MOGolf said:
Your dealership is probably going to want to be paid up front for special order expensive parts like this. I know the one closest to me would require that. You'll also have to have a shop willing to install parts that you bought (unless you're doing the job yourself).
I may be able to do a few here throughout the year, if scheduled in advance and once parts are actually in-hand. I won't put up the money for the parts purchase ahead of time. I can't afford to have people be no-shows and claim that they either sold the car, went someplace else, just changed their minds, or drive off without paying for the parts.
MoGolf: Thanks, I understand your position, especially when it involves the costly parts and your time. While all your (and Oilhammer's) absolutely great work has been going on, I, and I am sure others monitoring this issue, have been doing our own due diligence on what we may do to help our own situations for getting these upgrades done before we have a much larger problem. I drive a lot in my business and want my car to be at its peak reliability now that we are hearing of more catastropic chain failures. This is absolutely critical to me.
It is apparent that Oilhammer will be booked for a good bit of time and he is "parts constrained" at the moment so we (the folks wanting to get the upgrade soon) need to find other shops/Gurus who can do this upgrade. My intent for getting more parts orders in the pipeline is to forge an additional demand to the supply chain, if that is possible. And I am not sure that the effort will have ANY effect.
I have spoken today with the sales department at World Impex where they now have a list of parts for the module replacement on their website (thanks
). Based on their estimates of delivery, it is possible that I can have the kit before the end of this month and I have placed an order this afternoon. I also have a fairly local trusted shop/Guru who is working with me on this upgrade. If all this works out as planned, I will be upgraded and there will be another installer in the south here that can handle this work for others. This is my plan. It may not work, but I have to give it a try. If none of this works out like planned, my wife has family in St. Louis and we may make a visit this spring, with a stop at OH's shop.
From reading these related B5 balance shaft threads, there are efforts on the east coast to do the same as I am trying to accomplish, so I am not alone.
FYI: I went to our local VW dealer here in town, which is quite large BTW, and asked about getting the BS module and related parts. They (parts department) never heard about this upgrade and couldn't find the parts in their system. Now, maybe they didn't look hard enough, and I felt like it was a bother for them to help me. But that is what I got for two hours of my time yesterday. This is not the first time I have been treated this way at that dealership, but it is the last time.
Tony