MG Metal Works DIY kit knowledge share

[winnievan]

Well -- I got some adjustable caster/camber bushings for my axle that I'm about to install before I get this MG kit under my van.

I have the caster shims from MG on my radius arms -- MG said he runs those + 1.5* caster bushings and his van drives great. I'll probably go a bit higher to 1.75* caster on each side so in addition to the shims, that should put me at 3.75* more than wherever the axle wants to naturally-- which should hopefully put me close to the high end of the spec.

What about camber? I imagine this pretty independent of the axle geometry - so I was going to set the bushings to add +.25* -- which is the spec for the F-Series.

I'll go in for a professional 4-wheel alignment -- but it would be nice to get it close and maybe alleviate the need for them to pop the upper ball joint.

Thoughts?

[Chinook]

BrianW - Ya, good idea. I dont normally use paypal, i have no account with them. But i have so many things to buy there has to be an easier way than paypal worry. Maybe i will just call everyone and pay on the phone now. Since MG sent an invoice to me to pay, im not sure i can send only one dollar without him having to send another invoice?

[Chinook]

Winnie... my rig is mildly different than your im sure even though its an E350 superduty.
My experience has always been that the bushings always end up being a compromise between optimal caster or optimal camber. I never seem to be able to achieve both using bushings. There are those two piece dual eccentric style bushings, is that what you have?

Course it may be a non-issue for you since you also added the radius arm shims.

I plan to use adjustable radius arms to adjust my caster seperately and dedicate the balljoint bushings soley towards camber adjustment. That will allow me to be dead on with both camber and caster.

[Lilnuts2]

It takes just minutes to setup a PayPal account and your anguish could have been avoided. If your going to acquire "stuff" it's a good tool.

[winnievan]

Originally Posted by Chinook

Winnie... my rig is mildly different than your im sure even though its an E350 superduty.
My experience has always been that the bushings always end up being a compromise between optimal caster or optimal camber. I never seem to be able to achieve both using bushings. There are those two piece dual eccentric style bushings, is that what you have?

Course it may be a non-issue for you since you also added the radius arm shims.

I plan to use adjustable radius arms to adjust my caster seperately and dedicate the balljoint bushings soley towards camber adjustment. That will allow me to be dead on with both camber and caster.

Yah it’s those adjustable ones — I’ll just shoot for the spec and see how it goes. I can add caster without changing camber... within reason, it seems. Just gets limited at the higher end of the adjustment for either.

[mk216v]

As was said, the PayPal receipt is your receipt of transfer of funds to the party you paid. That's how the system works. If that system doesn't work for you, then look elsewhere for a company you can mail a cashiers check or money order too(they'll wait for it to clear before sending out product). Be patient with the small businesses which provide the best parts for our rigs, they're the hardworking backbone of our country.

Originally Posted by Chinook

I have absolutely no interest in giving the internet service known as paypal fulltime permission to access my bank account and personal information. Paypal is not a bank nor are their business practices deserving of my patronage. If you think using paypal somehow gets rid of your headaches, you dont know much about paypal or youre simply not paying attention.

Try actually reading your paypal terms of service.

No thanks, i will never give control of my bank account over to a third party internet service. But lets pretend for a minute that paypal is just a disinterested neutral third party that has never screwed anyone out of money. Do you have any idea how many people have had their paypal accounts hacked and money removed from their bank accounts?

IMO, its nothing short of complete foolishness to knowingly make your bank account and your financial security vulnerable on the internet to third parties and individuals that dedicate their every waking moment toward compromising other peoples accounts for personal gain.

You may goto bed and never think twice about your paypal account for days or even weeks or months for that matter (kinda like out of sight, out of mind) but that paypal account is still sitting there on the internet, vulnerable 24 hours a day, 365 days a year just waiting for the wrong person to stumble across your paypal email address. The same holds true for online banking.... No Thanks, i will pass on the so called convenience, the risks outweigh any benefit.

Lets say youre on this forum and you run across some great deal on a part everyone is eager to get their hands on. You arrange a group buy on the forum. While youre waiting for all of your forum buddies to send you payment via paypal you go ahead and place an order for 50 of the said items from the distributor. You pay that distributor in full out of your bank account. You now have $50 left to your name in your bank account, but no worries your about to get all of that back and a few extra bucks for your trouble after everyone gets their paypal sent to you. BOOM, paypal freezes your paypal account and prevents you from accessing your own money for no valid reason..... Youre now obligated to fill those orders, you have no money to ship them and paypals sitting on your money for the next 180 days. Thats six months, half of a year.... Have you heard these stories? I ask because their true... The following is taken directly from Paypals User Agreement and may help you to grasp what im getting at.....

"PayPal is not a bank and does not itself take deposits. You will not receive any interest on the funds held with PayPal. PayPal combines your PayPal funds with the PayPal funds of other PayPal users and invests those funds in liquid investments in accordance with state money transmitter laws. PayPal owns the interest or other earnings on these investments. These pooled amounts are held apart from PayPal’s corporate funds, and PayPal will neither use these funds for its operating expenses or any other corporate purposes nor will it voluntarily make these funds available to its creditors in the event of bankruptcy."

If paypal is not a bank and is not FDIC insured, who in their right mind is going to leave funds sitting in a paypal account for any period of time? NO ONE, with that said how is paypal going to pool users money to invest as stated in the above User agreement? Simple, it freezes individual accounts for 6 months when they see larger transactions. They then pool those funds to make investments, after 6 months they unfreeze that individuals funds and pocket the interest earned.

Wow. I'd like to watch a Netflix Original Documentary on this.
Unfortunately i think you're going to be challenged in this day/age to do businesses with most companies for the parts you require, short of driving your van all around the country and handing them some greenbacks in person. But along the way, I assume you'll also pay cash for fuel, else if you use a credit card you'll have to watch out for any hoodlum gas attendants possibly taking a picture of your card to fraudulently use later. Although with all that cash you're hauling around you'll have to protect yourself well, watching your back at all times. That might get old/tiring. Simply no free lunch, even in 2020.

Sorry to the OP for straying from the topic of bitchin' coil spring 4x4 conversions...

[mgmetalworks]

Would be nice to keep this thread on topic... which is sharing knowledge pertaining to the installation of this kit and completing the 4x4 conversion.

[JWA]

Originally Posted by mgmetalworks

Would be nice to keep this thread on topic... which is sharing knowledge pertaining to the installation of this kit and completing the 4x4 conversion.

Sadly that's like herding cats, sometimes such detours muck up the thread.

[RememberTheFallen]

Originally Posted by Chinook

mk216v,

lets clear things up since you feel the need to interject your opinion in nearly every post on this forum whether its of any value to anyone or not...

First of all, i did not come directly to this forum with my concerns about the business transaction between MG and myself. I had been inquiring on the kit for over a month, when i asked how i should send payment since i do not use online payment services for security reasons, which by the way i made clear to MG via our email conversations. I was told by MG that he would send out an invoice with an option to pay using a credit card or debit. This ordeal has been going on since last week, not just since i made the post on here expressing my concern.

MG made absolutely no mention of it being paypal (not that it matters), however he was fully aware of my concerns about using online payment services. The invoice arrived on 8-7 and it was from paypal requesting $2145. I convinced myself that this was the easiest way to expedite the transaction and keep things simple for everyone involved (my mistake). I feel the same about all online payment services not just paypal. I opted to go ahead and send him payment using the paypal invoice against my better judgement simply to make the transaction as easy and smooth as possible for everyone.(again my mistake)

I immediately filled out the form giving paypal my bank account information and authorization to transfer $2145 dollars to MG. I then immediately sent a seperate email to MG on the same day two minutes later, which was last week on Friday requesting that he send me an email confirmation that he actually recieved the funds from paypal as i do not have an account with paypal to check if the funds were recieved. Again MG was informed and fully aware of my concerns about online payment services.

Paypal sent me an email confirming that i authorized them to withdrawl $2145 from my bank account and forward said funds to MG on my behalf. However "NOTHING" in this email implies, otherwise indicates or suggests in any manner that the funds were successfully recieved by MG on his end.

I patiently waited threw the weekend until monday end of business day watching for a confirmation that the funds were actually recieved. No confirmation was recieved from MG, not wanting to be overly demanding i sent a second email requesting any documents he had pertaining to part numbers and or any documentation he had on the install, hoping it would spur a response. Again i waited another full day and recieved no response.

Keep in mind this entire time MG is signed onto this very forum making posts everyday. On 8-11 i made my first post on here stating i placed an order and was not getting a response from MG in regards to our business transaction specifically confirmation that payment was actually recieved by him. My concerns were with paypal not MG or his integrity or if the parts had shipped. MG responds that personal issues have prevented him from responding to customers, but he will be sending out an email to all paying customers asking them to be patient.
(However apparently those same personal issues had no impact on his ability to browse and post on the forums everyday.)

He goes on to state on the forum.. "That is the confirmation".. in reference to the email that paypal sent me confirming that i gave them authority to access my bank account, withdrawl $2145 dollars and forward it to him on my behalf. It does "NOT" in any way shape or form confirm that the funds were ever recieved by MG on his end.

I then told myself that MG stated in his post, that he is sending out an email to everyone that has currently paid for parts asking them to be patient, so i will simply wait for that email which will indicate to me that i am actually on his list of customers that have paid so as to avoid any further airing of dirty laundry on this forum. That email was also "NEVER" recieved and most likely never sent. At which point i again emailed MG calling him out on not sending me some sort of confirmation despite my multiple attempts at requesting same from him. Clarifying to him that the email i recieved from paypal in no way indicates or implies in any manner that he actually recieved the funds. It only implies that I authorized paypal to send those funds on my behalf to MG.

Of course this entire time all that was being asked of MG was for him to take one minute of his day to send an email reply saying "yes i recieved your funds successfully on my end, thank you". But for whatever reason that was asking to much of him, evidently it was more important to be browsing the internet forums than it was to address a customers legitimate concerns about the business transaction that occurred nearly a week ago now.

So rather than simply fire off a simple email confirming reciept of payment, MG sends my money back via paypal in the middle of the night while he is still busy posting on the internet forums. If this is the type of small business youre referencing as the backbone of this country, then we have big problems as a country. However the post i made which you felt a need to interject yourself into was specifically about and limited to paypal not my transaction or dealings with MG. That said im somewhat confused as to why you would even mention that matter when responding to a comment specifically about paypal when the other matter had clearly been dropped previously.

Mind you, NOT ONCE did i ask MG if the parts were shipped, when the parts would ship, what color the parts are or anything else for that matter other than.."did you recieve the funds from paypal that you requested via the paypal invoice?"

Your personal issues are exactly that, your business obligations are exactly that. Somehow i was expected to accept personal issues as a reason for not responding to my concerns about a business transaction via email for nearly a week. As if sending an email stating "yes i recieved your funds" was somehow unreasonable and more demanding than browsing a web forum everyday for a week.

Theres only one person here that was wrong in their handling of this transaction and it wasnt me...

Wow, with your PayPal paranoia and overly optimistic expectations of small businesses I think it would probably be best if you stayed off the internet and just sourced your parts locally while paying with a cash or check.

You refused to open a PayPal account but paid through someone elses. You then emailed the seller over the weekend and were mad when you didn't get an immediate response. He then said he was busy at the hospital and that your email was your receipt which wasn't good enough for you. You are now complaining on here that you got some kind of bad deal? Lol

Maybe try your local 4 Wheel Parts store?

[86Scotty]

Wow. Hey Chinook, move on then. This thread isn’t about your PayPal problems.

I’ll give you $5 to quit griping about your inability to accept progress.....sent via PayPal.