Ok heres the situation. The turbo on my car is starting to go out, and since Im replacing the exhaust manifold, 02 housing and exhaust, why not go the whole 9 yards and replace the turbo as well? Turns out that my uncle had an excellent condition 14b, but the exhaust housing was badly cracked. I thought, what the hell, why not just get a new exhaust housing and BAM I have a $40 brand newish 14b.

Shortly after that I made a lot of offers on dsmtrader.com and saw one that I thought would be a good deal; no cracks and the seller was verified in paypal. I asked him a few questions and he said (not exact words) "there are a few cracks in the wastegate area, but other than that its fine". I thought, thats ok, theyre notorious to crack there, and if there arent any other cracks its ok.

I shelled out the $50 (for extra fast shipping) for it and it arrived a couple days later. I opened the box and found a pretty nice exhaust housing. Upon further inspection I found that it not only had cracks in the wastegate area, but had a huge crack on the OUTSIDE of the housing. Thats simply unusable, it would leak boost like crazy with a crack like that. The broken exhaust housing I had before was in better condition!!

I emailed the guy back a couple of times, but he insists that "i told you that the exhaust housing was on my car and worked. I said the flapper closed perfectly, and there were a few cracks in the housing. You never asked for a pic of it either. You seemed to not mind that there were a few cracks in the housing. Therefor I do not wish to send you back a refund for the housing. Sorry."

I never did ask for pictures, but he siad that there were ONLY cracks on the wastegate area. What should I do? Did I just screw myself over for $50?

S O L

Screwed.

I never buy anything w/o pics.

How did you pay for it? Was it paypal with Credit card or balance transfer? If it was a cc purchase, call the financial institution that issued the card and cancel the charge. If it was balance transfer, you are screwed. You would have to file suit with his local authorities and go to court but that would cost more than the $40 you spent originally.

Yeah I guess Im SOL. It was payed with paypal. Is there anything that I could do with the broken part....besides throw it out?

You can:

1) Pay a professional to weld it. Shouldn't be too expensive... check around.

2) If you pay shipping to send it to me and back, I'll weld it for you, free of charge - It won't probably won't be very pretty, and I can't guarantee my work since I'm not making any profit. I'll do my best though.

Probably better to have someone else do it, as I just want a pass at it because I've never tried welding on a turbine housing before.

I heard they dont weld well at all. Anywho, about a day after I got screwed, I found someone willing to give away more than $500 worth of parts. I might just get a 16g though, since almost all the housings out there are cracked.

But with the earnings I make from those parts, I can definately afford a new turbo. Now I just have to hope nothing else breaks.

Don't use the trader...ever.

if it was through paypal file a claim... and if you have the emails that were sent by him stating that the cracks were only on the wastegate, then submit those to them... they will handle it...

You should be able to get more than $500 for all that stuff!

Pfff, maybe! I should give it away also to others who are in need of parts in teh madison area, but hey I dont have a job .

I might keep the tranny, cams, turbo, ISC. But all the other stuff might get $400