Macedo – Customer Service - History

(From posted statements and interviews with the customer from Ohio - quotation marks not always there)

Fall 2005 – Larry Macedo promises “at least the high 700’s and quite possibly the low to mid 800’s in power” and my Viper will not be returned to me if it doesn’t drive smooth and reliable. Larry says my car should be ready before April 2006. Larry says he charges more than most tuners - $125/hour - because he is better than they are. Customer is willing to pay more to have the job done right the first time. Customer asks Larry Macedo if it would be alright to post progress of his project on the internet and Larry thinks that would be a good idea.   

November 2005 – My car delivered to Macedo Motorsports. 

April 2006 – My engine has been rebuilt and reinstalled in my Viper. There have been some parts problems that have slowed down the progress of my build. I also have decided to have Larry put in a roll bar based on NHRA rules and the promise of “at least the high 700’s in power”. Larry says my roll bar will be like the SRT-10’s roll bar (2 hoops behind the seats). The roll bar ends up costing $500 more than the quoted price and looks nothing like 2 hoops behind the seats – most of it is below the driver’s and passenger’s heads providing almost no protection. 

June 2006 – I make my final payment to Macedo totalling a few dollars shy of $28,000. 

July 2006 – My Viper is returned to me by Larry Macedo personally. It needs a 500 mile break in to be done by me. Larry says I did not send him my new license plates – I sent him copies of them and insurance papers and a letter authorizing him to drive my car. He said he “can do without” the actual license plate in an email – I thought he could use the copies I had sent him with a dealer’s plate. He also says he needs to get another PCM from an older Viper and also have my Random Tech metal substrate catalytic converters removed and the Belanger headers’ pickles removed. I told Larry that I had tried an early model PCM before and it ran better on the original PCM and I also told Larry that my Viper is a street car and my county in Ohio requires catalytic converters and does checking for emissions. Larry says he won’t be able to tune my car without doing those things and I reluctantly agreed to do what he wanted. Larry tells me my car still has some tuning issues before he delivers it where it needs to be started and run a while and then restarted in order to keep the engine running. The car runs horrible with dangerous uncontrollable surging and bucking – lays rubber each time it surges. Larry says he will try and return back to Ohio in a month to tune my car. He then tries to sell me a $4,500 AEM system after I paid $420 for the older Viper PCM that was not used. The original Macedo estimate was for less than $21,000 and I had him do some extra work that brought the total to almost $28,000 and can not afford another $4,500 and tell him so. He then has a “family problem” and won’t be coming back to Ohio to get my car tuned right. 

My transmission console cover had gotten big cracks in it while at Macedo Motorsports – it costs $800 for a new cover. 

Bobby Loder, my Viper Tech, puts several grounds to the electrical system of my car and the bucking and surging lessens, but is dangerous to drive on the street still.

When my Viper was delivered by Larry Macedo 7-1-06 Bobby Loder was there to help. Larry told both my wife and me that he was planning on starting a new Macedo Motorsports in Ohio to go along with the original one in Orlando Florida and Bobby Loder would be the manager.
 
I did not know he was working for Macedo until after my car had been returned to me in July 2006 & then he told me it's normal for cars to need 4 more months to be tuned after they are returned as completed. He told me he was doing work for Macedo on Tony Rockhold’s Viper.

August 2006 – Loud “BOOM!” under the hood and my Viper won’t run on first trip down the drag strip. Bobby Loder found fuse blown and did some work on my car at the drag strip. Another fuse blew the next trip down the drag strip and more work done on my car. It finally did run down the drag strip without blowing fuses, but it still had bucking and surging just as bad as before. 

Larry tries to tune my car by mailing my VEC2 cards back and forth. He loses them on his desk for about 2 weeks and gets mad at me for not sending them to him. He doesn’t make new ones and send them to me in the meantime. (VEC2 cards are around $2.50 each new from a supplier.)  

Larry several weeks later sends the VEC2 programs to Dave Pollen’s computer and Dave meets with me and installs the VEC2 programs to see if they make my car run better, but they don’t. Dave is another Viper owner and friends with Bobby Loder and Larry Macedo. 

Larry had posted on a Viper site that I should “Go to Joe.” Referring to Joe Donovan getting my car tuned right since he was unable to. Joe Donovan was flying to Ohio to meet a friend and to check out why my car was running so badly. Larry sent some VEC2 programs to Dave Pollen that caused my car to barely run and to surge and buck and backfire to the extreme. It took half throttle to get my Viper up to 40 MPH! 

Dave Pollen told me a few days later that Larry had told him he was not allowed to help me with my car and also Bobby Loder, my Viper Tech, was not allowed to help me in any way either. 

I was told by Wendy Macedo that my warranty with Macedo Motorsports would be void if anyone even looks at my car – referring to Joe Donovan, of course. Later, after Joe had flown back to St. Louis without looking at my car Wendy told me Macedo Motorsports has no warranty. I also found out that Larry did not like Joe and he was being sarcastic in his post, but at the time I thought he was trying to help get my car running right. 

I found out it was impossible for a Roe supercharger to flow enough air to produce the promised horsepower and Larry revised his promise to the mid 700’s in power. Sean Roe told me the low 700’s was all the supercharger could produce. 

September 2006 – My lawyer, William James, tells me I should give Larry a second chance to fix my car. I very reluctantly agree and my car is shipped back to Macedo Motorsports. Larry continues to try to sell me the AEM system. He still tried to charge me $1,000 for an 8 hour installation, but several of his previous customers had warned me about him doing this. They told me it is really around a 2 hour job. Larry lowers the price several times, but he continues to tell me his cost is hundreds more than what other dealers are selling their AEM systems for and they are making a profit. Larry told me his cost was around $2,900, but I find out later he actually only paid around $2,100. Larry was also requested to make my Viper street legal by putting the catalytic converters back on. 

October 2006 – Larry has fixed an electrical short in the month he has had my car. Nothing else was fixed. Larry says he hopes to have my car fixed and ready by the end of November. 

December 2006 – I had to employ my lawyer, William James, again because no word from Macedo about my car being fixed and returning to me was received in November. A Demand Letter was issued for Larry to return my Viper by December 15^th. On December 13^th Larry told me to fly down to Florida and sign some papers. He would not show me nor my lawyer what the papers were in advance. A few days later I was informed not to come down because the AEM was recalled back to AEM for an update. I checked with AEM and it was true. Larry had given up on tuning my car with the VEC2 and installed the AEM system out of his own pocket. 

January 2007 – By midmonth it was verified that my AEM had been returned to Macedo Motorsports weeks earlier, but Larry still had not notified me or my lawyer that my car was ready. Another Demand Letter was issued for the return of my car by 5:00 PM February 1^st. The Florida Attorney General’s Office told me that if my car was not returned by the day and hour specified in the Demand Letter that they would arrest Larry Macedo for Grand Theft Auto. 

February 2007 – On February 2nd Larry calls me at home while I was at work and also my lawyer telling him he’s dropping the car off and he needs to have someone take possession of it. He did not notify either of us before this when or where the return of my car would take place. The car has problems and needs to be put on a battery charger to get it to run. My Viper Tech, Bobby Loder, drives the car to me when he gets off work. The car is absolutely filthy. The next day I try to drive it to a car wash and it died in traffic 3 times and had no heat to melt the snow off of the windshield. 

The coolant level is barely over half full and I fill the cooling system with a 50-50% mix of distilled water and anti freeze. I had to do this several times. The battery also had to be replaced because it was not put on a trickle charger while it was at Macedo Motorsports for 5 months where it was only driven around 50 miles total. I bought a new battery and still my car surged and bucked and died in traffic and still had no heat some times and heat the next. 

Larry’s dyno graphs showed my car getting close to 750 rear wheel horsepower and a perfect air/fuel ratio. I took my car to 2 different local dynos and each dyno facility showed my Viper was tuned extremely rich and off the measuring scale and I was only getting close to 650 rear wheel horsepower.  

I also discovered that various interior panels had rips and tears in the fabric- the 3 panels are around $500 each.

Car was undrivable and paid $775 to have it transported by Exotic Car Carrier to Underground Racing, Charlotte, North Carolina. 

Main Bearings and Cylinder Sleaves show gouges and scrapes evidence of detonation due to a bad tune and/or too much gasoline mixing with the oil due to a too rich tune - both of which were present in the engine. Tops of Pistons look damaged as well.

Bolts on Connecting Rods appear to have random torque settings.

Head Bolts appear to have random torque settings - some are loose enough that they could be the cause of the loss of 5.5 quarts of coolant internally in the engine.

$800 Port Match on Roe Intake Manifold does not have ports matching.

Roe Intake Manifold not sealed in back - allowing supercharged pressurized air to escape causing loss of Boost Pressure.

Macedo $3,500 Fuel System has fuel pump and main fuel line running inches away from driveshaft, which does not even have a safety loop. Fuel lines are split in engine compartment and held together with silver duct tape to seal the connection. Cause of gasoline smell discovered when old fuel line is removed from fuel tank - O-rings, both inside the tank and outside the tank, were installed bent up instead of flush with fitting allowing gasoline to spill out into the passenger compartment. Fuel pickup was a single small diameter pipe that was hacksawed to fit, but was not deburred from sawing it. It was placed to the far right side of the tank which would cause fuel starvation in a hard right hand corner. Larry Macedo was informed several times before the build that this car was primarily a street car the sometimes did autocrosses and drag strips.

Various interior panels sustained damage in the form of gouges and the carpet was torn. 

The $1,900 Roll Bar did not come up high enough to protect any adult's head - very poor design.

Found electrical problems due to all the grounds not being removed and wires pinched causing shorting. Ken's Viper Tech, Bobby Loder, was asked to help remember where he had put in some of the grounds and he called Wendy Macedo, who posted in public that Bobby would not be helping as if she was Bobby's boss and he was working for her.
 

When he called Bobby Loder for help in finding where he had put some grounds on my Viper’s electrical system, Bobby immediately called Wendy Macedo, wife of Larry Macedo, and she posted in a public forum (Viper Alley) on June 21,2007:  

“Bobby will not be calling UGR to help them with the problems they are having with your car. Thanks for leaving the message on his voicemail!”  

Shortly after Wendy Macedo’s post was posted at another public forum (DodgeTalk) Bobby and the customer from Ohio had a telephone conversation and when he was asked about why he is taking orders from Wendy Macedo, Bobby couldn’t come up with a good reason why he called her right away after getting his phone message instead of calling Underground Racing or the customer from Ohio. He did start to claim that he never was on Macedo’s payroll right away even though no one suggested it before hand. He did this as if he felt guilty. And he did it over and over in our phone conversation which seemed very weird since he was the person who brought it up originally and he kept bringing it up again and again.

Car could not be tuned by anyone because Larry Macedo used too long push rods and compounded the error by preloading them and extra 2 full turns making the valves almost never closing and thus making the car undrivable at part throttle.

Car came back from Macedo's Second Chance with an extremely rich air/fuel ratio and only achieved the low 600's in rear wheel horsepower, not anywhere close to the claimed mid 700's in power.

Exhaust system came apart causing metal parts to melt inside passenger's side sill. Pipe clamp Macedo used was not even finger tightened as the clamp spun freely around and around when flicked by a finger. Insulation in both side sills ruined by slip shod reinstallation of catalytic converters.

Random Tech metal substrate catalytic converters ruined due to excessive rich air/fuel tune by Macedo - another $600 to replace plus labor.

Roe supercharger had to be rebuilt for around $900 because the supercharger was spun way above it's redline, presumably to get more boost out of the poorly sealed intake manifold.

Kenny sold some of the take off parts to a friend and discovered the Larry Macedo had not returned around $500 worth of parts. He did not return the money it took to buy the parts that he lost. He also threw out $80 worth of spark plugs that were the correct spark plugs for the heads and deliberately put in the wrong reach spark plugs. 

Larry promised to return the $500 that he charged Ken for tuning the car with the VEC 2 since Larry did not do the tune. He refused to return it when reminded. 

Larry was asked to take back the unneeded 1996 Chrysler Viper (European Spec) PCM that he charged $420 for and was not used and Larry did not return the $420. 

Kenny had to hire a lawyer again to get his car back since Larry Macedo had pretty much stopped working on it due to frustration by his own admission to several visitors during hius second chance.

When a product is defective and it is taken back to be made right and it comes back even worse than when it was recieved the first time a refund of the customer's money is in order. Larry Macedo has been asked several times to return the money and he has not. 

This site will be updated with captions for the photos and much more soon. Please come back. Now go to the Coupon.