Lets Break Some Stuff on the Dyno with Nitrous and Holley TERMINATOR X

[@SloppyMechanics]

Stock 10 bolt life

[@michaelallen2501]

My buddy John who owns Tick Performance sold his dyno and tuning equipment specifically because of cars like that. Told me the "Sloppy Mechanics" style hack job builds (nothing against the channel, he crosses his T's and dots his I's, but the majority of his fan base does not) started to outweigh the properly built cars. I want out of the repair industry and into the Performance side bad, but this very thing worries me. They taught us at WyoTech in the High Performance Powertrains class that "If you get into the performance side of the industry, the hardest battle you're going to fight is getting the customer to be honest with themselves." Here's a prime example.

[@pete540Z]

I'm gonna tell ya, this video cemented in my mind that YOU will be the person I bring my car to to get tuned. You show a lot of integrity and heart. The way you handled this is WAY above the call of duty. Can't wait to meet you in person, Joe. signed, Pete

[@heytonyman]

That’s literally a 125psi ball valve on a 3000 psi nitrous bottle... God be with you 😂

[@mback12000]

Nitrous is not even close to 3000psi. More like 950 (typical system flow point). But you still have a point.

[@ryanbrewster4630]

Your vids are the reason I've changed the way I do business with my clientele. We can only go out of our way so much before it affects us financially and personally in life.

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

hahaha thats funny. its tough. especially when you schedule a car for a day and you have to turn it away. its just like throwing money away. its easy to say charge them anyway but at the end of the day i need to be able to sleep at night as well.

[@nooch8it197]

I deal with this same issue every week. I have had to turn many projects away and they return with maybe 10% of the issues fixed. Keep at it I dig your content.

[@coalstang]

you made the best of it. kept engine safe. informed the customer. 👍 and informing youtube covers you butt too. 👍 even if you loose crappy customers you likely will eventually gain customers by showing this stuff and how you want to do things.

[@ThomasVilleneuve-db6fq]

Joe, I must tip my hat off to you for powering through. I would have looked at the rats nest of wiring and butt connectors and said hell no to the customer. But with that said, your ability to take crap and make something of speaks volumes. Your straight talking calling out what it is refreshing. I like seeing the good and the bad, really helps with understanding the importance of detail to prevent issues down the road.

[@8wireracing694]

You know what I would be super thankfull that a shop owner was honest and fed me game that my dumbass was never gonna learn and if i did learn its the hard way so I would pay for the advice and straight talk....may even save someones life.

[@fildavis2024]

Really liked how u showed the video clip of u talking with the customer. Honest, straight forward, and wanted the customer to understand where u were coming from. That’s all that can be done from your side. Thanks for the awesome content and sharing of knowledge!

[@TurboTrucks7875]

I look forward to seeing dedicated content around acceleration enrichment.

[@sfr2929]

I deal with the same thing in the gun industry. One thing i tell the customer is everything gets fixed or i wont do it because my name (business name) is forever tied to it once i accept it through the door

[@stephenmitchell3569]

Your truth and professional kindness are values that build future contacts. They will always be those who pass blame to use as excuse for their failures of planning, workmanship, "simply not following installation correctly", or buying junk parts (worn-out). You will always have customers you have to turn away because of safety and too many loose ends to complete what they want for the man hours/price they can afford. Your channel is the best example of the value you put into doing best job on each customer's car. 👍

[@adamelwood7768]

Man, i hate being in this situation. I always want to give any customer the best of my ability. So when it comes to making sure everyone is happy in the end, there is (as you mentioned) a happy balance to find. This saying always seems to hold true from my experiences. Good, Fast, Cheap: Pick two You did the right thing, you were transparent and gave him your honest opinion before moving forward = Conscience Cleared. Don't worry about the customer with a poorly executed project going around and bad mouthing your business. If they cant build a car, they surely cant manipulate reality. The truth always prevails!

[@christophercarson4310]

Thanks for sharing these tuning sessions with us Joe.. We learn a lot from your dialog and input. I am purchasing the Tune The Trilogy Series for my build.

[@LSswapfox]

The wiring reminds me of every 80s Ford winter beater truck I've worked on. All wires the same color, crimp connected, no shrink wrap, 10 wires jammed under the battery positive, ect. Not much you can do in this situation. Great video though. I'm glad something non motor related broke.

[@timdontwannasay5889]

You seem like a very kind person! Most guys would've basically said "THIS IS WHAT YOU GET! " Thank you for the info! I'm a total nube so all of this helps me not make a common mistake! 👍

[@jplperformance9073]

My buddy who owns a hub dyno and I help him out sometimes and I see more of these cars than I wld like. Always a headache but he likes to try and help people. He's the boss so It is what it is.

[@tomdivito264]

Joe , I had to deal with this same less quality of work and it always cost me in the end . Thanks for sharing all your knowledge I definitely make it a point not to miss your content !

[@BlueDoomDeath]

You mention on the nitrous how you would rather it be a dry shot and progressive. Could you explain why. Ive been concisdering adding a wet nozzle setup to my terminator x.

[@rippinproz]

Been right where you are in this video and you are right, you show them the problems, make recommendations and they just think you are being difficult and are the problem. I learned to just turn it away and so far that has saved me huge because others try their best and end up getting blamed by the owner of the POS for it blowing up or not working.

[@AndrewFarrar77]

Appreciate your honesty in your videos and conversation with customer!

[@lochnessfox3441]

You’re a brave soul. I can only say thanks for showing me what not to do. So thank you for the heads up on what not to do

[@TravYFZ]

Good Job. You handled the car and customer very well. Not sugar coating, and giving realistic expectations with clear communication.

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

thanks i appreciate it!

[@morgan2678]

Props to you for handling it, this is a customer I would have fired a long time ago-anytime one of my cars goes on the dyno, the shop owner and myself look the car over together before it touched the rollers. I’ve seen other shops that have a checklist they send out to anyone thinking about coming down

[@acanfield87]

Great work! As a potential customer I'd say you did everything you could to explain the situation.

[@brainward2611]

I totally agree with your approach Talk to the customer and if he says go Then unfortunately like you say you follow his request And itemize all of the issues like you have I enjoy all of your videos I just don’t comment much Keep up the good work !!

[@kjewer1]

As a tuner, I can relate 100%. It's a fine line to walk between not wanting to turn away someone that needs help and not wanting to blow up shitboxes in your own shop. As a track owner, I hope I never see that car here. That's a no win situation.

[@joshking6706]

I would’ve told him bring it back when it’s fixed and I’ll be more than happy to do it

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

I tried that it came back multiple times

[@smokewizard666]

I commend you for how you handled this situation. No sugar coating, just being honest. It may hurt people’s feelings but honesty is the best policy. If your professional opinion and gut feeling says something is not right then you have to stick to your guns, because at the end of the day it’s your reputation on the line. I’ve seen a 7.50 1/4 mile mustang come through our shop for suspension work and absolutely cringed every time I glanced at the wiring. It was worse than that Camaro. You’d figure if you were going that fast safety would be a big concern. Even funnier about the situation was the owner worked in the aviation field. Super scary. Honesty is the best!

[@Jvcomet]

Being honest with the customer is always best even if the customer doesn’t want to hear it. Good video.

[@benjaminwarner2186]

Whew wee brother you have balls of steel. No shot in hell would I do a WoT pull on spray in that unit. Props to you for being an honest man/shop owner, and just kinda plowing through the shit though!

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

i try my best to make power through it and make everybodys stuff work. doesnt always work out that way though!

[@russellbroadwell]

I have really big spool of yellow wire and is starting to show. Electric fan trigger, 2-step trigger, phone / laptop charger. As a DIYer it's really tempting to go back to the yellow roll. I am scared of cheap wire, what type of wire do you buy / where do you buy it? What's the best way to label wires? I do all my own work and know what's what, but can see where it could be intimidating to others. I am going to work on drawing a wiring diagram.

[@xxsupralvrxx]

In my opinion, that car is an example of someone cutting corners and not taking pride in their work. I really don’t blame you for being cautious about moving forward, glad it worked out for ya!

[@rj_boostedz2897]

I love your humor in all these videos. Entertaining!!

[@Bigchief45]

I’m not a tuner. But I tuned my last three personal street cars, all turbo stuff. And probably wouldn’t have touched that car with a 10 foot pole. Let alone bring it to a shop and expect them to fix it. Props to you on the way you handled it. If safety is ever an issue turn the job away.

[@allanmorgan4976]

As you get older you definitely get less tolerant to the shit that comes in the door, The younger version off me was exactly like you, bend over backwards to accommodate, as I got older the goalposts shaft a little and attitude towards customers changed, my outlook listen to your gut feeling and say take it down the road if that’s what you’re thinking, you get bogged down with there bad decisions and proudly only earned 5 bucks an hour, you are way to talented for that shit Joe, some customers just have to do it the hard way….keep up the good work I love it.

[@8wireracing694]

Right !! Turbos are like the fancy white collar crowd and Nitrous be like the I know a guy who knows a guy, fell off the back of a truck crowd😮

[@getthisdrew]

As a Dyno owner, I feel your pain with this one. I also respect your work ethics not on just this one, but the videos I have watched. Keep up the good work

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

thanks i appreciate it!

[@Bdoyle909]

I know the feeling, one of my buddies works the same way because he doesn’t know any better so then ill come by to help out and end up redoing almost everything that he did so he doesn’t die if we go make a test hit somewhere. Especially the situation you are dealing with, its like calling the customer and telling him you’re going to shoot his dog

[@eddieparis4286]

Dang young man i thought i had to work on some les than stellar units. Thanks for the videos. Your are right about being talked about bad if you turn it away.

[@moonboost8199]

Glad it was the rear end that went and not something more, um, theatrical. Have had stuff like that come into the shop I worked at and it was just an absolute nightmare. A lot of times the customer had a "friend's shop" build it for cheap because they couldn't afford to have it done by the quotes we'd given them. Then they couldn't afford to have it all redone after we pointed out all the dangerous things done to the car. Can't please everybody and sometimes it's the lesson some people need to learn that in many cases in this industry, you get what you pay for.

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

yea ended up being a best case scenario i think

[@MegaSpool]

I’m in a similar situation. Small town and people prefer to do as much work on their own as possible. Sometimes that’s good, sometimes it’s bad. I do my best not to turn anything away except for the HP tuners stuff. I absolutely hate HP tuners but that’s another story. I would have done exactly what you did. I also would have given him a price to go thru and re install the holley and nitrous stuff and tried to push him towards that, shitty thing is at that point it’s your baby 😂 Keep up the good work Joe! Your channel has become my favorite without a doubt!

[@SamSheepDoq]

I want to ask why you hate HP Tuners? I primarily tune LS based stuff and even though I don’t care much for their layout (I wish it was more like open source stuff where everything was in drop down lists), I haven’t had many issues tuning on it that were related to the software itself.

[@willyb2412]

I’ve never had a nitrous bottle look like that with all those damn fittings

[@4739-g9c]

You did the correct thing. Only thing is if you didn't have cameras I'd have the guy come in and watch. Other than that take id incurage the customer to take it back to the guy that first built it.

[@SuperOMARKO]

The customer and the other shop know that car is a mess - thats their problem and they wanted it fixed! The first question i would want answered is who is paying your invoice?! Don't be concerned about the bad rep, haters are gonna hate, but guess who the'll ask to get them out of a hole? Ha. Anyway when your channel grows they will come from everywhere LOL. Subscribed.

[@todds5956]

I'm nearing completion of my build and will be firing it up soon. 5.4 4v- Terminator X max with a 400 dry system

[@bruizer28]

you kept saying you can use that calculation "if" your target and actual afr are close but what if they are not? any other videos that help there? my closed loop is working its but off

[@matthousden9919]

I couldn’t imagine what u must see! Lmao. Possibly why I can’t beg a shop to get mine in the dyno! Thankful for your vids my shitbox is still running! Keep up the good work

[@cobrabuilder9336]

I own a performance shop and have had to turn cars like this away,. most, not all, of my customers have really nice cars that were professionally built and have not gone the DIY route. My primary tuner has the exact same issues that you have with the cobbled together cars, unsafe, parts falling off, things not mounted properly and wiring nightmare's. i know everyone cannot afford to pay a professional, has the knowledge to do it themselves or worse yet cares. I feel your pain, remember it is your name on the door and your reputation. Never compromise that.

[@TurboLSX]

You're a much better man than me. I never would've pulled it in my shop after raising the hood. But you are also correct about maintaining your reputation in a small town. It's a catch 22, but you handled it very professionally. On a side note, I look forward to you getting out of that building one day soon. You certainly deserve better. Cheers brother.

[@sergebasque8460]

Thanks for letting us understand what can go wrong with installs and wire ect.....👏👌

[@codycole8]

After hearing you mention this car on the podcast, I had to find this video. With that being said. Don't ever question yourself on weather you are a good guy or not lol.

[@edgarlaboy5225]

Wow. As a shop owner/tuner i really enjoy your content as i can relate to things so much. Haha. I love this industry but these kind of jobs are really what scares me the most. Me personally, i would rather be known as a shop who has turned down work here and there. I think.most people who i actually want to be my customers would understand why something wad turned down. rather than just accepting anything and fighting with stuff, hating life and having problems with crap blowing up or failing. When alot of people here about stuff blowing up at a shop 99% they assume shop or tuners fault especially when they dont understand or see the "quality" install. Keep it up joe! Would love to meet you sometime! we arent that far apart! Drinks on me👍

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

yup its a tought one to juggle for sure. still trying to figure it out 100 years later haha

[@funfun8095]

I just give customers like that a "I don't want to do it" price, and have them sign an actual paper agreement.

[@justme7055]

I do the same thing. price it according to the mess they bring me.

[@RobSmith-lv6jb]

Amazing what people can find acceptable. I've installed a number of EFI systems on my own cars as well as Racepak/motec data logging systems on top fuel. There is a personal responsibility to all those in a race team that what you do is reliable and safe. I would never want to be responsible for a failure at the track simply because I was too lazy to do a job right. As they say " not enough time to do it right the first time but always enough time to do it again". I know exactly what your talking about buddy.

[@gi_bnv]

Hey Joe, you acted so well with your customer. Unfortunately honesty is not always appreciated as it should be, but don't let this feel you bad. I always applied you same philosophy with my customers during the tuning process and, at the end of the day, they loved my 'how to do things'. P.S Your work with this channel is fantastic! Stay on this line 👍🏻

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

thanks! I appreciate that!

[@pimpinak89]

Love the welding helmet hahaha nice work

[@ericpost4732]

Customer point of view. If a tuner told me it might break and I said send it then it's on me if it breaks. I don't care if the tuner was shitty or great, I picked the tuner and I said send it. And I'm okay with cheap and ignorant but when your told how to be safer and you ignore it then your flat out stupid and that can't be fixed. I'd have sent the car down the road due to safety concerns related to the hardware store nitrous fittings never mind the electrical nightmare. One leak and one electrical hiccup and that shit is on fire in your shop with a bottle full of fun in the back seat, not cool. I appreciate you had the balls to post the vid.

[@philstrohm4181]

If you can’t fire the customer and you’ve already told them you’re “3 weeks out” then you do exactly what you did. Lose money , keep your morals and do the best you can.

[@boostnhoe]

Love your videos. Thank you for trying to help all us out. Love the ODB plug is. 👐🏽

[@juiced71]

Take his money and run! All you can do is warn him rest is on him now if you think something like a fuel leak or is gonna jeopardize you or your shop pull the plug If you gotta fix things time is money . With that said it would be cool to see it done right 👍🏻 I’m still Sbc and running home brewed hanger18 carb ... I love to do a fuel injection setup just so I can ping back and forth with E-85 So every little bit of info is always good ... Love the channel !! Do you charge by the hour?

[@NoFox_Given]

You win a medal for even touching that... that battery alone scares me.

[@NORMANBARR]

Is it appropriate to ask a shop hey is my car to much of a shitbox just for my own safety because I just built my car in a car port but I dont wanna be that guy but I want to know what I may have done wrong

[@pete540Z]

^^^ Completely the correct attitude!!! Bravo.

[@SteveSummers]

Wow, what a POS. I would have been afraid as well. Some people just do not know the difference between good work and bad work. In a situation like this a call to the owner was the correct move. That car was definitely a safety hazard.

[@CompoundKodiak4x4]

Treat it like a normal repair shop. Document what you find. Break down the list as required things and suggested things. Give customer the list. Then you have record of things and from there its on them. And like you stated in the video its not bashing its this isnt the way you wanna do this if you want it to last or be safe. Knowledge and money are normally the limiting factors. I enjoy watching yoour videos!

[@rizzoid]

He just needs to make videos on them like he did with this. Best documentation around and it's fun to watch. :)

[@CompoundKodiak4x4]

@@rizzoid oh i agree. I think showing how to properly fix some of the issues commonly found would help a bunch of people as well.

[@slows102]

My nitrous 5.3 s10 will be coming to you soon! Its a dry 300 progressive shot on terminator x. Maybe I should just have you install the terminator so I know its right and I don't want my truck in a youtube video like this lol

[@rickhowd6093]

Lotta times you just have to bite your lip and go ahead and try to fix it as long as you tell the customer every single thing that you’re doing and what may go wrong Rick from Michigan

[@stevens5723]

Those fittings on the nos are ticking time bombs.

[@TurbineResearch]

If someone came to me with that car I would just straight up tell them that I need to fully rewire the car before i can tune it. I don't do well with rats nest autozone nitrous kits 😆 well done though you got it off the dyno without your shop burning down

[@BadLuckGarage]

I'm only 5 minutes in and already I can say I wouldnt have touched that cluster f*** if I were you. Looks like Ray Charles wired that thing.

[@TurboDog73TX]

10/10 if a customer brought Me a car like that, I'd tell them to take it down the road, out of My shop.. You can never make EVERYONE happy all of the time, nor should You try, IMO at least.

[@TurboDog73TX]

The real reason I feel so strongly about that is You attempted to counsel the customer, who clearly indicated that "He knew better than You", the professional His car would up at.. Those kinds of customers are the last thing You want associated with You, and Your reputation, because the microsecond the I told You so happens, they're typically fast to run around blaming YOU, the guy that "just wanted to help them out". Been there, done that, never again.

[@Ribbityibzki]

You're a saint for parking that thing in your shop. I'd quote $1k minimum to sort their wiring before I ever made a base map.

[@Flitzer514]

Are there any fuses in that system? Anyway, if someone is that persistent and knows the risks, I would have done what you did.

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

i have no idea haha

[@RACEALOTGARAGE]

This is real entertainment and real life shit 😅 loved the video and as much as i was laughing it was still a positive video👌🏾

[@BKMDano17]

Well I'm a small remodel guy and I gave a list of things to a potential customers that they would have to answer before I could give them a price. They just kept coming back with no answers! I went round and round for 3 weeks finally gave up

[@BTB31]

I love when they put teflon on the 37deg an fitting

[@jamiebush1829]

No is a sentence....great work Joe..

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

thats true, thanks!

[@Karadon1969]

What actually broke? Was it the 10 bolt rear?

[@OtisFlint]

"I think he grudge races this thing"...ahhh, it all makes sense.

[@boostednova7120]

I did dry n20 on my terminator... its been working great

[@woodzy575]

People have a pretty short memory about when you tried to help them and it soon turns into " You ripped me off " . I wouldn't work with a situation like that. If somebody is angry at the previous mechanic they will probably turn on you too. How did it all work out in the end?

[@stevenbready3019]

Not going to lie I was kind of scared for you 🤣. And it ended just as we thought, with something broke.

[@cameron878]

We call that type of vehicle a liability at my shop. Lol. A comeback looking for a place to happen

[@clint.garage.6092]

Bro that’s crazy....I had no idea what you all go through when something like this comes through the door..... I feel like it’s a no win situation for you as a tuner or the owner. However as a carpenter by trade I have faced similar scenarios with unrealistic clients when making similar phone calls to the one you had, thankfully my industry is licensed and regulated....so there is that to fall back on when all else fails.

[@Boostismyfriend]

You stop picking on my wiring, lol my buddy Nigel go’s threw this on the weekly

[@bigo975]

Great content! I said a prayer for u dealing with this car...

[@JoeSimpsonAtTempest]

😂

[@autotuneengineering]

I loved every bit of it. Now thats some funny shit, I dont care who you are. "Well it was built for nitrous" maybe not all 10 lbs in one sitting though...

[@TurboTrucks7875]

I look forward to every one of these!

[@andrewadams1428]

Every car at our shop came from another shop. So many of these cars out there. We normally just start over.

[@paytonfowler6955]

Keep up the good work brother! Hang in there. Do you have merch? Terminator x trans tuning video would be cool.

[@HandGunPat]

I'd be so ashamed and embarrassed as the car owner for bringing it to you. I would NEVER let someone see it or touch it in that state, if my tuner said they wouldn't feel comfortable touching it I wouldn't force the tuner to finish tuning it. I think you should have the right to turn down a car until specific items become addressed. Having to diag wiring, deal with leaking fittings and nitrous come out of the ball valve like that is unacceptable. It's pure negligence on the owners side, if they don't care about it neither should you.

[@hackjobgarage9289]

Makes my Nitrous Ls build wiring look good!

[@joshmiller8663]

Joe I would want you tuning my car after this video. That car is sketchy at best. If I was a shop owner and something like that came in I don't think I would touch it. would be afraid I'd burn my shop down. That wiring looked scary.

[@D3thM3tal]

I was hoping to see some 10 bolt parts scattered around a bit. It sounds like that car looked like hell, was nearly functioning (backwards relay) and that it didn't need all that much to get going. I know where you are coming from though, it probably started off as some random incorrect stuff but just got worse as time went on. I know the wiring isn't exactly pretty in my 70's EFI rock crawler and looking at it from time to time really makes me want to tear it out and start over, but it's been together problem free for over a decade.... so I guess it stays.

[@seangooden4746]

Safety First number one priority customer doesn't want to get his car fixed send them down the road have a good day

[@apw30534]

I've turned away work numerous times because I didn't want my name associated with the car/boat/whatever. Years of experience makes it easy to spot potential trouble/liability. I would not have worked on that car at all. lol

[@deraculandrac917]

I tell my customers straight up if you putting price over safety sign your life away understand the consequences period. Otherwise the liability game gets used & they try to shut you down. Being patient with these types of customers are key to not blowing a fuse

[@heavydutyroadsidellc920]

its give and take, some people just do not understand it is not safe and it will break.

[@chriswells4382]

I’d love to know who the shop and customer are in an effort to avoid both. Lol