A little muffler porn Options

[Mikey914]

Working on a mount for the mufflers. Liking it so far but need to make some further adjustments.

[Mikey914]

Look,
Ben's not making them. I like the idea of a tubular chamber (simulr to the ANSA exhaust). That what I had been running.

I like the Triads also, and would carry them if they were made in quantity that I could stock.

I tried to support Ben on his offerings, bought them, stocked them, sold them. Ben announces he's not going to do the stainless anylonger. So now that we have demand for them, and they are not available what should I do?????

I committed to making these in mass. Also to improve the current offering. We are making custom flame tubes to produce a "quite version" Not copying anything that has been done previously. Did we look at them and say what can we improve, you bet. But as they are not being produced by Ben, we stepped up.

As for the mounting flange, I bent up some metal quickly and as you can see it fit's poorly. I need to improve the design to allow for flex and correct angles.

[Superhawk996]

I tried to support Ben on his offerings, bought them, stocked them, sold them. Ben announces he's not going to do the stainless anylonger. So now that we have demand for them, and they are not available what should I do?????

That is a really good question.

I can say in all honesty - I don’t know with certainty. But what I can also say in all honesty is that I have been a customer of yours as well as Ben’s and I respect each of you. I intend to keep doing business with each of you since you each produced needed products.

Usually things like this come down to how would you want to be treated if the shoe were on the other foot? Maybe there is no “right” thing. What I can say is that “appearances” are often perceived as reality.

Maybe if you are going to produce them, then either do it in the back ground rather than having the appearance of having lifted Ben’s designs and then flaunting it to the community? And yes, I get that Ben probably leveraged the 911 and/or OEM 914 designs to get to where his product was at. Maybe Ben should have put a patent or patent pending protection in place assuming he even had enough uniqueness of the design which might not have been feasible since a muffler is a muffler. Either way, it would take time and $$ to do put any protection in place which would drive up costs even further for the customer but adds no value for the customer. Maybe just acknowledging that it is based off Ben’s design is sufficient to give credit where credit is due? Maybe a gentleman’s royalty of 1 case of beer per unit produced - (IMG:style_emoticons/default/av-943.gif)? It is a tough call - I’ll grant you that.

I’m sure there is more to this story that I don’t know and I probably don’t even want to know. It’s just been a crazy two years of chaos and supply chain disruptions and I don’t like the appearance that a design was / is being pilfered. That’s just my opinion.

Business is competitive and dog eat dog by it’s nature. I just hate to see it within such a small tight community as we have. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/confused24.gif)