OT: Settling a dispute when selling machine parts.

Here it goes. It's long winded.

This is a money + trade deal for a 2HL LL attachment to a guy who said he's a Pm member but he's never given me the name he uses. I wouldn't put it out there even if I knew it.
Seems like a nice enough guy, made a trade with him 4-5months ago and everything went perfect.

This trade/sale didn't go so well and he's really pissed off at me.
He had a 1:96 worm I needed for my 3CH. I told him I had $450 into this 2HL box and would trade him his 1:96 worm + $400 & shipping for the LL attachment.

Seems like a fair enough deal, right?
We were supposed to ship the same day but it took me longer to box this thing up, so it went out the next day.

I recieved this worm and couldn't believe it. It's horrible, The OD is undersized, there's an 1/8" + of backlash and plan wore out from wherever it came from. This thing is somones failed attempt at making a worm.

After looking at this POS worm I was a little pissed off. UPS told me I had to make a decision right then because it's going on the truck for delivery.

I cancelled the delivery of the LL box. I refunded his PayPal pmt, refunded the cost of him shipping his worm to me and I'm shipping back the worm he sent to me on my dime. I'm out about $160. He's being refunded every penny he's got into this deal gone bad.

Did I handle this the wrong way, Should I have let this package get delivered and try to sort this out with a person that I don't know and is 1000 miles away? He said after the fact that he would've paid more to make it right. Allegedly, He called the guy he sold the worm gear to but now has it back in his possession, all the same night. I still haven't seen a picture of it. He said his buddy will take the worm I have for trade. After you look at these pictures, Who in their right mind would trade a brand new gear for a POS like this and be happy?

What would you guys have done I this situation?
Here's a picture of the worm he sent me and here's a picture of the worm & wheel I send him 5months ago. I was kinda expecting my worm back but it really doesn't matter to me, I just needed a good usable gear for my machine.

Andy

you handled it fine. He's not out anything but petting his worm gear for a couple days. He needs to move on as you already have.

Sounds like you are dealing with a slime ball, and did the best you could to minimize the hit you took. I would have done the same thing.

The most surprising thing is that the first deal went well, maybe you want to go double check whatever you got on that deal before you have to depend on it for something important.

CarlBoyd

The thread that's there looks ok, it looks like a milled thread to me, not really in the 'home-made' category. Probably the threads were turned off each end after the thread was milled, hence all the traces of residual helical groove and other scummy cutting on each end. The fact that the PD is wrong is the main issue, I reckon.

CarlBoyd said:

Sounds like you are dealing with a slime ball, and did the best you could to minimize the hit you took. I would have done the same thing.


CarlBoyd

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^^^^This. The condition of that worm tells us all he's either a slimeball or doesn't know what he's looking at.
If he ever wants to deal with you again he owes you $160.

HuFlungDung said:

The thread that's there looks ok, it looks like a milled thread to me, not really in the 'home-made' category. Probably the threads were turned off each end after the thread was milled, hence all the traces of residual helical groove and other scummy cutting on each end. The fact that the PD is wrong is the main issue, I reckon.

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I've had a lot of these K&T Low Lead gears in my possession and this one doesn't look like any I've seen before. I can't believe for a minute that a gear of this quality would leave their factory. I can see horizontal grind marks on the ends so thats an indication it was stood on end and surfaced ground, usually the ends (worm width) are sized between centers. There's a lot of tool chatter at the root and tooth surface. Usually there's only a few thousands of backlash in them.

1/8" of backlash is an issue. If he described the gears as "good" condition or better, then you aren't at fault and I don't blame you for doing what you did. It might have behooved you to contact the guy and give him a chance to put it right first, but that's water under the bridge now.

Mud said:

^^^^This. The condition of that worm tells us all he's either a slimeball or doesn't know what he's looking at.
If he ever wants to deal with you again he owes you $160.

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I'd like to give him the benefit of the doubt and it was a big misunderstanding. There's no hard feeling at my end. I'll either pass the $160 along to the next guy or just throw it under the bench and keep it.

eKretz said:

1/8" of backlash is an issue. If he described the gears as "good" condition or better, then you aren't at fault and I don't blame you for doing what you did. It might have behooved you to contact the guy and give him a chance to put it right first, but that's water under the bridge now.

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I think that's what the guy is mad about the most but I don't know him from anyone. If he had a good reputation here, I would've let it get delivered and figured it out afterwards. I fired off an email as soon as I opened it and he only had a couple hours to respond. I know people don't live on their computers or phones but UPS told me I had to make a choice because it was going g on the truck to be delivered.

The fact that he wouldn't reveal his screen name to you is troubling. You did the right thing. Just move on.