Prancing Horse Motors

What started life as Prancing Horse Automobiles became "Sportiva Macchina Internationale" about a year ago or so.

Mark Coffey doing sales. Race team at same location. PROCAR a shambles at present, but still some activity.

In Richmond, cnr Balmain/Stephenson st.

 

I don't know what they did there but I'm sure Coffey wasn't "sales".

I remember an interstate visitor looking for a 246gts and found one at Prancing Horse. When he arrive they (Coffey) wouldn't open the door to him and kept him locked out.
I didn't believe him when he told me, so we both returned the next day and BOTH got the same treatment...sales??
The guy went back to QLD and bought one up there; sale lost.

He should take sales lessons from his more successful namesake.

 

errr yeah, that's happened on many occasions. Not my choice but he operates an "appointment only" system, despite the 400sqm of glass!

Although genuine buyers do get turned away from time to time, the ratio of tyre kickers and timewasters is more of a problem with doors wide open.

Consider that most of his stock is on commission sale...how would you like 20 people a day yanking on the door handles and sliding their jeans all over the leather seats of your Ferrari while it's in a showroom trying to be sold.....

.....what "namesake" do you refer too??

 

I agree, I guess he has to find a balance between tyre kickers and true buyers...not easy.

I was led to believe he was Steven Coffey's (chain of Ford dealerships) nephew, yes/no ?

 

yes, I think you're right. The Coffey ford group is the same family. Marks philosophy is "why deal with cheeseburgers, when you can deal in steak".

Mind you, Name a steak dealer as wealthy as McDonalds.......

 

Nope, never official dealer.

Maranello imports are in sydney and the story as far as I know it is really quite uninteresting. Just a business at the end of the day.

Market quite small really but I read somewhere that Melbourne has the highest population of Ferrari "per capita" than any ohter city in the world....just a relative thing though...not many people here!

 

Prancing Horse is not an official distributor of Ferrari. They sell used Ferraris and prepare Ferraris and other cars for racing. I went there last May to get some parts for my Stradale, namely braided hoses for the brakes and BMC filter. The mechanic that I was supposed to see was on leave so I had to deal with the receptionist. She flatly told me that they don't sell parts. I should get them from Lance Dixon. If I want standard factory parts I can get them from my dealer in KL, but I want performace parts.

My friend bought excatly the parts that I wanted but they just wouldn't do it for me. Strange!

 

Then you should have driven the extra 100m down the street to my workshop!

I've got sports air filters in stock. Hoses are a 5 day turn around to match your existing ones. I can do anything you like to your 360 (or any ferrari) and I share the workshop with a fantastic wheel alignment and road/sport tyre distributor.

Got all bases covered really.

The Showroom/race team really do just that...sell cars and race them.

 

Hey...are you any good at permanently fixing oil leaks?

 

I'm good at getting rid of permanently annoying problems, whether they're oil leaks or customers...you'd know that as well as any!

By the way, I've just got some new fluid for my head gasket/hydrocarbon leak diagnostic tool...care to try it yet?

 

And i'm good at making sure that anyone and everyone knows about people who do shoddy work on cars and don't stand behind the work they do, yet quickly point the finger at any wrongdoings by other mechanics!

I've just wasted good money, based on your ridiculous assertsions, having a compression and leak test. The results were almost indistinguishable from a new engine, which is as you'd expect after 13,000 (mainly) road km.

 

Post your figures then, with the % leak found and to where the leak was going........

 

Why? You brushed me off about it before, not wanting to rectify the errors you made and instead attempting to cover up and ridicule me (which backfired, of course)...has something changed that makes you suddenly give a damn? You got my money, that seemed to be your main concern, as far as I can tell.

 

I'm not going to bite. I hope you're happy with the service you get now. Your whinging is only exceeded by your lying.

 

Lying, you say? Want me to post your emails? Anyway, I rest my case. Like on all the forums I've seen you on, you make things up and resort to name calling. Good luck to you. I'm not wasting anymore of my money on you....and if you treat me like this, you'll do it with others too....it's only a matter of time before you come unstuck.

 

refer to post #16

 

He's whinging eh ?

Shouldnt you be going to all the trouble you can to make him happy ?

Obviously he has a problem with your business and instead of addressing that and doing everything you can to make a customer happy, you come out and call him a liar and a whinger.

Whether he has a valid point or not, it doesnt look good for you.

 

I put my car in for a "fix the few leaks for minimal" money and it turned into a $4,500 clutch, pressure plate, transfer gear deal AND i still had the leaks!!

Admittedly it is an OHOS but if the dealer says it will be fixed and then it isn't they shouldn't wonder why I take the car somewhere else.

I evenually fixed the leaks myself for $180 and a days worth of my labour.

I intend to be very whiny about my next car as I have a right to some expectation of a fix where I part with my folding but as I will be getting another OHOS I will be doing all the work myself as I no longer trust many people with my cars...sad but true.

Another really easy way to fix these leaks is to park the car on some black carpet like I do and you never worry about it again so long as you chck your oil levels

 

Oh dear..it's a long story, and Aircon and I have agreed to disagree.

Luckily for me he has a reputation all over Australia about his behaviour with many other similar situations and I feel no need to defend myself on here. Suffice to say, if it ever got nasty I have enough stuff put in a file to adequately protect myself.

In summary, his car was perfect after it left me for some time in road use, until it went to a few track days and blew the corners of the cam cover gaskets out at the point where they meet the end plates, and weep slightly. His car also leaks from the head gasket oil drain gallery areas and the engine to sump joint, and the rear main a bit. All of which were masked from me at it's visit due to the fact it arrived to me with a completely blown oil line that had sprayed oil over the whole engine, making leak diagnosis impossible.

The cam cover gaskets were blown out exactly the same when it arrived to me and I suggested they may have been poorly fitted previously. Having had it happen to my work now (I've done approx 20 355 cam cover gasket jobs without any problems), I now suspect excessive crankcase pressure (from piston ring blow by) when in track use with long periods at full throttle....it's a 355C and has had no engine refresh, or even new rings since it was extensively campaigned by the highly successful and very fast John Bowe...known for his particularly aggressive use of machinery.

I have offered to replace the cam cover gaskets again, but only if I test compression, leakage and headgasket blow by first..at his expense.

I am confident I've been very fair in my dealings and if anyone is really interested in the full story they are welcome to pm either one of us....

 

while i find this a little amusing/interesting i think that you should both lay this to rest (on here) before it gets nasty/out of hand

of course if you want to continue please make it as nasty as possible

 

WTF are you talking about? My car has never been "campaigned" by John Bowe! See? yet another example of where you talk through your backside.

As I said, there's good compression, no blow by, (just tested by a ferrari mechanic more experienced than you)

The cam cover gaskets, which are the leaks you assured me at the time you could fix, and are by FAR the worst, (no point telling me NOW that you were unable to diagnose) (the rest are very minor weeps) are being fixed properly now and I'll be presenting you with the invoice for it at VCAT. Consider yourself told.

 

ooooooops...i didn't respond to this bit did i?

Fistly, we've agreed to nothing.

Secondly you're right. I do have a reputation because I've never let a mechanic get away with cheating me before. You're certainly not the first whose done it, but I hope you're the last, and I've never lost a claim yet. I know my facts, I have everything in writing and I have expert witnesses. Any further denial or twisting of the facts by your is either you indenial, or wishful thinking.

Guys, beware.

 

Yup...isn't it amazing? Talk about customer relations! Anyway, I have my way of going about things. Being reasonable didn't work. Publicity and VCAT is all I can do now. I intend doing both.