3 link vs 4 link

ZRTX · Mar 30, 2021

Something new I found about a hour ago.

jAndyMendo said: ↑

Ok. Two week nightmare is finally over. It started with finding a new victim of Wyatts. Finding out he was a retired dood that gave him his daily driver for a 6 week job, months later and his truck still isnt close to being finished and parts not ordered even though the person was local and visited. He was being fed lies about work being done and parts ordered and health issues. as he checked into these stories he started finding that wyatt was faking parts installs for updates and lying about deliver times of items under order (he confirmed these lies by calling vendors and opening a diff cover, wyatt plumbed a air line into a rear housing to fake a locker install).

With someone visiting that was local and a employee unpaid for months, it was easy to start getting information on other projects.

We had 5 vehicles mostly chopped up so it looked like work started at his new shop, 3 more in some form of starting and money paid. 2 more vehicles at another shop with one being sent chopped up without any parts or money to start it (was moved to hide from the owner that visited from Louisiana after being told it was ready for pick up). All vehicles with wyatt between 6 months to 4.5 years.

Not only were most of the trucks chopped and sat on jackstands, with large amounts of parts deposits made. I found a large handful of people that bought large parts and kits awaiting shipment (with stories about freight trucks crashing and pallets being shipped back to the shop with damages), those ranged around 27-33k. Found just as many with small parts purchase, 4-12k in losses. A lot of credit card purchases past chargeback, and too many ach and venmo payments.

This dood told a series of stories to everyone about Marlin shop being a shitshow and leaking transfer cases, bad parts alignment. This was so bad i actually told too many people to not buy parts from Marlin Crawler because they were slipping while Big Mike only cared about his “worlds slowest ifs”. He told stories about Advanced Adapters having a new owner and sourcing parts overseas with bad tolerances, so bad the stories were that I told people to hold off on buying four speed atlases until this was completed. He told stories about dynatrac not being able to build axles for canbus tacomas because they couldnt do speed sensors for abs without his help and connections with trd in japan and he sold them a solution for racing supras. Wyatt gave me a handful of other excuses about other vendors issues form metal bending to master cylinder valving. He gave everyone stories like these, some similar, some different depending on your build scam.

Even worse were the health stories he spread, we mostly got them but at different times. In my 3.5 years Wyatt had a congenital heart issue with multiple signals firing in his heart needing multiple surgeries and a pacemaker that went faulty. During hospital times I got texts from his Wife even though she would never answer the phone immediately after sending to talk. After that recovery he passed out work and got rushed to the hospital, this time he has a very rare case of MS that was very aggressive, he got into a trial treatment and within a few months of that and speech therapy, he was back to 100%, miraculous recovery. Through all of this his Mom was having issues, now in my stories his mom was alive but needed to be moved to his brothers house, unfortunately others were told she died and one even sent a card to wyatt after the notice. This is why we never tried to push him too hard, once i personally wanted my truck back, when i visited (wasnt local) it was on jack stands with trucks in my way on jack stands or i would have picked it up years ago, i couldnt push him because im not a monster and believed his health issues, we all believed him.

When i visited, i had parts under my truck, had axles floating. had the wrong shocks at one point in the rear. in finding other people and hearing their stories, my front axle i saw for years was actually dropped off by a customer, shocks were for mockup, no idea whos rear was under my truck, but it was for a fj/4runner by its width. 57k paid in parts and labor 3.5 years ago and no parts were ever ordered. The front axle that was brought by a customer, he also brought a atlas that was put on someone else's 4runner, never to be recovered when he picked up his parts and vehicle finally three weeks ago. Thats another thing we found. Wyatt did complete a lot of small projects (I say wyatt, I mean his employees). he completed a lot 2wd->4wd conversions with parts cut off dropped off projects. I dropped off a fully built ifs tacoma, no parts still remain, donated to conversion projects. As his best friend found out, he dropped off gears for his fj, wyatt put them in someone elses small project, he finally got his gears last week after years of excuses.

Talking about friends. Part of me is glad wyatt didnt finish my truck, he did finish a friends 4runner, he almost died on the freeway driving it when done and he lost steering. After wyatt fixed it, it again fell apart in mexico on a trip. he no longer calls wyatt a friend, he came and helped yesterday. Wyatt never built a beast. Demello built his beast while he watched. Abu’s white tacoma would have been his first, mine second. He finished neither. Mine still chopped up, Abu having his finished by the unpaid employee, after this employee needed to change most of its “RST BEAST” geometry that wouldnt flex you over a parking lot curb. this dood is a total scam from day one. everyone said the same thing about great reviews, and trail pics, and recommendations. Even shops said good things, but a lot of these shops now are also owed money by wyatt they will never see, so they share a seat on our boat to no money island. Even his building owner is changing the locks today, Wyatt has never paid rent at his new shop, luckily we were able to get our trucks out before.

So in a side chat we coordinated finding all owners, from Louisiana to Canada and many other states between. One was already picked up the week before we started, and then vehicles leaving all last week, the final day being Saturday. We looked for all the parts we could find, which was only well wrapped and labeled take off parts and used front diffs ready for more quick conversions.

Not one part of anyones order was found. Only one set of axles was on order at dynatrack, but ordered not paid for. We counted that he needed at least 4 sets not including the pending shipment orders. No atlas orders, he told us he had 2 on order, he needed at least another 6 to meet all the orders i found paid for. No drive shafts, no coilovers, no tower brackets made no link mounts made (we heard from employees he bought those from other vendors and paid people to cut RST logos in them to call then his), no links made. He told me once that he had parts at another shop, then in a container after the shop move. When a employee started looking to work on these projects just sitting around for years, he said he would go to the container to get parts and was told there was no container, it was a lie he told customers and employees. he would roll parts under your truck when you visited that werent yours, when you asked about your wheels and tires and other items you paid for, they were in storage. when i visited employees always had the day off for good work. when i asked about other trucks sitting, i was told how they kept changing their builds. when i started asking questions of people that used the shop, they told me i should “stop changing my build”, in 3.5 years i added and paid for up front a single simple battery box change, thats it, no other changes were mine. he did change everything multiple times for me, a few to buy time. when i finally talked to all the other customers, they had similar stories of other vehicles making a lot of changes. I wish we could have found other customers, but wyatt didnt share info of others, i would have been easy to find here or on ig.

Well thats about it, i could go on and on for a lot longer, but everyone gets the gist of what we all found. My truck is a total loss. It would cost over 75k just to get it rolling (cut off his mistakes and start over with fresh parts purchase and actual labor pricing), i already paid 57k, handed him a low miles 2nd gen worth no less than 35k now. To finish off my build with swing out and camper and armor, i would have a 250k tacoma. Yeah its dead. total loss no more money spent. Insurance wont touch it. cops showed up on saturday to talk to us, they dont care. i have good friends and the truck has a home at the back of a shop that actually does work. it was close to meeting a wrecker and scrap yard. I would love to get some money from wyatt, but he doesnt have 300-600k that we can see to cover all the claims, he barely has a high miles gx and $15 in his wallet, we found him and checked. we know of one lawsuit he lost for 6 figures already, and one from a bank/cc company.

anyone out money from him, do what you need to do now, if you are lucky you can get a chargeback.

NO ONE SEND HIM ANYMORE MONEY, YOU WONT SEE IT AGAIN.

3.5 years of updates, in order.

TLDR; Wyatt underpriced his quote so you were happy to give him a stack of cash up front. he then chopped off the parts on your vehicle he could make money on, sit you on jack stands for years while never buying parts and lying to you about vendors and his health. when you finally get your destroyed project, it will cost you more than you paid wyatt originally to finish. yeah i learned that lesson the hard way. If you have 57k you want to give away, I recommend hookers and blow, sure you will still get lied too, but at least you can pay for eye contact while you are getting fucked...

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jAndyMendo · Mar 30, 2021

looks like you already moved away from the RST kit, so no warnings needed from me.

good luck with your build. hopefully 4wu can get the 2nd gen kit out. its multiple vendors covering it now, wish billy kept his files when he made all his 2nd gen parts.

ZRTX · Mar 30, 2021

jAndyMendo said: ↑

looks like you already moved away from the RST kit, so no warnings needed from me.

good luck with your build. hopefully 4wu can get the 2nd gen kit out. its multiple vendors covering it now, wish billy kept his files when he made all his 2nd gen parts.
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Yeah I hope 4wu comes out with a kit in the next year or two.

jAndyMendo · Mar 30, 2021

ZRTX[OP] said: ↑

Yeah I hope 4wu comes out with a kit in the next year or two.
Click to expand...

you can piece it. have seen a few similar lists of all the vendors you need to buy parts from. can start it in a few weeks.

Dayman Karate · Apr 15, 2023

81Trekker said: ↑

Stick with a 3 link/panhard setup so you can get a little bit more uptravel and use a steering box. A true 4 link will be a nightmare. As someone who does this for a living I would want nothing to do with trying to 4link the front of a Tacoma
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3 link vs 4 link

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jAndyMendo i eat samiches

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3 link vs 4 link

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#81 ZRTX [OP] Well-Known Member

#82 jAndyMendo i eat samiches

#83 ZRTX [OP] Well-Known Member

#84 jAndyMendo i eat samiches

#85 Dayman Karate Fighter of the night man, champion of the sun

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#81
ZRTX [OP] Well-Known Member

#82
jAndyMendo i eat samiches

#83
ZRTX [OP] Well-Known Member

#84
jAndyMendo i eat samiches

#85
Dayman Karate Fighter of the night man, champion of the sun

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