Slick 60's

I bought 2 plastic "sweep" style guage clusters on eBay, off the same guy. I paid 30 shipping. The arrive in a regular corrugated box with packing peanuts inside. Of course, both clusters were busted into a couple dozen of pieces.

I have shipped complete grilles before, and I always beef up the inside of the box. I get heavy cardboard tubes from a blueprint shop, cut the tubes to length to make reinforcements at the corners and at certain points in the middle.

I do have to say the box itself was intact, showed no signs of being purposefully dropped or mistreated. I guess the seller just didn't pack them properly. I sent the guy an email, but I doubt anything comes of this. I used paypal, but they are usually worthless in disputes or damages claims, my experience anyway.

I thought this rant would make me feel better, but it doesn't.

blame the shippers, not the seller
when i was selling lots of parts on e-bay i sold the same cc instrument panel to a guy in Mi.
i packed it in bubble wrap very carefully and foam nuts too.
when he got it it looked like yours probably do.
he had bought shipping insurance from the post office and took the whole thing down to his post office where they decided it was not bad packaging and he was able to reclaim the cost of the item , but not the shipping $.took a while for him toget it but this is the only time in over 500 sales i ever had someone get a damaged item.

it is the reponsibility of the buyer to demand insurance on shipping if it is not offered in the auction.

i made it a policy of selling that any item over $25 or anything with glass or fragile you had to buy the insurance or i would not sell. the cost of insurance is very little and no one complained.

recently i had a generator sent from N.C. to here.
it was double boxed in heavy cardboard but when it arrived it looked like it was used as a football by the Terminators. no damage to the generator other than some very slight bending of the fan blades.

bottom line

its the shippers, not the seller, 95% of the time.

Even with insurance, you will have trouble when its an ebay item.

I got a steering column from another member here -- UPS managed to drop it and bend the upper collar (where the turn signal switch resides) which is a part that is not available. Anyhow, in spite of claims filed, UPS never gave me a single cent. They refused to accept that my cancelled check represented documentation of the value of the part.

Just accept that in the brave new world of commerce in the 21st century, there will be bumps in the road. We have access to parts via the web, ebay and friendly fellow members that we would never have had 10 years ago. You take the good with the bad.

I will say, the biggest packing mistake I see folks makeing is choosing too small a box. If the part touches the outside of the box or is close, then all the peanuts in the world will not help if the box is dropped with that side down.

DHL is a problem in my corner of the US at least. My employer won't use them anymore and they just closed up a major hub near here with 200 or so employees. No one locally wants to use them, damaged and lost stuff is the norm. I use FedEx or USPS, Forward Air for big expensive stuff.

I had a USPS issue once also. I paid 300 worth of insurance and they lost the item,admitted to losing it, made me wait a month in case it showed up and then had me file a claim and only paid the actual receipt of what I was paid which was under 200 and did not even pay for the shipping which was the part that caused the whole mess to begin with! Why ask me for a value if your not going to pay teh value but what you want! I took USPS red white and blue boxes for a while, flipped them inside out and used UPS until I felt reimbursed.

UPS has been having problems a lot I think because I hear everyone having damage problems with them, especially the auto body and paint guys. I have all my stuff from them come in on time and not lost but it comes in bad shape too. FedEx used to be ok but slower but the last time I used them they lost a huge paint order and it put me back over a month on a paint job for someone which in turned pissed my customer off because I didn't have to materials to finish the job on time. They were good about getting my money back so I can reorder but they took forever doing it just like any other company would have.

I emailed the seller through eBay. The seller replied saying he insured the item. I didn't notice an insurance sticker on the box, but after thinking about it maybe it is the post office that does that. Guess I'll try them and see what they say.

Maybe I ought to go with a metal cluster and avoid all this crap. Of course, they can get bent. But I've shipped and received 4 different F600 metal panels and never had an issue with those.

dot, is the he main housings that are getting broken?
If not, I have the guts of a sweep speedo cluster (gauges, lens, etc) I'd be happy to send to you. I just don't have a good main plastic housing.

It is the plastic housing, unfortunately. Actually, I haven't checked the gauges or really looked at it that closely. Once I saw all the little plastic pieces, I just thought oh no, looked quickly at both units, then put them back in the box.

I wonder if the crazy glue stuff, or plastic welding would work well? maybe patch them up and send the best one off to be refinished. Actually, I really need to look into this insurance thing. I guess I need to file a complaint or whatever it's called with eBay & Paypal.

To bad I don't like those Dakota "Bronco" digital dashes better. I'd get one of those and a metal instrument panel and just run that.

If you get it put back together wear can you send it to get refinished

for any one looking for a different way of shipping you might consider using greyhound bus service. might not work for every one but you put the package in the storage compartment and it stays there till the package gets to the destination. the drivers change the bus keeps going so the package dosen't get tossed around. my nephew has shipped hoods and fiber glass parts with no problems. just a thought.

Dot: If you would like, I have a sweep gauge that I would find a metal box for and send to you for shipping. Just to see if it got through in a metal box. Of course homeland security might have to open it to look at whats there L think I have a metal box from a xmas present that should work. Let me know............Ross

pm sent

i say it is the packagers fault for not properly packaging the items. when i ship stuff i say to myself what if. and i package according to what if something were to happen. no one like condoms but that little extra protection can go a long way.

we ship a lot and we do get damage, last year we had 2 damage one by dhl and the other by Ups freight, now so far 2008 Ups damged a headliner that cost 120.00 to ship to Fl. Ups killed it, tore it, footprints over and tire marks from a forklift, we getting a full payment for it + shipping another one here to us anymore none of these places care, Ups just raised a .04% increase more surcharges and higher insurance for what?

nobody cares.... everybody is just totally careless with everything. Throwin stuff, kickin it, crashin into stuff...

I knew a kid a few years back that said he worked at Best Buy in Highschool, said when they got a truckload of computer monitors,instead of climbing up and carefully unstacking them, they would just knock them over and pick them up. There was a shitload of returns, but the kids didn't care.

People are the same way with your stuff, they don't care if it's totally irreplacable, it's just stuff, and they'll never see it again. Little pricks...

I posted a few photos in my gallery of the damage. I have been in contact with the seller, I sent him about 15 photos of the damage. We are probably going to be able to work it out, so it seems.

I will try to repair with crazy glue and/or plastic welding once all this gets settled. I'll post with the results of that, maybe do a tutorial if it turns out decent.

i been dealin with ebay, and shipping via UPS , Purolator, dhl, etc etc etc for about five years now - and i have only one thing to say about those rapin n pillagin pigs -

USE US PRIORITY OR EXPRESS US MAIL ,OR in Canada SIMILAR CANADIAN MAIL - ITS USUALLY CHEAPER, ITS INSURED, AND IT IS FAST, AND IT IS RARELY DAMAGED IF THE SHIPPER DID ANYTHING NEAR A DECENT JOB PACKAGING

just remember whether the seller works something out with you or not. if you are in the middle of a settlement, whatever..., ebay requires you to file a dispute 45 to 60 afters the auction. after that time frame then the seller isn't required by ebay to help you no matter what and ebay also will not do squat for you. trust me, i found out the hard way. filing a dispute isn't a complaint, it is just informing ebay that you need more time to settle a situation and if it doesn't work out then you can turn the dispute into a spittin match.