My experience w/ "professional installation"

[Geezerpoop 10+ year member]

I usually have a shop in town install things because I don't know what I am doing, or have any friends into car audio. This place takes pride in its excellent installs and the fact that they only carry high quality products.

I had a cd5000 installed that I bought from cardomain.com, and they made sure to tell me over and over that they are offering no warranty on the deck because I did not buy it from them (they are an authorized eclipse dealer). Even though they were being jerks about that I didn't mind.

I went from an eclipse 3403 (for sale ) which had 2.7v outputs. I realized they had not reset the gains while driving away at the end of their work day, so I took it back the next day. I had turned down the gains all the way just to make sure I did not damage anything while I was driving that night. When I went back in I was told I had voided my warranty on my amps, subs, and speakers that I had purchased from there because I had touched the gains.

Also, I pointed out to them that the front and rear were reversed so when I faded to the front it went to the rear, and that some of the lights on the deck did not illuminate while on.

I wish I knew how to install things so I didn't have to put up with this junk.

...and this is all coming from the better shop in town

Click to read more...

 

[Randy Savage 5,000+ posts]

Where in NY are you?

 

[Geezerpoop 10+ year member]

syracuse area

 

[Trey803 5,000+ posts]

Well we can help you do it yourself....Its actually pretty simple

 

[BIGsherm7272]

hey, thats professional install for you. I dont consider those professionals......I consider those that compete and now what they are doing porfessionals.

 

[azbass 5,000+ posts]

bs. you did not void anything. you own the amps. you can do as you like.

id open a can of whoop as on them.

 

[Geezerpoop 10+ year member]

I turned down the gains because it was blaring at 40/80 on the h/u, so I turned them down to not damage anything. I wanted my gains set by them properly, which seems reasonable I think. Pretty sure I will never be there again and try to keep others away from it too. I have a worse and longer horror story about a different shop but I won't bother posting it because I don't wanna seem like a total whiny wiener.

 

[beckSHO 10+ year member]

bs. you did not void anything. you own the amps. you can do as you like.
id open a can of whoop as on them.

I second that notion.

 

[PatFitz9 10+ year member]

it's one thing to void the warranty if you blew them by adjusting the gains. but if nothing is damaged, i don't see why they can't just set them right and thats that.

 

[DaBurner 10+ year member]

the only thing I would get installed on my car would be my amp which they do for $50 at PC Richards, they install decks for $45......if you got a semi new car its worth doing because you dont wanna scratch anything and such on a new whip but I still just installed a Deck/Amp(today) in my 07 Corolla

And PC Richards is cool about it they let you buy your installation kit/amp install kit at other stores so you dont have to buy their overpriced one's

So for right around $100 you could have your amp/deck installed and hook subs up to it on your own

But seriously if your spending alot of money on car audio you should Learn and Do It Yourself

 

[mjf 10+ year member]

I turned down the gains because it was blaring at 40/80 on the h/u, so I turned them down to not damage anything. I wanted my gains set by them properly, which seems reasonable I think. Pretty sure I will never be there again and try to keep others away from it too. I have a worse and longer horror story about a different shop but I won't bother posting it because I don't wanna seem like a total whiny wiener.

alot of them are dicks, and lowering your gains out of all things should not void your warranty.

post it, stories like that are rather funny.

 

[Geezerpoop 10+ year member]

But seriously if your spending alot of money on car audio you should Learn and Do It Yourself

I would like to, I hope to learn a lot more about installation once I finish grad school.

 

[Geezerpoop 10+ year member]

alot of them are dicks, and lowering your gains out of all things should not void your warranty.
post it, stories like that are rather funny.

My other story:

My old car died, and my dad gave me his accord a year ago.

I went into my POS stratus and took everything out and brought it to a car shop in Syracuse to have it installed. I contacted them a week earlier and told then I had a h/u, front and rear speakers, amp for them, two subs ina box, and amp for it.

They told me for all the installation kit for the dash, wiring the amps, wiring harness, and installing everything to be functional would be $350. This was $100 cheaper than the shop that my story above was from, so I drove an hour instead of 5 minutes to save some money.

I went to a mall after dropping the car off, and 4 hours later they called me telling me everything was done, but that they did not have an eclipse wiring harness for the deck. They had claimed on the phone they did. Had they notified me they did not I could have picked one up at the other shitty shop for $15.

When I got there I also noticed they had not put the amps on the back of the back seat, they put them in the back of the trunk, pushing the subs towards the latch. I had told them to mount them on the back seat.

This summer that this happened I was working 12 hour shiftwork, rotating 7-7 schedule between strands of day and night shifts. Because of the schedule, it took 3 weeks before I could get back there. They put the wiring harness in and everything worked fine. They built a simple amp rack and put it in back, but the wires were not long enough and had to be redone so that the amps could be mounted on the rack.

3 weeks go by again because of my work schedule.

I go back up and get the amps taken care of. Whoever did the rewiring also decided to rewire my amp and subs to a 1 ohm load. I told them a 2 ohm load which they had right the first time. Driving away from the place I cranked it to make sure things were okay, and I blew a fuse. I went back and told them, and a half hour later they came out, rewired it, and replaced the fuse.

2 months, 3 trips, and $350 later everything was taken care of.

For anyone who enjoys reading horror stories, I think this is a pretty good one.

 

[rpfuror 10+ year member]

I have done this for many years and have never heard such BS. You are the customer. If I were you I would picket that fing place and make sure everyone that walked in the door knew of your experience.

Even better, go directly to the company that made your equipment... that's what the dealer is going to do anyway. I work within the engineering service industry at a fortune 500 company. If you go to the main company and ask for a return/replacement for something that is broke under warranty (they will know by serial number) you will get it. If they ask why you’re returning it direct, ask to speak with management and tell them that their distributor is saying "I won't warranty that crap, everything fails, the only reason I sell XX brand is because some sales guy told me it was good... etc"

Trust me the distributor will have more problems with that then anything you could do. At minimum you will 100% get a longer warranty if you just tell them the truth.

 

[Geezerpoop 10+ year member]

At this point I think next time I need an install (hopefully not for a while) I would drive up to 3 hours to meet a CA.com member who is knowledgable and has a lot of refs to help me.

After I learn how to install and configure equipment, I will break into the vehicles of the shop owners and mess up their stuff the way they did with me, and I won't even charge them for it:up2somet: