Chris Harwood dba XtremeMotorsports, SportscarTech.com, and Arrive-n-Drive.com

[Bob K]

Just got back from a vacation in Mi. No phone (land line or cell) and no computer. We really had a great time.

Before I left I contacted my Congressman, Bill Posey. I have received communication from Bill that he has instructed his office to follow up with the Attorney Generals office and others concerning Harwood. This guy needs some prison time for an attitude adjustment. Hope I can help him.

 

[Bob K]

I have emailed Congressman Posey and requested an update. I told him I would not get off his back until Harwood is arrested.

 

[Rich Z]

Well, this is interesting. On a hunch, I emailed a guy named Vernon Hills, who is the regional sales manager at STS Turbo and asked him if he had any record of my turbo chargers being sent to him about a year ago to be rebuilt. He called me on the phone and said he has found NO record at all of turbos being sent in from Chris Harwood, nor any of Harwood's business names. He is checking on Keli Burris to see if he can find anything under that name, since Chris would often use Keli's name in transactions. I asked him to email me back a statement detailing the fact that no such transaction took place for the case I am building.

So it appears that I spent $750.00 on turbo rebuilding that did not take place.

Also, Vernon told me that from the sound of things, it was not anything that went wrong that would require a turbo rebuild. Actually they are very reliable and seldom need rebuilding. The problem was probably a clogged valve that sits on the turbo housing that caused the oil leakage, a $17 part. He said that this valve, and the failing of the return pump, are normally the only issues they experience with the setup.

Lovely............ :banghead:

Wish I had these types of hunches BEFORE I took my car to Harwood.

 

[Bob K]

Harwood is going to regret everything he has done Rich. Maybe 5 yrs in prison will teach him a lesson. There are two reasons a person doesn't do these things to another person. It's either out of respect for others or fear of the consequences. Harwood has no respect so I think he has to be taught to fear the consequences. 5 years should do that.

 

[Rich Z]

I thought a statement from RPM Transmissions concerning my transmission and differential would be helpful.

On 11/16/2010 1:19 PM, jeremy@rpmtransmissions.com wrote:
> Rich,
>
> Your transmission and differential you sent
> us were 100% stock and haddn't even been rebuilt to stock specs. I hope
> you can lock that deadbeat up for a long time.
>
> Jeremy
>
>

>> Jeremy,
>>
>> I really would like a statement stating that my transmission and
>> differential sent to you from South Georgia Corvette were factory stock
>> items. I already have confessions from Chris Harwood, but you know how
>> these things are. I want a ROCK SOLID case against him.
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Rich Z

 

[Rich Z]

Also, this is an email received concerning my supposed turbo rebuild that I paid Harwood for:

On 11/16/2010 11:10 AM, Vernon Hills wrote:
>
> STS Turbo Email Header
>
>
>
> Rich,
>
> Good morning! As I mentioned to you on the phone yesterday my operations manager can not find any records of having received your two turbos from Xtreme Motorsports! If we could get any shipping information as to when the turbos where shipped to us and a RMA # (standard STS sop) that would help us in finding out if the turbos where sent to us. Please let me know if you are able to get any additional information!
>
>
>
> Thank you for your interest in STS Turbo!
>
> -Vernon Hills
> Regional Sales Manager
> vhills@ststurbo.com
> 801-224-3477 ext. 805

 

[Rich Z]

Chris has told me via email that he is working a job 4 days a week, 10 hours a day. I don't believe he has tried to reopen his own business, and probably is working for someone else. Does anyone at all happen to know where it is he is working, if this is actually truthful?

 

[vetteguy61]

hard to say if he's telling the truth or not Rich. He wasn't very truthful to his customers. At this point in time I wouldn't believe a word he says.

 

[Rich Z]

Well, if I have to hire a private detective to find out, I certainly will. My guess is that Chris is just hiding out in his house, peeking through the curtains every time a car drives by. He knows what is coming....

Anyway, just to recap the situation and get my ducks lining up in a row:

1. On 08/13/09 I got a cashier's check made out to Xtreme Motorsports for $25,000.00 that was for the purchase and install of a custom made 427 engine, along with other enhancments to the drivetrain, fuel system, suspension, etc. The price included ALL labor, materials, and state sales tax. This check was personally delivered to Chris and Keli at our residence. This list also included the following items that were ultimately NOT provided as stipulated:
   • $1,450 for a built differential. Instead of buying and installing this unit in my car, he instead painted my old stock unit and put it back into my car claiming it was the built differential.
   • $360 for a transmission/differential brace. This was not in my car when it was removed, even though Chris claimed everything mechanically had been installed.
2. 11/23/09 a check was made out to Xtreme Motorsports, of which $750.00 was paid for the rebuild and shipping charges of my turbochargers to be done by STS. STS has confirmed that they have no record of ever receiving such items from Chris Harwood. Further, the person I talked to said that quite likely the cause of the problem was likely a check valve, which costs about $17. He said that turbos RARELY ever have to be rebuilt.
3. 02/04/10 a check was made out to Chris Harwood dba Xtreme Motorsports, of which $510.00 was for the ceramic coating of the turbo housings by Jet Hot. As per correspondence from Jet Hot, the turbos were originally shipped to them, but Chris apparently did not know that the housings had to be removed from the main body, and they therefore shipped the units back to him, uncoated. When I next viewed the turbos, they were obviously spray painted, yet Chris insisted that it was just a crappy coating job by Jet Hot, and he claimed he sprayed clear paint over them to try to make them look better. When I balked at that story, Chris said he would send them back to Jet Hot and tell them to do a better job of the coating. When the delay seemed excessive for those turbos to come back, I contacted Jet Hot myself, and found that they had no record of those turbo housings coming back to them for recoating. That was when I found about the above mentioned return of the units originally. Even though Chris KNEW I was talking with Jet Hot, he still insistently claimed that the turbos WERE at Jet Hot. He claims to have told Jet Hot to send them back to him uncoated, since they were taking too long and I wanted them back on my car. Chris did refund this money, but the fact remains that he did defraud me (in my opinion) and only refunded the money when I had him pinned in a corner. The refunding of the money does not expunge the original fraud (in my opinion) that he perpetrated.
4. 09/11/09 a check made out to Xtreme Motorsports for $2,500 for a "Level 'V' transmission". As in the case of the differential, this purchased item was not provided for my car, and matter of fact Chris made up a bogus invoice showing that both the transmission and differential were built by a company called "DRM Motorsports". I say "bogus" because in two separate emails, Chris admitted that I did not get the transmission and differential I paid for, so that invoice he provided to me HAS to be fraudulent. What he put into my car was my original transmission merely spray painted. It needs to be pointed out that the transmission, differential, and those supposedly ceramic coated turbos were ALL painted exactly the same color.
5. On 09/17/10 I received an email from Chris Harwood stating "I will have the car mechanically ready today and I will call Aaron Scott and make arrangements to have him tune it." Chris stated verbally to both Aaron and myself that he would pay for the tuning of my car, which was to be done by Jim Smith. This was the day that I decided to have my car towed from Chris's shop. I had to gain access to the shop by having him contact Toby, who owns a local body shop and had a key to the building, to allow us into the building so I could remove the car. Chris refused to come to the shop himself. It turns out that Chris did not have the car mechanically ready, and actually was not even at the shop most of the day. So in my opinion, he really had no intention of making the car "mechanically ready" at all that day. To date, I have paid Aaron $1,000 for the work he has done mechanically on the car as well as the initial tuning done by Jim Smith. When the car was sent out to be aligned at a professional alignment shop, they found MANY loose and missing bolts, as well as a few that were cross threaded, needing to be repaired. Bear in mind that the new engine had been in Chris's shop since 04/30/10 so here it was four and a half MONTHS later and it was apparent that most of that time could not have been spent working on my car with so many things still unfinished. So it's not like I did not give Chris Harwood ample and abundant time and opportunity to fulfill the terms of the contract implicit in his accepting the job I paid him for.

So adding up the amounts I have apparently been defrauded of by Chris Harwood, we come to a total of $6,570.00, of which $500 has been refunded. There will obviously be more expenses to be paid when Aaron finishes up on my car, which will be added to that total when known.

 

[Bob K]

So adding up the amounts I have apparently been defrauded of by Chris Harwood, we come to a total of $6,570.00, of which $500 has been refunded. There will obviously be more expenses to be paid when Aaron finishes up on my car, which will be added to that total when known.

I'm really surprised it's not more than that. I think he got Mike for about 2500, and I'm not sure about Liz, Dan or the others. More than that, he stole part of everyone's life. None of you will ever forget this and I don't think you'll ever be quite the same.

Have you verified that the engine has been paid for? No, I'm not kidding, I would check.

 

[vetteguy61]

So far the parts that I was missing come to $3475.00 plus $3400 to put my car back together, $1864 for the first rebuild at LME and $538 for shipping.that comes to $9277.00
Not counting the 8 months of insurance I paid for and never had my car to drive.

 

[Rich Z]

I'm really surprised it's not more than that. I think he got Mike for about 2500, and I'm not sure about Liz, Dan or the others. More than that, he stole part of everyone's life. None of you will ever forget this and I don't think you'll ever be quite the same.

Have you verified that the engine has been paid for? No, I'm not kidding, I would check.

Actually it WILL be more... I already paid Aaron $1,000 for the work he has done up to a few weeks ago, and since then he has pulled the drivetrain to replace the incorrect clutch that Chris put in there, as well as shipped off my transmission and differential to RPM and then reinstalled the new ones when they came back. Plus the tuning needs to be finished up and a number of small things that Chris left unfinished, or else left in a state of disarray that the final product just needs to be cleaned up. Also, I had to pay Aaron for steel braided hose that Chris was supposed to run for the oil lines on the turbos but was not done. So yeah, here will still be more to add to that total before it is all said and done.

I'm sure the engine was paid off long ago. That was done when it was the Warhawk engine, so I seriously doubt Bryan would have built me another engine if that first one hadn't been paid off completely. I got the spec sheet directly from Bryan, so I know what was put into that engine. Of course, that engine was at Chris's shop long enough for it to be completely disassembled and put back together with inferior parts, but I just don't think that happened. Which, I guess, is based more on hope rather than any evaluation of Chris scruples based on the other stuff he pulled on me. Fortunately the block and heads themselves are unusual enough of a manufacture that a full switcheroo of them would have been quite difficult for Harwood to pull off. But then again, he apparently DID think that I was so stupid that I couldn't tell a spray painted turbo from a ceramic coated one. So really, who knows what might have gone through his mind to try to do?

 

[Bob K]

So far the parts that I was missing come to $3475.00 plus $3400 to put my car back together, $1864 for the first rebuild at LME and $538 for shipping.that comes to $9277.00
Not counting the 8 months of insurance I paid for and never had my car to drive.

Looks like you and Rich are going to be close in the money dept. I hope the state understands that you had a warranty on the first engine and shouldn't have had to pay.

 

[vetteguy61]

Chris said since the machine shop was at fault there was no warranty by him to get the motor rebalanced. That was not told to me until I tried to get my money back on the rebalance from LME.

 

[Bob K]

Chris said since the machine shop was at fault there was no warranty by him to get the motor rebalanced. That was not told to me until I tried to get my money back on the rebalance from LME.

That guy is so full of crap it's coming out of his ears. Wouldn't it be a great Christmas present if he was in jail and you had your car. :yesnod:

 

[Rich Z]

Chris said since the machine shop was at fault there was no warranty by him to get the motor rebalanced. That was not told to me until I tried to get my money back on the rebalance from LME.

If you never received an invoice from the machine shop that supposedly did the work, I would strongly suspect that the work you paid for was never actually done. Even if Chris has provided an invoice to you, please keep my experience in mind where he obviously forged such a document for work he claimed was done on my car.

If you know which machine shop Chris claims did the work, I would go directly to them to get proof that the work was done, or evidence of his defrauding you, whichever way the FACTS pan out.

 

[Bob K]

Do you guys keep turning in the new stuff to Pagano as you think about it? Maybe that's one reason he is still investigating. If Harwood never did the work for Mike I think that would be a huge and Pagano should be notified right away. Man, it just keeps adding up.

 

[vetteguy61]

Neil Connell was the one who did the first balance job on my motor.Maybe I need to get in touch with him and see if he did the work the first time.

 

[Bob K]

It wouldn't surprise me if he didn't do it Mike. Maybe he never heard of you. I've never seen an engine come un-balanced. I think we've talked about this before but I can't remember the facts.

 

[Rich Z]

Do you guys keep turning in the new stuff to Pagano as you think about it? Maybe that's one reason he is still investigating. If Harwood never did the work for Mike I think that would be a huge and Pagano should be notified right away. Man, it just keeps adding up.

My guess is that the more people they interview, the more names that crop up that leads to more interviews. I'm sure that by now they are interviewing people even we know nothing about. It's not like Chris would have told any of us about others he has similar dealings with.

BTW, if anyone needs to be able to reference the case for another investigating agency, the case name is "Sports Car Technologies" and the case number is "1009-35372".