FA20Club Up Pipe

[woode]

If you haven't seen my thread on FA20Club's customer service, you can check my post in the vendor review section to see how that goes.

Worth reading, side note:
http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56141
http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=55263

Now how about their product.. and fixing it. I brought the up pipe and a few others in to work with me today so I could get started on fixing them.

Here is what I got from Toni at FA20Club:






So, obviously these are absolutely terrible welds. You don't need to be a welder to tell that. Somebody even tried to grind the welds, and fucked it away even more. There was one particular weld on the wastegate flange that looked like it was cracked all the way through. Well, good thing part of my job is to inspect cracks..





The fluorescent penetrant was applied to the outside of the pipe and let sit for about 20 minutes. The penetrant had made its way thru to the inside (indicating a crack/hole obviously, see pic#3 on the inside). This was so obvious that developer wasn't even needed to pull the penetrant.



I bought some weld rod and I rewelded around the wastegate flange to eliminate the hole (yes, hole. it was beyond a crack.) The internal welds were also smoothed out, however they were already contaminated so badly from being so crappily welded before that it wasn't really possible to make them perfect.

The odd part is that one side of the pipe had great welds. The other side looked like somebody gave a monkey a welding machine and a bottle of vodka and told it to go to town. I am assuming there are multiple welders at FA20Club.. and one of them needs to be fired.

The other welds on the whole kit are the same story - hit or miss. Either great or beyond terrible. Ugly welds are one thing.. but welds that don't even penetrate adequately are just unsat. Especially when there is a straight up HOLE in the exhaust like there was here.

This was pretty frustrating because I bought the kit so that I didn't have to spend a bunch of time fabbing, welding, etc. I wanted something that was fitted correctly from the get go. If I would have know I would be spending hours upon hours fixing this shit, I would have just made it all myself.

Anyone else with similar experiences?

[King Tut]

Damn man. Those are the first pics I have seen of an FA20Club part that is that bad. I have only seen fitment issues previously. I bet most people would have struggled to find that leak.

[Gaiseric]

[xjohnx]

did toni recently hire a new welder? yikes.

[Travisty75]

Originally Posted by woode

If you haven't seen my thread on FA20Club's customer service, you can check my signature to see how that goes.

Now how about their product.. and fixing it. I brought the up pipe and a few others in to work with me today so I could get started on fixing them.

Here is what I got from Toni at FA20Club:

So, obviously these are absolutely terrible welds. You don't need to be a welder to tell that. Somebody even tried to grind the welds, and fucked it away even more. There was one particular weld on the wastegate flange that looked like it was cracked all the way through. Well, good thing part of my job is to inspect cracks..

Those first pictures are of some HORRIBLE quality welds. It looks like the main flange welds have been boogered in with a MIG, while the others TIG'd.

Man, I'd be embarrassed to have my name on that part if it was going on my own car, not to mention if I had a shop and was selling those parts... Yuck.

[Touge_ninja]

holy hell, thats pretty lame. are you gonna take time to inspect every single weld on the kit? if the up pipe has this problem i would inspect everything he sent over.

[Sportsguy83]

[maxjedi]

Thanks for this useful information and pictures.

[raven1231]

I sure hope their turbo kits don't have these welds....

[charged86]

that's unacceptable . Sorry, but that's noob diy status.

[Mr.Jay]

Originally Posted by raven1231

I sure hope their turbo kits don't have these welds....

These are from their turbo kit... I believe @woode runs their uel 60 trim setup.


these would have to be the worst welds I have seen on an automotive part that was a diy

[Frs300]

@woode NDI ftw lol

went all out and did a dpi/lpi

[raven1231]

Originally Posted by Mr.Jay

These are from their turbo kit... I believe @woode runs their uel 60 trim setup.


these would have to be the worst welds I have seen on an automotive part that was a diy

Holy Sh*t! I didn't even realize that when I was reading the description. To think I was wanting to get their kit too.....Not if they have welds like this.

[Mr.Jay]

Originally Posted by raven1231

Holy Sh*t! I didn't even realize that when I was reading the description. To think I was wanting to get their kit too.....Not if they have welds like this.

I have no personal exp but seems very hit or miss.

Frs300 has no car lexusb3 car runs great

Some kits bolt on no problem and some werent even close