Crave Luxury Texas

Wow!! Three motors out.

 

They didn't inspire a lot of confidence in me when I visited them awhile back and looked at that carbed Boxer they were trying to move.

But I will say I've heard one good report from a fairly reliable source about them standing behind a sale when problems occurred for the new owner (it involved that spate of water pump problems that the flat 12's seem to have had recently). I don't know if one of your engine outs was due to this?

Are you in the Houston area? I'd like to hear how/who finally sorted the car out for you either publicly or privately as you wish?

 

It always pains me to hear of such story. Hopefully you will be able to put all this behind you and the car will give you miles of smiles. At the same time, thanks for the heads up on the dealer.

 

Man, am I sorry to hear that on many levels. The 512TR is an amazing, supremely competent, exhilarating, and pretty reliable car. Sorry your first experience was anything but. I'd place the cause more on the dealer than the car. Hope this gets worked out for you.

 

Can you add more details to your story? Since they are local, I was hoping they could be a buying resource for me. At this point they look like Houston kryptonite.

 

More info.....I remember that car.....a beautiful black 512tr. The pics looked amazing. What was wrong with the car?

 

Why 3 motor outs?? I would think someone competent would fix it the first time.

John

 

Mike, I know it's little consolation at this point, but I think you're not the only flat 12 owner who's been through this. Hopefully others will chime in with their first hand experiences, but from what I understand, (and I'm only a 550 owner standing on the sidelines, not a flat 12 guy (yet)), there were a "batch" of "official Ferrari" water pump parts for these cars that were defective and managed to be installed in several FChatters' cars and the resulting problems were highlighted here and other places on the 'net.

I would find it odd that any shop that worked on a water pump would only replace the seal, and not the bearing - it's just one of those opportunity things, so it may well be that defective parts were taken out and replaced.... again.... with defective parts, and no one knew. I'm certainly not trying to take up for Crave here, but apparently these defective water pump parts have caused more than their share of expensive horror stories over the last year or so.

FWIW, on the 456/550/575 side, something similar is happening with timing belt tensioner bearings and we are having to watch/inspect them VERY closely. In our case, it seems to be an issue with gray market parts making their way into the official Ferrari parts channels.

 

During the ppi, you knew it had a leaking water pump and you bought it anyway? How is it Craves fault that the mechanics had to fix it three times? Seems like your issue should be with Mike Sphere and Vincent Latino.

 

hmm reminds me of another thread....... 3 motor outs.....

 

The guy that did the PPI is Mark at Sphere Motorsports (Sphere isn't his last name). Without a doubt one of the best exotic car repair centers around.

After hearing the rest of your story, I feel better about Crave and their part. You had a PPI done, got the results, fixed a few things on your behalf.

Even your own guy missed the bearing issue......twice.

Now I think Crave could have helped you a little more financially, and I'll keep that in mind if they get a car I'm interested in.

Sorry you and your car got off to a rough start.

 

We honor our work for what we did to this car and we sent Mike a refund on what had been done and a new part as well. We did not for see the issue with the shaft as we had road tested the car for 20 odd miles without no issue. It was not until Mike got it home and started it up again and it started to leak. I am sure that if you check Sphere Motorsports did what they could other than having the car shipped back and done at our shop. We have spoken to Mike and i do not think he has an issue with us.
At first we thought that we had cracked the new seal as the next guys but in the end it was a bigger issue. We have implemented new protocols since this issue.