I think this post will cause a lot of arguments & i may possibly lose a few friends but its all true. Im not one for getting involved in arguments but ive got to make people aware of whats been going on recently. My swb has been with a zed specialist and very good friend Lee Dent. He got it back on the road, which wasnt easy. The car was missing a few major parts including a prop shaft. I managed to find one on facebook, a z1 lightweight prop so i was really happy to find that. i dropped it at Lee Dents not long after receiving it in the post. About 4 months later, after a lot of crap with the swb it was finally ready so i collected it & dropped my lwb off with Lee at the same time. I was really happy with the swb but on inspecting it a few days later i discovered the Z1 prop shaft wasnt on the car but a standard one was. So i messaged Lee to find out why & he told me it was rattling & would get it fixed for me & said he was sorry he forgot to tell me. I told him not to worry just put it in the boot of the lwb & ill sort it over winter. I thought it was a bit strange as he messaged me about all the other issues when they occurred but not the prop which is a pretty major problem. Shortly after this i became aware of a rumour circulating that my prop was on someone elses car. At first i thought it was nonsense as lee was a good friend & wouldnt do that to me. But then i started to get more details & i became suspicious. I found out whos car it was supposedly on but i couldn't challenge Lee as my lwb was still with him. i got that back last week (prop wasnt in the boot like id asked for but he said that he would get it fixed for me again) so i started to dig more. i heard that Lee has asked Jimmer to make him a prop for a swb manual na. I contacted Jimmer & he confirmed this & he sent me the message Lee sent him asking for one asap as he had "borrowed" one from a customer. You dont borrow other peoples parts. So Lee is trying to replace my ali prop with a steel one. however Lee never sent jimmer payment for the prop so it was never sent. Then i got in contact with the guy who has my prop on his car & explained the situation. I asked him to look under his car & see what prop was on it. The next day he phoned me back & said he has a silver prop on his car & he took a video of it. Its my prop!! This guy knew nothing about it, as far as he was concerned his prop was a brand new steel prop so weve both been conned here.

This whole situation has left me absolutely gutted & even though ive known for a few weeks now im still in shock. Ive always thought of Lee as a good friend but cant get past what hes done. I even paid him in full for the work he did on my lwb even though i was 99% sure he had stolen from me. Ive got a lot of good friends on here who are also good friends with Lee. I know you guys will be in as much shock as me & i hope you believe me. Ive got no reason to make this up. Ive always been happy with Lees work and i know he worked hard getting my swb back on the road. i dont know why hes done this but i cant let him get away with this. If it happened again to someone else i wouldnt forgive myself.

I dont want any smart arse comments please.

Edited October 12, 20178 yr by t.mogsy

Sad that it's ended this way Tom although it seems from what I've read on here and putting 2+2 together that you're not the only one and it's sad that a garage that once had such a good reputation now has dark clouds hanging over it. I hope they can sort themselves out and make good.

 

Stick with it, hope either be puts you right or you get things moving with another Z garage.

 

I've always recommended PowerZed for example as I've used Jim since he first started up - you'll never have issues there I can assure you.

 

Have you confronted Lee over this prop shaft? Very shady it that's the case.

Cheers Si. To be honest I'm really not interested in what he's got to say. I'm not expecting a Z1 prop to turn up or even an apology. I'm finished with him now, I was nearly selling my zeds when I found out & a lot of people I've told wanted to go down there & sort him out but I'm not like that. Just got to move on but warn others so they don't fall victim

Best attitude mate, it's not worth getting caught up in anything else. The forum is a close knit community and those that stand by what they say will always remain respected.

 

I hope it hasn't dented your interest in the cars too much.

Sad that it's ended this way Tom although it seems from what I've read on here and putting 2+2 together that you're not the only one and it's sad that a garage that once had such a good reputation now has dark clouds hanging over it. I hope they can sort themselves out and make good.

 

Stick with it, hope either be puts you right or you get things moving with another Z garage.

+ 1

This is very sad. Very sad indeed.

 

It'd be bad enough if Lee had stolen from a random customer, but the fact that he's done it to a (supposedly) good friend, who would always sing his praises and defend him from any detractors, is just absolutely despicable in my eyes!! If he's done this to Tom, who else has he done it to...?

 

I've heard lots of stories and rumours about Mr Dent in the last few months. I've also seen some of his oldest or best customers either go very quiet or outright stop using him. So what has caused this, I wonder...?

This is very sad. Very sad indeed.

 

It'd be bad enough if Lee had stolen from a random customer, but the fact that he's done it to a (supposedly) good friend, who would always sing his praises and defend him from any detractors, is just absolutely despicable in my eyes!! If he's done this to Tom, who else has he done it to...?

 

I've heard lots of stories and rumours about Mr Dent in the last few months. I've also seen some of his oldest or best customers either go very quiet or outright stop using him. So what has caused this, I wonder...?

 

Yeah that's pretty shocking. Not sure what I'd think. I've had friends shaft me before (over a woman actually) and that made me bitter and numb. Lies and deceit are pretty hard to swallow when they come from someone you considered 'friend'.

 

Wonder what is going on.....

just want to reiterate the guy who Lee sold my prop to, he isnt on here but hes on facebook, didnt know anything about this & hes a really nice guy. Hes helped me get the final bit of evidence i needed. Im hopefully meeting up with him soon to have a good chat about it all. Hes as gutted as me as he thought he had found a trustworthy zed garage.

Sorry to hear this mate. I don't know either of you nor heard of Lee Dent but will remember the name now. Many thanks for having the courage to bring this to the forum and advise others on a sensitive subject. Good luck mate.

just want to reiterate the guy who Lee sold my prop to, he isnt on here but hes on facebook, didnt know anything about this & hes a really nice guy. Hes helped me get the final bit of evidence i needed. Im hopefully meeting up with him soon to have a good chat about it all. Hes as gutted as me as he thought he had found a trustworthy zed garage.

 

That's what SouthwestZed and ZTech used to do with customers cars. Doing shitty stuff will always catch up with you.

 

Well at least you know where there's a good single peice prop that was ordered and never paid for!

I'm sure it's no secret that Lee fell out with me a few months ago. Hell, I had four of his customers contact me in the summer to ask me questions, ranging from "Why have you stopped using him?" to "Why have you betrayed him and taken your car to Powerzed?"

 

I mean, what?!!

 

Since then, he's either slagged me or my work off to anyone who'll listen and he's now blocked me on Facebook and actually issued a threat to me via a third party. What a prince!

 

To think that, because I took my Zed to him in the past (where he used half a tank of fuel, forgot to fit the alternator pulley bolt and sent me a text telling me that me car likes to drift at 85mph in 3rd gear!), I am somehow honour-bound to only use his services... even when I was having an exhaust built in Bristol so it made sense for me to have some other work done at Powerzed at the same time.

 

In the last year, I've heard so many horror stories about Lee - some are confirmed and some are not. The fact that Tom's nightmare has turned out to be 100% true is making me wonder what else is true...

Tom I have known you for many years on the forum and we have met up on occasions and to hear that one of our traders has done this to you is not good. Lee Dent has a right to reply to any allegations but I believe what you say is true. Looks like the Committee will have to look into this further and take appropriate actions. But for now I am very sorry this has happened to a friend and hope you stay with us Tom.

 

where he used half a tank of fuel, forgot to fit the alternator pulley bolt and sent me a text telling me that me car likes to drift at 85mph in 3rd gear!

 

I couldn't believe that when I heard about that. I was gobsmacked.

I couldn't believe that when I heard about that. I was gobsmacked.

 

That was my first ever visit there, Si. I was rather taken aback myself, to say the least!

Tom I have known you for many years on the forum and we have met up on occasions and to hear that one of our traders has done this to you is not good. Lee Dent has a right to reply to any allegations but I believe what you say is true. Looks like the Committee will have to look into this further and take appropriate actions. But for now I am very sorry this has happened to a friend and hope you stay with us Tom.

 

thanks Gary. I wont be going anywhere mate. Job for the weekend is to get all the L A Auto stickers off my zeds.

That was my first ever visit there, Si. I was rather taken aback myself, to say the least!

 

That is really really low.

 

To add the two folk I know on here who have the highest standards of workmanship I've experienced in many many years (Jim and yourself) appear to both have been slagged off. Just very bizarre and immature behaviour.

Edited October 12, 20178 yr by Funkysi

thanks Gary. I wont be going anywhere mate. Job for the weekend is to get all the L A Auto stickers off my zeds.

 

Good man Tom and you have many friends here that are real friends mate.

Thanks for bringing your issues out into the open Tom; I am always sad to hear things like this.....

 

Tom I have known you for many years on the forum and we have met up on occasions and to hear that one of our traders has done this to you is not good. Lee Dent has a right to reply to any allegations but I believe what you say is true. Looks like the Committee will have to look into this further and take appropriate actions. But for now I am very sorry this has happened to a friend and hope you stay with us Tom.

 

....And Gary is absolutely right. Please do keep us informed of any developments - as we will indeed have to consider our own actions, being that Lee is an official trader on here.

 

And I too hope you stick around Tom. We're all part of an ever-dwindling community; but we remain a community, united in our interest of these cars despite such issues.

 

Richard:clover:

Well where do I start????

After using mr dent for many years I also have had enough of the way he treats you,the worst is with lack of communication!!!! That boils my f..King blood does that:(

He has treated me very discourteously,I've done nothing but spend thousands with this guy and over the last few months and he has wanted nothing to do with me for some reason...completely blanked me for **** sake...you don't do that to one of your best costumers surly??

Now Tom has brought this up,what's he done to me..god knows he could of had my legs up big time:(,I'm a true believer though of what goes round comes round:) you will get your comeuppance!!

The last straw for me was when he finished my full engine rebuild for the second time round... I had the car booked Into Greg at protunner so he could map my car, lee could not get it running correctly after the build saying it was an ecu or electrical fault and he was fannying around with it for weeks changing things to it that didn't need doing and charging me for the privilege, I told Lee it needed to be mapped correctly by someone who could diagnose the fault but he was convinced it was electrical or my alarm, I new this was *****cks but he just kept my car and charging me:( so I eventually booked it in with Greg and told Lee all he had to do was speak to Greg when the car was there,just so Greg could get a feel of what he might think the fault was and he also wanted to know the build spec of my engine....so Greg just needed literally 5 f..kin minutes of his time..and guess what he couldn't be arsed ringing him,so the job cost me just over another £1000 because the car was there days longer than it should of been:(...I mean come on,I've spent thousands with you son and you can't be arsed not only to speak with Greg but with me also...and we are so called mates......*****cks!!!

 

Ive finished with it...moved on ...., don't get me to elaborate on this matter anymore...its been very stressful and ****in expensive for me

 

 

 

Signing out

Edited October 12, 20178 yr by gray

Its very sad to read this after being a friend of Lees myself,I had numerous dealings with him and got on well,Until Mondo came to mine that is.Around May he asked me to get made an urgently needed swb na prop as he had "Borrowed One" somewhere and needed to replace it.After getting it done at expense to myself, Lee saw via Facebook Mondo was getting work done at mine he went very quiet after and payment was never made.I was then made aware he was telling everybody i was poaching his customers ! despite me turning 3 of his who were unhappy away in the last 12 months out of loyalty too him.After a previous 9 week wait for payment on 6 fuel filters he had asked me for this was a kick in the teeth to say the least !

Sorry to hear this is why forums are important i only work on my car and do as much as I can myself , it would be a good thing for people to post up pictures and write ups on how to do certain jobs which then would help others , I even posted earlier needing some help and I manage to sort things thanks to members on here .

 

Hope you get things sorted Tom:thumbup1:

Sorry to hear this is why forums are important i only work on my car and do as much as I can myself , it would be a good thing for people to post up pictures and write ups on how to do certain jobs which then would help others , I even posted earlier needing some help and I manage to sort things thanks to members on here .

 

Hope you get things sorted Tom:thumbup1:

 

I wouldn't tar everyone with the same brush.We do have a very highly regarded and highly skilled Z specialist (PowerZed).

Hi Tom,

 

His time has come and now its on the open forum I'm sure many more will come forward with stories.

 

I have the unfortunate experience much like yourself to have directly suffered abet indirectly by the hands of Lee Dent.

 

Three years ago near the end of my last zed build named Purple Rain; Mr Dent rebuilt and engine for me in which I then

installed in my shiny new zed, less than a month on the road the engine seized up on the way to its first show at the NEC.

 

Now i'm not sure if this was fate or not but that broken down Zed within 20 minutes of breaking down was struck by a large

semi-trailer which carved a whole bigger than the iceberg that hit the Titanic down the driver side.

 

Luckily my insurance paid out the full valuation and I've started my rebuild once more.

 

Now just last month I decided to break that very engine with the purpose of moving it out my garden rather than being a feature

and I finally discovered that the failure was caused by what I would call an exploded piston because I found it in shrapnel sized

pieces and jammed up inside.

 

The second item that concerned me was the gaskets or what was left of them were not of the brand I gave him.

 

I've hinted a few times about this over the last few months but as I got a big insurance pay out and my new build is to a higher

quality it didn't bother me too much, - I am pissed but its been nearly three years since the event that took my zed away.

 

Lee

I wouldn't tar everyone with the same brush.We do have a very highly regarded and highly skilled Z specialist (PowerZed).

 

Trust me I'm not read my post the very person you mentioned has helped me out in the past finding a part I needed and given me a bloody good quote on work I can't do myself and I will be going to him later this year

I feel it for you Tom:( you didn't deserve this one buddy:( a young guy with a very young family) I really feel it for you bud..I myself Luckily can afford to take financial kickings of people like this ( although it's still hurts) but not you bud it's not fair,what a w.nker

 

I'll see you Tuesday bud :)

Edited October 12, 20178 yr by gray

Sorry to hear Tom, it boils my piss when i see things like this, it has happened in the past with various traders, unfortunately trade well at first, become a trusted member then a trader, then something changes like a switch and things start going tits up, member get stung or worse actually lose their cars:thumbdown:

 

Although there are always two sides to a story, i cant wait to see what sort of reply we are going to get, if any :whistling:

 

Either way as far as the club is concerned the outcome will likely be the same.

 

Glad you are staying and thanks for airing your experience :thumbup1: