Seeking some advice on how to proceed with an issue I'm having with a tuning shop.
Back in January, my car had a cracked exhaust manifold. For a range of reasons and decisions it was replaced with an aftermarket one, and the resulting change in airflow meant that it needed to be tuned. I had the vehicle tuned at, let's call them Mechanic A, which was a tuning shop.
Cut to two weeks later I had warning lights for hill start assist and emissions control. On advice of a mechanic friend who no longer lives in my state, he recommended Mechanic B for ECU related problems. Mechanic B looked at the vehicle and after initial investigations found that they were not able to get into the ECU to look at the tune. I'm not an expert on these things but it was done through some means other than the OBD port - KESS or Alientech I think was mentioned by Mechanic A if that means anything to anyone reading this.
I called Mechanic A who was immediately quite hostile and repeatedly asked if I wasn't happy with the tune, claimed that the other shop probably didn't know what they were talking about, and that unless the issues popped up straight away then the problem wasn't the tune. They seemed VERY uninterested in even considering it might be their problem.
Following this, Mechanic B has attempted to rectify the issue in a few ways that ended with replacement of the O2 sensor given the errors that the car was getting. Having done this, I drove away and about 10 minutes later the issue popped up again. Cue return to Mechanic B.
Mechanic B removed the ECU and sent it to some kind of ECU decode expert people. Having done that, I have received the shocking news that despite the software on there which locked it, the car had in fact not been tuned at all. I believe now that having found that, Mechanic B is in a position to finally resolve the problem so I can get my car back. I'm still finding out but I believe I will be given some kind of report that highlights what was done or rather not done. The emissions control errors are exactly what we were looking to avoid by having the vehicle tuned so I think we've cracked it.
Now I'm stuck as to what to do. I have heard rumours (which are unsurprising based on my experience and the type of people in the shop) that Mechanic A are a shady bunch of dudes and possibly involved in dealing more than just car parts… I'm extremely nervous about the prospect of butting heads with them.
Bikies may not be an option given it seems I'm going up against a bunch of bikies in the first place.
I've put some options in the poll but I'm keen to hear some thoughts or ideas from the community.
Charge Back or Forget . Mechanic will not cooperate whatsoever