As people have been following my 2 year many thousand dollar loss with ARE (the crooks of the west end) I have been updating regularly on the findings as they become evident.

nosguy has done an excellent job of trying to save me money and effort in the hopes that something was indeed done right. Today was the final knife in the proverbial back.

It was decided that to try to save time, effort and some money to fire up the car with the existing ARE engine in it. I was uncomfortable with the decision however, why not, I was game just to get her running. nosguy suggested we leak it down cylinder by cylinder and if everything was fine we'd go for it and if not we'd move on from there.

Upon removing the valve cover it was quickly learned that things weren't as they were supposed to be. My titanium retainers and locks had been replaced by heavier stainless parts, probably for another customers car. The heavier parts will cause excessive loading on the valve train. The springs seemed OK so the leakdown test was performed.

On a never run motor 5-8% is reasonable as the rings have not been sealed. Surprise, surprise please note the results

#1 38%
#3 41%
#5 40%
#7 40%

#2 45%
#4 80% ( TAP ON THE TOP OF VALVE AND GET 45%)
#6 42%
#8 40%

As you can see the results are horrible, and the motor must now come out to investigate the problem. I'm pretty sure I'm going to find a host of substandard used parts. To be safe I now have to measure each cylinder wall, re balance the whole rotating to be sure, and of course put in new rings. While we are at it the heads must be disassembled and checked the valves are tight and appear misaligned, I'm sure there is a valve job or many that must be fixed. My valves are supposed to be extreme duty, but there is no way to tell while the car is still together.

If I had tried to fire up an FI car under these conditions I would have quickly destroyed the engine, probably burnt the oil and smoked the rings and bearings in very short order. ARE at this junction would have blamed nosguy, I guess we figured it out first.

When the motor comes apart I will compare peice by piece to what I supposed to have, any beting man would love those odds that they are not.

First off Dave DiLuca did not build this motor, I know who the two people at ARE who did, so no complaints or band wagoning about Sled28 please.

I would love to hear what the ARE spokemen have to say now about this. I have lost parts, had to redesign my turbo system and now to add insult to injury I've lost my motor This just gets better and better every day.

ARE you ed me royally, I hope you truly enjoy the money I gave you for nothing in return.

On a brighter note nosguy and his company feel very badly about all of this and have made the effort to help out where possible. I guess I'm now back to square one.

I will continue to post up the findings as they appear. I truly hope you guys that got good service and parts because ARE is temporarily trying to make itself look good again remember the cost that many of us paid in theft of parts, money and broken cars.

Once again ARE thanks