interested if not I won't bother so just let me know.

 

Im really interested in the review , please post .

 

Part reviews are good information. Post away!

 

Ok so I'm finally posting the first part of this review and the story will explain why there was such a delay.

The reason I ordered from Welder Joe was they were the only option I could find that used coil-overs but did not force me to have to buy their coil-overs. I wanted to use a brand coil-over I trust and also so it would match the rear where I'm doing a triangulated 4-link with coil-overs. Also Welder Joe was able to provide me the specs on what the coil-overs should be for this kit so I could order my own without having to figure it out. They also emailed me the directions before I bought to look them over. The directions are not very good but I heard that as a common complaint from all IFS kits so it did not bother me. I liked No Limits set up but even after ordering my own coil-over and springs it was still almost a $1000 cheaper so this is what motivated me to give them a shot.

So I order my IFS from Welder Joe, I added the sway bar option and power steering rack. The parts got to me in about 7 days after paying. I figured this out by who shipped the boxes to me but it was confirmed that this is a Helix/Hoffman Group Corner Killer IFS. There is Helix part number#/stickers on everything. I already assumed this was a kit being made by someone else and just drop shipped so it did not bother me but I know it's a question floating around so now it's out there with no doubt.

So I quickly inspected all the parts and took inventory. I found that I was missing the two brake calipers, both rotors, and one 90 adjuster for the upper control arm. I emailed Welder Joe about this that day(Friday). I did not get a reply till Tuesday and was informed that the brake rotors where on back order, and that the other parts should of been there and to take pictures of the boxes they were shipped in. The also offered to refund me $90 for the rotors to go buy my own and sent me an Ebay link to 9" Mustang II rotors that where $90 shipped this was nice but the kit was suppose to come with 11" rotors.

I refused the rotor refund and I took pictures of all the boxes and the parts in them as best I could that day and emailed them to Welder Joe's. Did not get a response till the following Tuesday. They said they spoke to the drop shipper and they weighed the packages and they checked out and the parts should be there. At this point I'm getting a little worried so I called Helix myself to see if I could buy these parts separate and how much they would cost me. After calling Helix they did confirm the rotors were on back order so that made me feel a little better that maybe I was not getting the run around.

I paid them through Paypal and was getting near 30 days so I filed a dispute before my time ran out requesting refund for what it would cost me to buy the parts directly from Helix. They declined to refund me and I got an email from them a few days later to call them. I called them a day or two later and after speaking to them on the phone they had me believe they would take care of this and send me all the parts when the rotors came in. After about 2 weeks I got a message from Paypal that the dispute would be closed if I did not escalate. So I called Paypal and told them the situation and they told me I need to escalate. A few days later after escalating I got a message from Paypal saying that Welder Joe wanted me to return the items and they would give me a full refund. I called Paypal and told them this was not acceptable as I'm not paying the shipping and I do not trust Welder Joe's at this point. Paypal said they would pay 1/2 the shipping but I told them forget that.

I filed with Credit Card company for a refund to get those parts missing and it was immediately given to me. I waited to see if it would be disputed but it was not and my credit card company has confirmed that the money is mine and not to worry. So that is why it took me so long to enter this I wanted to give them a chance to make it right before I gave a review but this is the conclusion.

I would like to review the Helix Corner Killer Kit and Helix themselves should I start a new thread or keep it in this one?

 

I hate to say "I told you so..." but I posted my concerns about Welder Joe in the other thread. Hoffman group is well known as a supplier of third world produced knock offs, the Harbor Freight of the aftermarket parts suppliers. It would not surprise me to find out that Welder Joe is an arm of Hoffman to sell returned, overstocked, surplus and shorted goods on ebay.
At the very least, their customer service is very lacking. The boxes were complete based on they "weighed right" tells me they never packed the boxes or verified the contents, i.e. they are not the manufacturer.
IMHO I would have cut my losses and paid the 1/2 shipping charge to dump this puppy.

 

AX,

GTStang got his money credited by his credit card company. So, he has his money and the Helix kit with missing parts.

 

The way I read it he got refunded what he thought was the missing parts cost, not the entire price. So he has the kit with money for parts that Helix may or may not ever stock again. Most of these clone importers (like HF) buy a contracted number of complete units, no spare parts, from some anonymous 3rd world government warehouse. The manufacturers are government owned or subsidized factories. If the demand for the factory's primary product slows down the government has them produce a small volume clone product rather than sitting idle. Several different factories may produce the items at different times. What spare parts the clone sellers end up having are from cannibalized units (returns, shorted, broken boxes, etc) and when those sources dry up there are no more (try getting a part for a 5 year old item from HF, they can use the laugh!). They may continue to offer the same clone item, but since the government sets the specs, there is no guarantee of interchangeability. Even within the same run the manufacturer may change specs (bearings, castings, etc) if they find a cheaper source (they are not sourced from major manufacturers but from other cloners). After sale customer support or replacement parts is of no consequence to these manufacturers.
If a part fails or needs replacement you are on your own, you may need to wait months or it may never be available. As the old commercial was fond of saying: you can pay me now or pay me later...

 

I did only request the money for the parts to be replaced I probably could of gone for more but I'm not trying to get more than what is owed. I did request a number high enough if I had to get them from someone else it would not be an issue so there is a cushion.

I can not say that Welder Joe and Hoffman are not the same company but I would doubt it. The have different numbers and the Welder Joe one is linked to a company that sells a lot of parts that are not part of the Hoffman group companies.

I will say I assumed Welder Joe was just drop shipping some other company's kit so it did not take me by surprise. I have no moral dilemma buying copy cat parts as long as they not violating a patent nor an issue with parts made in some foreign country some people do so I made sure that information is now out there for everyone. Also I will say I did not return the kit for several reasons: I did not trust Welder Joe's to give me the money back even if they got it, out of principal I refused to spend any of my money or time shipping it back to them, and finally I inspected and test fitted the parts I have and I'm happy with the quality and fitment.

I don't think it is fair to bash the Hoffman/Helix in this thread cause so far the parts I have there is no issues for me with quality/fit we can discuss that in depth later. Also their service has been great. When I called to order the parts they asked why since they come in a kit. I told them what happened but did not name the dealer and they gave me a discount on the parts for my troubles. The parts are going to be shipped soon and if I get they don't get here or something else happens I will update it and we can all bash away!

 

Problems with Hoffman group companies and products is well documented in this forum and on the internet. Just google hoffman group (or any of their subsidiary companies) +complaints. The parent company has an F rating with the BBB. I can only hope your experience turns out better than most, especially since you are dealing with an intermediate dealer and a high dollar, life critical product.

 

That in itself is a contradiction of terms. You have just admitted condoning stealing with your lack of morals. Someone, somewhere has spent considerable and significant time, money, energy and effort to create a product in a highly competitive marketplace only to have their work stolen, copied and resold. There is an entire economy being built and sustained overseas that is simultaneously harming our own American economy and our life and livelyhood by stealing patented, trademarked, or other intellectual properties. They are the ones making your copy cat parts you have no problem buying.

There are fake Edelbrock intake manifolds all over eBay for sale, just to name one item. If you don't think Edelbrock has significant time, effort and expense to create a product, that they surely have patented, think again. The constant and ongoing R&D that has to happen to continually ensure any companies products are always the best they can be is incredible. The entertainment industry is constantly publicizing their concerns and efforts to stop copyright theft and piracy. It takes absolutely nothing for someone to copy a casting, or rerecord a movie or music, then sell them for more profit at half the price as the original creator/creation. I could go on and on.

Personally, I have a huge moral dilemma over this, and I refuse to participate. If we know it's fake, we all should have enough ***** to stand up and just say NO.


That's my rant for today, and I won't apologize for this one.

 

Wayne,

I know the feeling. I once worked at a company that built and sold some major capitol equipment. One project that they built for a foreign company was thoroughly inspected by representives of the foreign company. It was amazing to watch. They took pictures of everything, and I mean everything. This was before digital cameras so they brought in a case of disposable cameras and took pictures of every square inch of the machine, inside and out. They crawled into the bowls of the machine to take pictures, they took pictures of all the tools used to assemble the machine and even the workers and how they handled the tools. The only reason I could think of at the time was they were taking pictures so they could reverse engineer the machine and later build them in their country for half the price. What also amazed me was the owner of the company I worked for allowed them to do it.

Another story I hear about a few years ago was about a major athletic shoe maker who noticed knock off shoes on the market that were exact copies of their product. Only thing they didn't have was a special ID sticker. Turned out in the Chinese factory where they had their shoes made the factory ran two shifts but unknown to them the Chinese government ran a third shift using their machines and materials to make the knock offs.

 

I make a living building instruments to detect counterfeit product. Metallurgy standards of most knock-off products are questionable at best. Not to mention that it profits those without ethics and often those with political agendas that mock democracy.
Jeremy

 

My statement had no contradiction there is a difference between a copy cat part of something that has no patent, is not strong enough to get a patent, it's patent has expired, or is able to be skirted around it in design(aka legal) and something thing that is an exact copy that breaks patent laws maybe the distinction was not clear.

Long before they where made in foreign countries legal copy cat parts were made by US companies against other US companies. While US laws can not stop the illegal products from being made in foreign countries or sold elsewhere they can still stop them from being sold here in the U.S. It has been done many times by other companies. The example you gave even has a US business entity so easily attackable for Edelbrock. If Edelbrock has not chosen to enforce their patents that it's on them probably cause their lawyers have decided they would not win or the bean counters decided it's not worth it. I'm not a patent expert but I think Edelbrock's last car intake manifold patent was around 1984 meaning it expired around the time you started seeing knockoffs that is probably what is going on.

Also Edelbrock is a not a great example as they have been sued and lost for stealing someone else's intake manifold design. If your rant is about foreign parts go look at something from Edelbrock besides heads and intakes and see where they are made.

So I'm surprised you fine me immoral and need to rant cause I'm supporting a business model that has been a major contributor to the success of the US economy for decades? These foreign countries are not killing our economy with making parts that infringe on patents and copyrights as this is a minuscule amount compared to the money they make manufacturer licensed and contracted parts for US companies.

 

I am not getting into this heated discussion, but a friend of mine bought what he thought was a complete set of Ping golf clubs. They looked beautiful. I went with him the first time he took them out. About halfway through our round he teed up for a drive with his driver. The noise just wasn't quite right and the ball went about 30 yards. The driver completely cratered upon impact. He took them to a Ping dealer near his home (he had purchased them online) and found out that his entire set were cheap Chinese copies. He wasted a lot of money trying to save a few bucks. I guess the point is that it is not easy to tell what is the real thing, so it is not always obvious what it is you are buying. The copiers spend a lot of time and money to fool us and we are probably fooled more than we ever know.

 

Well, I'm not going to get in a leg-lifting contest with you. Part of what makes America great is the fact we get to voice our opinions on any subject, no matter how mis-guided they may be. I respect that. And for the record, I did not "fine" you with any label, merely pointed out your own admission of lack of morals regarding the issue at hand. All I know is if someone picks my pocket, whether I have a patent on the cash in my wallet or not, it's still stealing. You can justify it anyway you see fit. But imagine just how much stronger our economy would be without people pilfering from it.

Each of us has our own moral code and a belief of what we feel is ethical, right and wrong. For myself, I'm going to continue not going out of my way to reward thieves. There's an old saying that goes something like the only thing evil needs to triumph is for good men to do nothing. Well, I'm not one to do nothing, and will continue to stand up for what I feel is right. And that's all I can do.