New Product - Dual Channel Coil Drivers

[dontz125]

TTR Ignition Systems is a new company that mostly focuses on the older FZR motorcycles, but we are also very interested in products that can be used in the MegaSquirt community. To this end, we are releasing our first automotive product, the Dual Channel Coil Driver. A stand-alone device that wires directly into the wiring harness, it includes two BIP373 coil drivers and appropriate base resistors. The normal option is 220 Ohms (for cased MicroSquirts) or 330 Ohms (for MegaSquirts).

The price per unit is US$50 + $10 shipping. These units are in stock, and can be purchased by Paypal here: http://www.ttrignition.com/ignition-drivers.html

[arjay]

Just an FYI for other potential interested parties. We dealt with TTR Ignition systems, aka Don McPhail, extensively over the last 6 months with decidedly unfavourable results.

Ultimately we had to contact our credit card company and have them issue a $600 charge back in an effort to try and recover the money sent to him. On top of that, we bought roughly another $600 in ancillary purchases that were dependant on Don's work - which was never completed.

We have full documentation, from Don, including written invoices guaranteeing delivery etc. It became clear to use after 6 months that delivery was never going to happen. It culminated with a phone call at Christmas time talking about a need for $1,400 for developing 'quick shifters'. It's only in retrospect that we have to understand that this was an effort to attempt to gain yet more funds from us.

It is not my intent to malign Don McPhail or his company, TTR Ignition Systems. However, when I see that he is back here posting and active on this site, without a trace of shame, it's clear to me that something should be mentioned if for no other reason then to protect other 'newbies' to the Microsquirt product line.

It is intensely embarrassing to me to mention this at all. I don't like being 'taken' and certainly not to the extent of 6 months of my time along with a considerable amount of money.

We don't believe that Don ever order the parts required with the money provided. We asked him several times to provide pictures of the purchases or any other form of confirmation yet each request was side-stepped. Yet, during the time he was supposed to be completing our project he repeatedly told us that he was getting side-tracked. In the meantime, we found that he was releasing new products, such as the one mentioned above. We cannot help but think that he used our money, for 6 months, to fund these projects.

I brought this matter to a few other key people on this site in an effort to ensure that no other people that are new to the Microsquirt product lineup fall into the same trap that we did.

I realize that this will likely come as a shock to long-time users of this site but the fact is, we have extensive documentation to prove out our experiences. We would be happy to provide more information to anyone via Personal Messaging.

In closing, I'd like to apologize to the people on this site for bringing this matter to your attention. I find things like this very disgusting and they have unfortunately caused us to think negatively about the Microsquirt product line, and in some ways, the community. It is my hope that by posting this, you won't fall into the same pit that we did as I'm sure that most everyone here, as well as the products, are good.

I was not originally going to post about this issue, but seeing Don McPhail active on this site, as if nothing has happened, only tells me that this kind of situation could easily repeat itself.

Again, we have ample documentation from this seller to illustrate every single one of these issues. And let me be clear, this is by no means a comprehensive post outlining all of the things that this seller did. I've purposely not mentioned a great deal of incidents during that 6 month period....

[dontz125]

Good morning, Marvin.

I'm not entirely sure how to respond to this. This is such a mish-mash of truth, half-truth, error, and outright hallucination that I'm not sure where to start.

It became clear to use after 6 months that delivery was never going to happen.

The first invoice, due on acceptance of the order was dated 8 October. The second progress payment, originally due on receipt at my office of the uSM and PCB, was authorised for early payment by yourself on 22 October, after I informed you that the PCBs were taking longer than expected, and would delay the ordering of the various subcomponents. You filed for a chargeback on 7 January. Three months was far longer than I had originally expected, but hardly 6 months. Incidentally, you may recall this project was placed on R&D hold in early December, as you were unable to confirm how the IACV would operate with the uSM. I concede significant delays, but your response was irrational.

It culminated with a phone call at Christmas time talking about a need for $1,400 for developing 'quick shifters'. It's only in retrospect that we have to understand that this was an effort to attempt to gain yet more funds from us.

First off, the call was initiated by me to 1) apologise personally, not just via email, for the continued delays, and 2) to offer liquidated damages in the amount of 10% immediately, and a further 10% if the IACV test rig had not shipped by 31 December. As I recall, you waived those damages - do you remember this?
The discussion regarding quick shifters was very much a secondary topic, as you and I explored the possibilities of future business opportunities, such as the 150-strong CBR125R racing club you had located somewhere in Australia.

In the meantime, we found that he was releasing new products, such as the one mentioned above. We cannot help but think that he used our money, for 6 months, to fund these projects.

Marvin. Seriously. Look at the date on the first post in this thread.

It is not my intent to malign Don McPhail or his company, TTR Ignition Systems.

- and yet I find it difficult to describe this as anything else but. You have cause to be upset; I cannot dispute this. The degree of hyperbole in your missive - posted against FOUR of my product listings - approaches libel.

We don't believe that Don ever order the parts required with the money provided. We asked him several times to provide pictures of the purchases or any other form of confirmation yet each request was side-stepped.

Again, this approaches libel. I do not recall being asked to provide pics or confirmation ONCE, let alone many times. If you have an email time stamp, let me know and I will check my received emails. As for photos -

ECU.jpg

uSM.jpg

PCB.jpg

You complain that you are out this amount of money, and that amount of time. I have been working on this since June, putting literally hundreds of engineering hours into designing and redesigning and changing and modifying the layout, correcting my own errors, incorporating my own ideas to improve the design, and accommodating your own changes - including you changing your mind about things. There was also the time spent explaining the same things again and again. In addition, I am out hundreds of dollars in components that I ordered with good faith, specifically for your project. I rather doubt Matt wants to get involved, but he might be able to confirm how many MicroSquirt Modules I have EVER ordered (one) and when it was ordered (9 October) and when it shipped (10 October, Priority Mail International Customs ID CJ428663840US ).

By the way, I tried to call you a few weeks ago, but you've blocked my number. Are you truly that concerned that I would yell at you, whine at you ... ? I am back in business, my health restored to its normal less-than-pristine state. I was seriously attempting to contact you to discuss resuming the project.

seeing Don McPhail active on this site, as if nothing has happened

What did you expect - that hang my head and never dare offer another product for sale? Your project came to an unfortunate end. I am sorry for that. Do not presume to stand as arbiter to my conscience in dealing with others.


To the audience, watching this train-wreck:

First, I am sorry you had to read this mess. This was not the way this should have been handled, but with a public denunciation, I had no choice but to respond publicly.

Why this became such a mess - My entire family had health problems this past fall, including my young daughter. My wife and I have on-going health issues, and December was simply a nightmare, with a 5-day power-loss leading into Christmas simply adding insult to injury. This situation was not expected to interfere with my business the way it did, and I entered into this project with Marvin in good faith. As it turned out, I was unable to maintain what I have already acknowledged was an unrealistic schedule - the confusion for that last part is something I truly regret. I did try to keep him informed as best I could, cautioning him several times that I was unable to work on the project at that moment in time - attempting to assemble an SMD board with an injured arm while feverish AND on muscle relaxants would have been simply unprofessional, and a waste of time and money.

That said, I did try to maintain a business. I had other orders arrive as this dragged on; most were also delayed. As the situation became untenable, I refunded several orders, those for which components had not yet been purchased. I could not in good faith accept their money as I had no idea when I might be able to build and ship their products. I am relieved that this backlog has been cleared, and I have received a number of re-orders from those customers to whom I had issued refunds. My health is back to its normal state, and I am open for business.


If there are those who are now reluctant to deal with me, I am sorry you feel that way. If you are interested in my products but need some assurance, please contact me via PM or email, and perhaps we can come to an accommodation.

[kjones6039]

IMHO..... This is not the proper venue for a pissing match between individuals. Take it somewhere else!

Ken

[arjay]

We will be happy to provide copies of our correspondence with this seller to anyone who asks for it that support everything that I have said.

I haven't gone through the seller's post - I've heard every excuse from this seller for the past 6 months and I doubt there is anything new there. There seems to be a reason for every failure to deliver, and our experience has been that each one will come at the purchaser's expense. The most recent excuse what that he was out of soldering iron tips and it was too cold outside to buy new ones.... During this entire 6 month period, after receiving $600 from us, and telling us why he could not work on the project (coughing, colds, dog ate his homework, etc) we find that he's been busy developing new products and posting them for sale on this very site. Just look at the dates of the posts. These products were designed, developed & released during the time when he said he could not work on our project, typically due to illness, that we had already paid him for months ago. I called him out on this several times during that process - no response to those specific inquiries.

In our last conversation he refused to refund our money and refused to give an estimated time of completion! As such, we have no control over when, or if ever, he will complete it and deliver it. It is all subject to whatever excuse the seller comes up with. This seller is OK with that, and this, after waiting patiently for 6 months. At that point we found ourselves in 2014!! We're not even in the same year anymore! How long will this go on for? The seller will not commit to any time for delivery - period.

He did, however, tell us it was too late to file a claim with Visa - too much time had passed. In effect, what this seller has done is take our money and then refused to hold himself accountable. Neither through a timeline, nor through a refund. He did tell us that if we issued a charge back it would not matter - he did not have the $600 to return the money and he basically could care less who gets stuck with it.

So we were left with, you can't have your money back, and, we will not give you any time frame to expect the product that you paid for several months ago. Along with every excuse imaginable to justify his inactions. It was at this point that we fired Don McPhail on the basis of a complete failure to achieve any of the goals that he had guaranteed to us, in writing, from the outset before we paid him.

But for us, it really comes back to being this simple, we paid him and received nothing. Nothing. For 6 months. In the end, all we got for that money were more excuses, and then finally, in writing, a statement that there will be no ETA given for the product's delivery. We then had to contact Visa, have them issue a charge-back and they then stuck it to PayPal because Don McPhail could not/would not cover the $600 that we paid out for a module (with more to come upon it's completion).

The seller has stated something to the effect of the time that he put into this project. There was a clear path for the seller to attain a recurring revenue stream from future sales as well as immediate payment upon completion for the current work. We, opn the other hand, are left with +/- $600 in ancillary items that we purchased to support the anticipated module that we had paid for but did not receive. Prior to purchasing these ancillary parts we sent him an email asking if there was any reason to not go ahead with the purchase of these items as we had a bad feeling about it. I could not discern why I was feeling this way...

It was my guess, that given the endless delays, perhaps something had gone wrong and we needed to cut our losses. The seller responded that he could see no reason for it, that the project was on-track, and as a direct result of that information we went ahead with purchasing items such as, a Bluetooth module, Spartan wide-band 02 sensor, licenses for Tuner Studio, a 10Hz GPS, tablet PC etc, etc, etc. The seller has not even acknowledged how his failure to deliver has impacted us with respect to these purchases. As recently as early 2014 we were actually in talks with a factory in China to arrange the manufacture and purchase of several hundred ECU connectors - the seller was aware of all of this and said nothing! He didn't warn us that we should not spend that money, to the contrary, all along he has been made aware of the extra costs associated with his product, which he evidently cannot deliver, and said nothing while watching us spend $$ up the wazoo. Money that we would not be able to recover without the ECU that he was contracted to deliver.

The seller has never given any indication of any kind of concern for these associated costs that we were absorbing every step of the way. And all of these based on the work that he was contracted to deliver. He has, however, arbitrarily decided that he will not refund the money nor give an estimated time of delivery - leaving us with nothing but vapor.

As you can imagine, this has cost us a considerable amount of money that is largely non-recoverable, along with a lot of my time. We're left with all of these ancillary items and no module to support them. The seller appears to have stated the untold hours put into development - this is true, but what is also true is the 6 months we've put into it with no delivery, no refund and no accountability or even a timetable for an expected delivery. I'm sorry, but we just can't do business like that.

The seller's fees were taken into account from the outset before going down this path. He knew what he was getting into. It was the seller who contacted us and asked us to go ahead with this project according to the terms that he set out and declared in the very first PayPal invoice he sent us. Our responsibility has been to pay for the work, to support his efforts with respect to providing information and feedback, and we have done this. His responsibility was to actually work on the project and deliver it. In this, he has failed. He has never delivered anything to us nor will he provide a delivery date. We cannot do business in this fashion because we cannot base any decisions on vapor.

It really is this simple, we sent him $600, with more to come, and after 6 months - no delivery, no ETA, just excuses. We're left with +/- $600 in other purchases, significant damage to our reputation, and the seller could care less. It's all about him. It's not about us.

In the last 6 months I've spent more time at the doctors and getting lab tests then during the previous 44 years of my life. This has not impacted the way that I have dealt with my clients. I do not use my personal problems as excuses for not delivering what I have said that we would deliver. This is not how we do business.

When we receive our customers money we consider that a contract and it's one that we are obligated to fulfill whether rain or shine. We OWE the customer something in return for that money. That's what the basis is of our relationship. We provide a product, they provide the money to purchase that product, and we are then obligated to fulfill that commitment in a timely manner. End of story. It doesn't matter if I slip and fall, it doesn't matter if the roof caves in or a meteorite strokes my home from outer space. None of this has anything to do with my customer. In the extreme event that something unforeseen comes up and, for one reason or another, we just cannot deliver, then our obligation is to quickly refund the customer's money and provide for them our most sincere apologies for wasting their time. But under no circumstances would I ever consider keeping the customer's money, and not deliver the product that they paid for.

We have been incredibly patient with this seller. When the seller ran out of money, and it stalled the project, we kindly sent him more, which was in direct violation of the terms of our agreement. We did not have to do this. We elected to do this because we felt for the seller. When the project's ETA kept slipping, we understood - for the first few months. But the fact of the matter is, that each time we got closer to any form of a completion date where the seller actually had to do something, either mail us something or show us something, that's when the excuses started coming out in full force until we finally found ourselves in 2014, with no refund and no ETA given. Basically, the seller's position was that we had no recourse....and it was at that time, after months of excuses, that we finally fired the seller for the reasons stated above.

During this 6-month long endeavor we had to call the seller to speak about the ever-increasing delays. The seller advised us to call, leave a message, and then, when he heard our voice, he would then pick up. In retrospect we realized that the seller is screening his calls...

We have been very kind and very patient with this seller. We have given more then we ever received. We have been patient and understanding and sympathetic to this seller. Yet, the only thing we have received from this seller is text. We would even have understood, if he said, I can't do it - I'll send you all the parts purchased that he purchased with MY money (assuming he purchased them) and gave us his apologies. We didn't get that. We got a 6-month long stream of excuses that did not bear up to scrutiny. The fact that the seller has been on this site releasing new products for sale, at the very time he was telling us that he was too sick to solder, or work on our project, indicated to us that there's something very wrong here.

Again, we paid $600, with an agreement to pay more, and the seller did not deliver, refused to refund, and refused to give us ANY estimated time of delivery. What else can be done? As stated, it is my concern that this seller will do this again. He does not seem to think there is anything wrong with what he has done, and he appears to believe that any excuse exempts him from accountability, and is perfectly acceptable to justify his inability to deliver what was promised.

From the outset, before any payment was made, the seller mentioned that, with respect to protection, we had all the power because PayPal would side with us in the event that there was a dispute. By the time 6 months had gone by the seller was telling us that we could not claim a refund as too much time had passed. Personally, I don't know why the seller was not able to shelve his own personal projects and devote his time to completing the order from the customer that had paid him up front.

One thing I do know is that when situations like this arise it tends to color a person's view of the Microsquirt product and the community as a whole. In an effort to make use of the $600 in ancillary products that we are stuck with I looked into buying a pre-fab module from a seller based on the advice of this site's admin. When I looked at their site and called in, and got a generic voice mail system, I started to get worried that this might be another seller who is not quite above board (pardon the pun). Is that suspicion accurate? I doubt it. But it caused by our experiences with one seller on this site and failures like this tend to create an instance where a person paints everyone with the same brush - whether they deserve it or not. People get suspicious when they get burned.

We liked this seller, we believed in this seller's ability to do the work, we gave this seller every benefit of the doubt, and then some, but finally, in the end, when the seller refused to set a delivery date and refused a refund, we realized we had no recourse but to attempt to recover a fraction of the costs involved. We have added this seller to our call blocking because, quite frankly, after 6 months of excuses we are not interested in hearing any more reasons why he can't work on our project, the one that we already paid for, while we find that he is able to create & develop his own personal products for sale on this very site.

We spent $600, with a promise of more, and we got nothing, not even an ETA, and this, after 6 months. We have documents from the seller to prove all of this out. Our only obligation was to pay the seller on a timely basis and provide support and honor the terms of our agreement. We did this. The seller's obligation was to do the work and provide us with a product - he did not do this. We have received nothing. We don't expect to. It's sad, and it's unfortunate. But this is reality and these are our experiences with this seller.

Enough has been said. Let the buyer beware. And hey, all I can do is testify to my own experiences. If there are lots of people who have had positive experiences with this seller then let them come in and post them up.

In my current business, we have yet to have a customer complain (fingers crossed). I'm sure it will happen sooner or later, the odds are that something will occur at some point. What we will do is what we always have done in such situations, work with the customer, in a timely fashion, to resolve the issue in a positive manner. That's who we are. That's what we do. That's what our customers expect from us, and this is part of what we provide as a company selling products to consumers. We expect the same from vendors that we deal with. We call that courtesy.

Can you imagine what would have happened if the module was delivered, was successful, and then we were dependent on this seller to provide us with, potentially, hundreds of circuit boards for our clients? It would have been a public relations disaster. Our customers would buy them, and then we would be dependent on a seller with a track record of providing every excuse in the book for non-delivery - with us stuck in the middle. Angry customers on the right, with ourselves in the middle, and a supplier on the left who felt it was perfectly OK not to deliver products any time something went wrong in his life. Wow, we do not operate on that basis and we would never, ever, expect our customers to put up with that kind of behavior.

We've learned a lot from this experience, hopefully, Don McPhail / aka TTR Ignition Systems has too. We will adjust our business procedures accordingly so that we can avoid, as much as possible, falling into the same trap. Hopefully, the seller will do the same. Objectively look at his failures in this process and begin to take steps to address them so that they do not occur again at some other customer's expense.

[arjay]

IMHO..... This is not the proper venue for a pissing match between individuals. Take it somewhere else!

Ken

I disagree, this entire process started in this very venue and if you feel these experiences are not relevant to the Microsquirt community, given that the seller continues to operate his business, in part, out of this venue, well, I'd have to say you're proving my point about just how easy it is for a newcomer to paint the entire community with a single brush based on our experiences.

Nevertheless, I will give you this, we'll de-subscribe from these posts and won't reply to them at all. We've said all we needed to say on this matter. As mentioned, dealing with this seller has cost us a considerable amount of money and a lot of time. The fact that you don't seem to have any compassion or empathy towards us with respect to that experience doesn't really surprise me.

That fact that you feel that bringing this experience to people's attention in an effort to prevent something like this from occurring again, to someone else, does.

Over and Out!