This post is legnthy and if you are not patient skip over it! :shock:
I dont know if all what is going on is all true but it has a hint of truth to it and I will explain. when i started rebuilind my first v (777) i would call chuck at blueline and order a switch for the control panel. I would recieve it and order more parts the following weeks son on and so forth untill I finish the truck. two weeks after chuck left and the merger happened, I called in and found out why chuck left the company. So i had no choice but to order from the guy that had taken the job chuck left open (notice i didnt say replaced chuck). I had a list of parts and stated i would fax it over to him and he could get back with me whenever he could about availability and a full quote. As the conversation continued he stated that they were going through a complete inventory and factory reorganization, and that it might take him a few days to get back with me. So naturally i asked if there were any major changes going to happen and he stated that for us there would be no interruption in service or pruducts and that the v would continue to be built. The following week he called me back and said he had some numbers for me and that i might want to sit down before we started talking about them. The first part we talked about was the control panel for a 7000. He said it was $5000.00 dollars and it would take him at least a week to build. I stated that i just needed the control panel stainless steel box and its silkscreened face including the stand, no electronics or switches. I told him that chuck sold me the control panel with face and stand for 460 plus shipping. He stated that the blueline so longer sells the parts alone and if you dont buy the whole assembly you dont get anything alone. so i begged him for a the part i could not or not easily could make, and i said what about the control panel face. he replied by saying THAT HE WOULD HAVE TO HUNT ONE DOWN BECAUSE THEY HAD BEEN THROWING AWAY OBSELETE PARTS AND SAYING THAT THEY DO NOT BUILD THE 7000 PLATFORM ANYMORE. I told him that chuck told me about six weeks earlier that he had about fifteen or so just lying around, because they send them out by sets of fifty to get silkscreened, and they were never used. So he said he would try to find one and call me back. He called me back a few days later and he said he had a few and he could get me one for about three hundred dollars just for the face. i told him that was a bit steep for a 20 gauge 4' silkscreen aluminum sheet that was obselete to wich he replied that is what the computer said it cost. The whole ordeal made me a little uneasy with the blueline and painted a different picture of what i thought about the company and particularly uneasy of buying another V let alone a new one.
On March 17 2009 I went to
Jon don for their customer appreciation day and Thomas Fielding was their. Store manager mentioned to him that i had a couple of v's and we started talking. He quickly gave me a bit of a history lesson on bluline and how it all got started. When he mentioned that it had started as mostly a parts company, i said thats it was kind of strange that now after the merger blueline doesnt sell parts anymore. when i said that the tone changed very quickly and he asked to talk inside the store managers office. He asked why i said that and i told him the whole story. He got visibly upset, i dont think with me, and told me he was going to be back in the office in a few days and figure out what was going on and that he would get back to me when it was corrected. still no contact but he might of lost my info, no big deal and i do have to say tom was very proffesional and took the time to talk to me but still i was uneasy with blueline. As a result i have been thinking about converting my second v into a
aerotech with their look and their instrument panel. really would like to stay uniform though and have identical v's but i dont get what i want always.
