BigMike

chromatest,

Sorry for the mess up with the transmission I don't know any of the details with your order but we always try our best to take care and follow through with our promises to our customers.

I think your shop meant to say we shipped one for a 95 Hilux because a 1995 R150F V6 Tacoma transmission will bolt straight into a 2000 V6 Tacoma. Nevertheless, still unfortunate this had to happen

We've discussed creating a R-series nomenclature such as R150F-A, R150F-B, R150F-C, etcetera, similar to what we've done with the W56 series, because there are a ton of different R150s that Toyota has made since 1988 - more than you'd believe! That may help alleviate what happened here. I will revisit this on Tuesday and also check on the status with FedEx to see what's up. If we said we shipped it, especially a transmission, then for sure we shipped it. Every trans we build is FAR too precious to us to see them get lost somewhere in transit!!!!!!!

Again, sorry you've had to live without your truck for this long, we never want this to happen, ever.

Hope you will have a great 4th of July weekend, talk to ya soon,
BigMike

chromatest

The transmission came in on the 21st or 22nd. Got my truck back and all is well. I don't know why it took so long though.

I'm very happy with the transmission, as I knew I would be. I'm annoyed that I didn't get the shift boot that the rep said he'd include. I'm stuck with my torn boot, but it was a freebie, so I can't be too mad.

Mr.Utah

A while ago I was considering a tranny from Marlin, no response with my messages as to why I should buy Marlin. I had a local guy here in SLC do my transmission, its now perfect!

I did order the shifter seat and bushing from marlin along with some other small items. Shipping time was good. No problems with these products. The shifter seats seemed to tighten up the slack in the shifting.

BigMike

chromatest,

I am very happy to see you got the trans & got it installed! We definitely need to do something for the trouble, I'll keep in touch!

Regards,
BigMike

chromatest

Hey BigMike!

I recently installed an URD short-throw shifter in the transmission and I was really surprised to find that it had the original factory shift level ball seat in it.


When I ordered the transmission, your sales rep assured me that it would be rebuilt using your upgraded parts, including the Billet Shift Fork. Of course, I have no way of knowing if that was done without cracking the case (which I'm not going to do), but I do know that the shift lever ball seat is an original factory fella.

Is this something that you could help me out with?
Thanks BigMike!

BigMike

Hmmmmmmmmm? We actually don't carry any factory seats here. In fact I've personally only seen worn out seats being replaced. I'd go so far as to say we haven't ordered a seat from Toyota in over 6 years. We purchase our heavy duty Delrin seats in huge quantities and always have excellent stock of them. Did you change shift bases maybe? Or did URD send you a stock seat with their short throw kit?

BigMike

chromatest

No change in shift bases, and nothing from the URD kit. When I went to install the URD kit, is when I found out that the shift seat was the original factory one.

To clarify, I mean it's the OLD (worn out) ORIGINAL factory one. The one that was installed by the factory is still in the transmission. It's not a NEW Original factory seat.

I was surprised that it was in there instead of a really nice Marlin Crawler one.

I know that they did not use the seat from the transmission that they took out of my truck (the one that was replaced by the transmission bought from MC) because that transmission (my old one) had a MC shift seat in it.

The only reasonable explanation is that the transmission shipped to me from Marlin Crawler never had the shift seat replaced by Marlin. It was probably just an oversight in the rush to get the transmission to me (after sending me the wrong tranny the first time)

BigMike

chromatest,

First, I'd like to say that no matter what I will get you a new HD Marlin Crawler seat. This is not the issue at all. This has aroused much curiosity from me and your above reply answered some concerns I had. All stock seats are removed from core housings and chucked straight in the trash. We inspect the pins on shift bases for wear and we pressure wash and bead blast all housings. So even it we didn't chuck the OEM piece in the trash, it would be resting in the catch tray with all the other gunk at the bottom of our pressure cooker. From what I can gather by your reply, it sounds like the shop you used to install the transmission discovered our transmission was missing the seat, so they found whatever used seat they had laying around and used that to get the job done (and also they discarded your own existing HD seat!!).

Our HD seat is one of the last items that gets installed into our trans, and it is required to be there for us to test shift each one before getting our seal of approval. I can only speculate that maybe Marlin had to remove the base during the final inspection phase and slapped on another base that was missing a seat!! Believe me you wouldn't be able to hear the end of Marlin apologizing to you and explaining how sorry he is for missing the HD seat after everything was approved! We are definitely sorry and will get this resolved straight away (Please send me a PM with your name and zip code so I can look you up and get some goodies in the mail today!)

Regardless of what happened, your new transmission does not have a HD seat & we apologize for this. (it's unacceptable). As for the internals, it's true that for many things in life a degree of trust is needed, but we take it waaaaay further than just that. Marlin keeps a very strict build diary of each transmission matching the Toyota serial number as well as his own custom number that he stamps onto every build. He hand engraves the date, sales order number, and his signature on every HD bearing plate and billet shift fork that gets installed and records the S/N of the trans & parts into his book. Once I get your info via PM I'll look ya up in his diary and will report back with the details of your build

Now please send me that PM good Sir!
BigMike

chromatest

BigMike!

Did you get my PM? Haven't heard from you.

Thanks!

BigMike

Sorry man, I've been pretty busy. I sent ya some goodies last week Have you gotten em yet?

BigMike

chromatest

Yup, got the package yesterday! Thanks!

BigMike

Awesome! Thank you for the update (sorry for my late reply!)!

kawazx636

iTrader: (3)

Just wondering if anybody else has experienced issues with Marlin Crawler shipping? I placed an order on January 3rd for some tranny parts (in stock) and they still aren't here on January 18th. They gave me the FedEx tracking number and it seem to be sitting everywhere but my front porch!

-January 3rd - Shipment info sent to FedEx
-January 9th - Picked up by FedEx and departed from Fresno, CA
-January 10th - Arrived and departed from Sacramento, CA
-January 11th - Arrived and departed from North Salt Lake, UT
-January 15th - Arrived and departed Hagerstown, MD
-January 15th - Arrived at Martinsburg, WV (Smart Post)

It has been sitting in Martinsburg, WV for 3 days! I could have driven to CA and picked it up by now...

Now I know this package is going across the Country, but it's has taken 15 days already. I have ordered parts from LCE, Summit Racing, Low Range Off Road, Eastwood and Advance Auto Parts since I placed my order with Marlin Crawler and all that stuff has arrived and been installed already.

Apparently, Marlin Crawler uses FedEx Smart Post to ship their items which is a cooperative between FedEx and the USPS in order to provide lower shipping costs and expedited shipping. This would be great if the cost were actually lower and the package arrived in a moderately reasonable time.

I've looked on the web at other forums and there seem to be a lot of people pissed off at these shipping times but they were from a while back when a lot of employees at Marlin Crawler were "sick." I had planned to get my crossover steering and knuckle rebuild kit from them, but it looks like I'm going to WabFab for that now. These parts are holding me up on progress on my truck and although Marlin Crawler may have high quality parts, I'll never order from them again because of it. Some may say that it's not Marlin Crawler's fault, but they chose to use Smart Post and they knew there were complaints about it and never corrected it.

Just beware when ordering from them; if you need a part urgently, perhaps you should look elsewhere.

catfish21

iTrader: (1)

Man I'm so mad right now I could kill someone the one weekend I get off of work to work on my truck I can't because once again marlin crawler didn't send enough knuckle stud kits, man don't get me wrong I love there business ans they have great product but who ever is packaging the shipments needs to lay off the booze this is the third time in a row that they have forgot something in my order. Aight sorry but this is just enough how hard is it to make up an order

Cyberhorn The Dragon

i recently ordered the upgraded shifter seat and ball for the W56 it arrived in good time an in good shape i haven't had the opportunity to install them but look forward to

will let you know how things go

Cyberhorn The Dragon

well the install was easy the shifter is firm an quite smoothly awesome so the seat an ball end get my full vote of you should do it! just make sure to firmly seat the ball end on the stick its a tough fit but has to be for proper fit inside the tranny quick bit of lube an put her back in with all the great shifting to come

my w56 boot ripped unfortunately trying to get it off to remove the shifter for the upgrade i have a new one on the way from martin for a very reasonable price

87blackbeauty

I ordered a shifter end ball and boot from them 2 weeks ago. Came in about 4 days ago, but not what I ordered. I actually was sent the ball and shift seat (already had one), no new boot was included. I haven't contacted them yet but I will come Monday. Just hard to do as I live on the east coast and my afternoons are often covered up with work. Of course I'll gladly send back the seat if they want it, but I certainly want what I order, not what they feel is the common order. I mean, I really get the feeling that they glanced at the order, saw two items, and assumed since I was getting the ball end, I was getting a shift seat with it. It's not too big of a deal, since I'm not planning on doing any real offroading in the next little while, but it is annoying, for both the customer and the salespeople.