Yeah back in the day the only real feedback you get about parts suppliers and shops was if you weren't the guinea pig and one of your friends dipped their toes in first...
There was more than one occasion where I did business with a company that was given mad props by some of the magazines or article writers, and those companies turned out
to be complete pieces of you know what. That was pretty dirtballish back then, the mags would write glowing articles, get free parts for their projects but never talk about the junk that actually
didn't work. I think that's why some of those 6-10 issue long builds would suddenly disappear from the magazines never to be seen again.
There were a few mags I just quit buying because I knew they were bs'ing.