[rlhay2]

It occurred to me at the GT500 lunch yesterday that there are lots disgruntled customers from the DFW Ford enthusiast community. As most know, I am currently a True Street customer but I am rather forthright and vocal about what I want and what I think is reasonable to expect.

As someone else mentioned, there is no independent shop that has the resources that Ford has available. That said, whether mail order or custom tuned, a dedicated tuner whom is truly interested in delivering a well tuned car, is capable of doing so.

But it takes time!
Typically, more than one day.

And if the car is extensively modded, it may take several days. Furthermore, if you are using forced induction or NOS, the only "true" way to tune the car is on the road in real world conditions. Dynos are useful, but they are not indicative of "real world conditions". This means trusting your tuner to drive your car or the owner making time to drive the car while the tuner datalogs and observes.

And for this to happen, it is not going to be discounted or a group purchase price or "hookup". If after all this, you still have a car that does not run correctly, find another tuner. And if you have burned bridges with all the tuning options in DFW, start turning it yourself.

If you have chosen mail order and the tuner has not requested datalogs of the car being started and driven in a certain manner, you have been short changed.

It's the performance triangle principle:

High Performance
Reliable
Affordable

You only get two!

I have a reliable, 1000+hp weekend car, it was not cheap. But I expected this before I began this journey. If at any point I feel that I am no longer getting the service I expect from a shop, I'll take my business elsewhere. There isn't a Ford shop in DFW that doesn't appreciate a good customer!