Here are some facts to consider if you want this technician to do anywork for you. this is my personal experience and what has happened to my truck.

First indications of getting my truck to be made bullet proof by installing studs and gaskets were great conversations, Chris made me feel comfortable with having him perform the work on my truck. It went down hill after the work was performed. The day I picked my truck up it was raining so I was not really able to inspect the truck for damage. The next day I was able to see the scratches on the right front fender, and the cab was not aligned properly when set back down on the frame. After further inspection I found the rear carpet was cut to access the center of the cab bolts, instead of rolling the carpet up to get to them. I called and left messages to get no response. I cleaned my carpet, aligned my cab, and wheeled out my fender.

Fast forward a month, truck seemed to be running ok. Until I crested a hill towing a trailer and the engine started to miss. By the time I had gotten it pulled to the shoulder it had hydrolocked from an injector that was just installed coming out. Having it towed to a repair facility near Traverse City, They tore into it to find that the bolts were not torqued properly on the injectors and it damaged 4 of the injectors that I had Chris install. I have to give props to the company that I bought the injectors from, they sent me out another set at no charge. So I'm back on the road, for the time being. Approximately a month after that the cooling system starts to build pressure, such as what happens when a headgasket cracks. So back into the shop near Traverse City again for the 3 rd tear down of the top end in less than 6 months. Sent the heads out thinking there was a crack, they came back fine, cylinders checked fine, come to find out there was a hairline crack on one of the Black Onyx headgaskets. The only way that this could happen, from what I'm told, by Black Onyx and the Technician at the repair facility was from improper torque sequence. i should also mention that the head gasket that was bad was also the same side that the injectors were improperly torqued.

I made numerous calls to Chris to have him at least refund the labor money that I paid him to help offset the all the additional repairs that occured after the poor work that was done. Of course I have not seen any of the Labor money.

I am really not a person to slam a person for no reason, there are a few members here that remember when all this went down. I paid close to 3 times what was necessary to get the truck running properly after I had the initial work done. I do also have to say that if anyone that lives up near the Traverse City area is looking for a reliable honest Diesel reapir shop go see Pioneer Diesel, they are located in Grawn on 31. Great guys there, Scott the owner and John the tech that worked on my truck were very open and straight forward. I should also say that I have been wrenching on trucks since the early 80's, but never got into diesel engine repair so I didn't want to tackle this large of a repair for the first one. Since the last set of headgaskets were installed last summer the truck has run flawlessly and over and above my expectations.

I also want to give a huge thanks to Torr for loaning me his car while my truck was in the shop the first time, and to William for listing to me vent when it all went down.

Again this is my personal experience. Sorry for the long post