Hi all,
comatosellama, I'm not asking anyone to take sides. I was just trying to get a baseline as to how reputable CCR is in 2015, since all the references I had were from several years ago. As mentioned, several calls were made to CCR (BTW, Sarah and Cindy were very nice but sounded put on the spot, I assume due to lack of any progress). Each time they said they had no response from Emily and then finally Sarah said I should email Emily at the generic info address. It wasn't until I posted a complaint to the BBB of Colorado and Yelp a week later (5 weeks after I started calling) that I finally got my first response from CCR. My mission, as Emily puts it, is to resolve this issue and figure out the integrity of the company I entrusted over $4000 to provide a rebuilt engine that would last as long as the original engine and not one that would limp along for maybe the length of the warranty. From the responses, I get the impression the only way they will honor the warranty is if the engine throws a rod or something. The fact that I didn't contact CCR for 6 month is irrelevant to there being a problem as it is still well within warranty. The truth is that I also thought the issue was a sensor and I spent that time replacing parts based on suggestions I found on the internet. I finally gave up and took it to the shop for diagnosis. BTW, CCR only suggested one mechanic (not two) that I've never heard of and is a 100 miles away and doesn't have the diagnosis equipment required to troubleshoot the misfire.
I'm happy to hear the above success stories and wish I had one too, but is there anyone out there that had an engine problem and CCR followed through?
Now on to something productive. Shoebee2 and others, the engine was loud and had a vibration from the get-go, not a hundred miles later. It was within the first hundred miles that it started throwing the misfire errors. Although the valves are louder than typical, the loudness is comparable to running at 1500RPM when only at 800. If the problem was just a valve adjustment, I would think that the Subaru dealership would have noted that. Relative to how they came up with the sticky valve, I don't know, but the vibration in the engine is pretty obvious, I just thought it was a result of the engine misfire, not a balance issue because if feels like an engine with old dirty sparkplugs. I assume that the mechanic was reading the engine codes while it was running and determined that all cylinders were firing and it was still vibrating, but this is a guess. Other symptoms include lack of power especially at low RPM ( often stalls if not reving from a start) and after market Crank Position sensor dies after 3-5 uses (have went through 2 and assuming due to not as rugged as OEM and the vibration of the engine is breaking them). The original Crank Position sensor works fine (i.e. the car runs).
Having never ran the engine, I don't see how CCR can dismiss a Subaru mechanic and make the statement "What we do is purely mechanical. Something outside of the engine is causing the problem." and this is the problem at hand. As of today, I have still only received the one response with no path to a solution. This combined with the initial lack of response has justifiably made me very suspicious of CCR's integrity. If CCR would suggest a mechanic that wasn't 100 miles away for a second opinion on the misfire & vibration, and would offer to cover 100% of the diagnosis if it confirmed an issue with the rebuilt long block, then I would happily take it there. CCR is affiliated with the Engines Rebuilders Council, and they suggest several local mechanics on their website.
Thank you all for your responses and sorry for the length of this response, however, I don't have time to check/respond on a daily basis and I wanted to address each of the above comments.
