Alright, grab a tall drink, this one's gonna be lengthy....
Those of you who have been on this board for a considerable time might remember John's first public project offering. Late in 2002-early 2003, he made an offer to the Moparts members; He was developing a car rotisserie. For a limited time those who bought in advance would receive the "group buy" rate and save considerably over the eventual released price. In this way, John would be able to get financing for the project and the members would benefit from the discount. Everybody wins.
I was one of the buyers. I wasn't a member of the Moparts board at the time, but in January 2003, contacted John when I read the thread. Even though I was late, he let me in on the buy. THAT project ended up taking a lot longer than John had planned (I still have the back and forth updates and emails).
At the Mopar Nationals that year I spoke with him as I still hadn't gotten my rotisserie while others had. He apologized for the wait and offered the display rotisserie after it's use at the show. I accepted. John will definitely remember this...we had to break down the rotisserie and stuff it into a Stratus for the ride home! There were pics of this on his website for awhile.
At that time we spoke quite a bit about projects he had in the works or was considering....he was quite excited about the advantages that CNC, laser and other technologies afforded him. He spoke of the driveshaft loops and some Charger parts he was looking into, never mentioning TWO different companies, BTW.
Forward to 2005 Mopar Nationals. John is there with his U.S. Car Tool booth. The booth features his rotisserie display with first generation Charger on it, the driveshaft loop (I believe) and a prototype of the Charger decklid piece on display. Once again, all under one business as displayed at the Nats. If I can find them, I have pictures of that booth.
Johns pitch to me - and obviously those on the '66/'67 Charger board - was very similar to his first proposition. Once he received $275.00 from 50 buyers he would manufacture the decklid medallion. NEVER ONCE WAS THIS APPROACHED AS AN INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITY. This was an advance payment on an item purchased. The advance buyers would receive the discount for helping to finance the project and John would receive the benefit of being the only game in town to sell the piece. Sound familiar?
As I had dealt with John before, I knew that there may be a chance that this would take awhile, but I felt things would come through eventually. Since the price seemed more than fair, I went for it. I then waited, and waited, and waited.
I convinced myself that this project must have been very difficult to do (after all, at that time nobody else had it) and waited some more.
Finally years went by and emails weren't answered nor phone calls. This brings us to a simple fact: my money has been stolen by a man that I trusted.
BTW...Amongst my old correspondence with John, I have an April 15, 2003 email update that is signed John Pasemann, www.USCarTool.com, 974-219-6142. The decklid piece was sold in 2005 in a booth with the same name. If he is claiming a whole other company, where was it?
I'm sorry for the length of this and hope it's not too confusing!
