Headers and other forums Getting things straight

[George Roffe]

mike kojima wrote:

>Not to make any excuses for Hotshot but they are a small company that
>makes the best Nissan headers on the market.

Amen.

I understand some folks frustration.  But sometimes it's almost hilarious
(pun intended ;-).  I realize that customers are king.  Unfulfilled
promises are indeed and issue.  I won't go into that.  I'm sure I don't
know the whole story.  But, having to wait for the best header on the
market for a Nissan is just a fact of life.  Whining about it is
irrelevant.  The customer is king, but if production is at capacity there
is little that can be done.  I didn't hear about anyone calling Sony to
bitch about availability when the PS2 came out and people were gouging
others reselling their new toys.  There are choices.  They are not very
good choices so everyone wants a Hotshot.  They must be doing something
right - certainly well enough.

>In fact it makes business sense for Hotshot to actually raise there prices
>to trim demand since production is the bottle neck in getting any of there
>stuff.

Absolutely.  There are many folks who have privately talked about that.  In
a market economy such as ours, supply and demand seek equilibrium.  When
supply is scarce, one way to do that is to increase the price to trim
demand.  Thank God John still refuses to do so.  I am 100% certain if HS
upped the price of their headers $50 they would still sell every one before
it is made.  Hmmmm....  Maybe they should up the price $100??......

The other market force is to encourage production to meet the demand.  So
far there doesn't seem to be much interest here.  For those who complain
and think John is nuts for not just hiring twice as many people, I say you
are nuts for not going into business yourself and build headers.  What's
stopping you?

>They do hold the line on pricing though.

Yep.  It's funny though.....   He holds prices down and he gets kicked in
the gonads because he doesn't produce enough.  John Spangler and Hotshot
have been very good friends to the SR20 community.  Yes, some folks have
had issues with HS, but they have been extremely good to us, and yes, they
*do* make a profit doing so.  But, Stillen makes a profit off of us and how
good have they been to us?

>Instead of whining or being impatient, perhaps you might want to design
>and produce your own header.

Yep.  Fill a demand in the market.

>Sorry if I sound harsh be welcome to the realities of the aftermarket for
>niche cars where we are lucky to convince anyone to make any parts for our
>cars at all.

Yep.

And as I've said many many times, while the breadth of suppliers and tuners
is small, the quality tends to be quite good.

>I spend my whole life waiting for special parts.  Then I test them, make
>suggestions, wait for more test parts, test screw around several times,
>then the parts get release for sale to you guys. Since the bigger richer
>more together companies are not really interested in Nissans, I have to
>deal with smaller companies that are not as well funded or organized,
>thus the waits.

Yep.

I don't think most people realize just how accurate this is.  Or how much
work this is.  Mike lines up companies who are interested in producing
stuff for our cars.  Then he tests them.  Then they modify them.  Then he
tests them, etc.  Hell, then he writes about them and gives us all the
straight dope.  No bullshit.  If it sucks he tells it straight.  If it's
the best available and it's verifiable through dyno testing, he tells us
this too.  And if it's just and educated opinion, he's clear about
that.  This is major work.

It's also easy to get or produce on-off parts for personal use.  It's much
harder to produce products for everyone else to use.  You can't just
through stuff together and fix it as you go.  I know.  I'm going through
this right now.

>Be thankful there are any parts at all.  Remember in the Merlin days when
>the ultimate setup was tokiko blue shocks with pro-kit springs, a greddy
>cat back, gen 1 hotshot header and a POP charger.

Heh.

You're wrong Mike.  The Hotshot header wasn't a production part
then.  Merlin left the list a little while before I joined and I was here
for several months before the first production batch of headers even shipped.

Speaking of which, in regards to Wayne's comments about the 1st gen HS
header, he is 100% correct.  I remember the very spotty quality that people
were receiving.  John listened to the complaints and instead of saying
"screw you guys" and building a Honduh header he kept improving the HS
header, both in quality and performance.

OK, end of my commentary.  I'm sure I'll be accused of having my nose up
Mike's or John's butt, but I can assure you I don't.  I'm speaking up
because HS is getting beat up and I think it's unfair.  Not *totally*
unfair, but unfair on the whole by a wide margin.

BTW, I'm sure Stillen has headers in stock and can ship today. :-)

George Roffe
Houston, TX
91 SE-R (well modded)
91 G20 turbo (well modded)
84 944 SCCA ITS race car under construction
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