That big throttle body adapter is LEGIT....I'm probably going to have to have one of those if I don't give in and go pro-jay. Good work man, you're definitely doing things for the scene that wouldn't be here otherwise. The Elite Rotary copycats likely also thank you for your service

but for real! good stuff.

Skeese

I am about a week out from finalizing that cluster, pretty stoked to get it out there as a few people have ordered one

I have some ideas for the FC market, just got to knock all this big FD stuff out of the way so i can focus on that
good point. i dont have the oem lines. i got a new under hood light and will check the clearances
I have been considering something like this for some time. i possibly have a dash coming with the airbag, which will defintly help with R&D
good ideas! all things i may have to look at down the road

Hey Ken, sorry i haven't been updating here, sometimes i imagine everyone who buys my stuff only follows my IG. The meterhoods are done and shipping this week. I have yours ready to go, and your tracking ready. I just finished the plastic replacment clips which will replace the defective notorious oem ones! thansk for your patience

actually out of Maine, i appreciate that. I would say so far so goodm just got to work on spreading out these huge influxes of orders!

Thanks brother, I will likely only have a few made. so hoping that people that need them or are truly interested in a killer clean setup grab one

Pretty big update on the meterhoods, i appreciate everyones patience! starting shipping this week. each one will include updated plastic retainers, that dont stick and wont rust like the oem ones. I really like that I can offer this. lot of crazy developments. including the AIM MXP dash setup. lot of things in the works. huge thanks to my supporters who are patient waiting 2 1/2 weeks for some of these things to ship!


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Nice. What about a gauge hood with the integrated gauge pods on the top. These used to exist but were very Mickey Mouse ear looking. With your designs you could really make it look good.

when im done on these larger products and orders I will defintely do some cool stuff like that

Some new stuff! super busy and working my butt off to keep the machines on 24/7. Some people may not realize, but the cluster takes nearly 3 days depending on complexity, which doesnt account for failures either lol the meterhood takes about a day and a half. overall shipping speeds will pick up when things slow down!
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I know you're super busy but any update on the cluster hoods? My order has been in pre-shipment since 2/24. I'm not too savvy on Instagram and couldn't really find any updates. Thanks.

I think you gave me the wrong tracking#. It shows as delivered to Belmont, MS. I am in Hawaii. Can you please check on this?

these issues are best addressed through email but I have made a few announcements regarding tracking so I guess I will here as well.

I am working my ass off, 20+ hour days for the last month straight.

Shut it down the website to catch up on the 60+ orders that were placed over the course of a few days. Totally didn’t prepare or expect that.

I sent out tracking for the first half of the orders and the tracking tracking slips expired since Usps updated their prices, they decided to recycle the numbers and still charge me. Shipping prices for almost everything has tripled so that’s great...

regardless, I only have maybe 20 order left to fulfil, most are the 93 finish which takes about twice the prep and finish labor.

prices have gone up, on some things double, I have lost or broke even on most of the orders placed.

I will reissue everyone a new tracking number, a lot of peoples. Stuff shipped this week I just haven’t had time to provide new tracking.

i just bought a home and larger shop, we closed yesterday. I’m prepping the house so we can move over. The next few days I’m taking a break from school and orders to speed up our transition.


ive decided that I can’t keep doing 20+ hour days just to keep people happy, so at this point I would much rather give refunds than respond to people who need daily updates on their orders.

seems nobody reads my terms and conditions, who knew

so if you are impatient and can’t wait, please let me know and I will refund you for your order unless it has shipped already.

sorry to everyone about the tracking issues, extended manufacturing times and issues.

Im going to extend my down time probably another month beyond the two, really sorry but I’m getting burned out because I made my parts too available and attracted the wrong kind of customers. which hs made my 20 hour days feel like a slap in the face getting some of these ridiculous and petty emails lmao

thats being said the majority of people are awesome and have messaged me with totally legitimate issues or questions.

i appreciate the patience from everyone as I transition and get caught up. Again, if I can’t get to your order when you’d like I can refund you! I wish I could offer a discount but I’m already breaking even on a lot of this stuff or 8+ hours into each larger part.

cheers
Shane Drake
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Yikes.

Good idea to pause and get everything in order. You have awesome products, getting the business side squared away will be good long term and you won't lose customers.

thanks brother,
i have had plenty of opportunities to turn this into some outsourced operation for cash or customers (quantity).

at the end of the day this is my hobby turned into something I enjoy. To me the most important thing is making sure I continue to enjoy this, never been about money or selling something to everyone. I’d rather get my stuff who appreciate the pieces and time it takes to hand finish them or design them. If people get turned away because I bought a house or had a better month than I could have ever imagined... well those aren’t the people I want buying my shit lmao

cheers

I feel your pain, man. Do you have any framework setup for folks that aren't on a truncated timeline/are still designing bits but would like to retain your services? Just shoot you a mail?

Second this - my FD is a long-term project and I'm working on it on-and-off. I wouldn't be in a rush ordering from you, even if there is a several month lead time

I wasn't meaning to call you out or anything. The email I received from you was a no reply address. In any event that sucks on the shipping and I'm happy to pay the difference. It's good to take a break. We can't have you burn out!

Sounds like you've got your hands full! I'm going to wait patiently until you are accepting new orders for a gauge hood. It definitely looks worth the wait.

I know the stress of moving, it seems like your never fully unpacked even after being the a year.

Keep up the good work! In the words of Galaxy Quest, "Never give up, never surrender! "

Vince

Just stumbled across this thread. Understand completely your need for a break being a one-man show and getting bombarded with orders. You definitely seem to have the know-how and ability to fill a niche and need for interior plastics with quality stuff. If you decide to produce any of the (lhd) map pockets (not the lid), count me in. I imagine there is some demand for these.

Hey shane, super bummed to hear about your run of bad luck. Obviously you're not taking orders right now, but was curious if you had some stuff completed it would be nice to know what you had laying around as I'm interested in buying some stuff and I'm sure you would like the extra money!

Hope everything turns around for you man.

Not sure if you guys follow Draklore on social media - but that house you see up there that he and his family just bought? Yeah. It burned down.

I can't imagine the amount of stress this is putting on him and needless to say it's going to delay part production.

There's a GoFundMe setup if you want to donate. The pictures are pretty gut wrenching:
https://www.gofundme.com/drakes-homeshop-fire


I don't want to say too much more as I already feel like it's not my place - but I figured I'd help spread the word since I know Shane has 1000 things on his mind.

For anyone who's first reaction is "but what about my stuff" please keep it off the thread. The best course of action is e-mail - although I understand all orders not yet complete were being refunded. :icon_tup:

His gofundme is no longer accepting donations fyi

Hey guys, Yeah as Matt said we lost the home shortly after moving in. We are safe and physically ok. Luckily it was the one night we decided to spend in out apartment that had a lease till the end of the month since we had painted all day and wanted to escape the paint odor.
We had insurance and eventually we will have a home again and hopefully I will have a shop.
I am mentally beaten down, I only had to offer about 6 refunds, and personally messaged everyone else who i had 90/100% parts to ship. it will be a couple weeks before everything is sorted, I havent gotten a full nights rest in over a month and now I have more stress than ever.
Aside from that im just going to take a break. Financially one way or another we will make this work, since business was good i had a good bit saved up, but we lost about 10k of what i had saved and spent on equipment and upgrades for the house in the fire. lost only a small portion of
our possessions in the fire since we had a couple weeks on the lease, we were moving stuff slowly. I guess that's lucky, I was about a day from moving the FD and the printers and the computer over, which would probably have closed my doors for good.

right now, we are extremely thankful for the donations. people wanted to help clearly and despite my hesitation, we ultimately need that money right now which we are eternally grateful for. We have already replaced some amenities we lost and it has helped more than i can say here.
I turned off the donations because I hated how the site was so pushy and just some greed machine. Any money we don't ultimately use I will see about forwarding to another worthy cause if we don't get bled dry by our landlord or others.
We had USAA, and they have been extremely helpful, it looks like we will rebuild, and hopefully we can get another post and beam cape within the year. We won't have enough to build a shop, and will have to move money around and Ill likely build a separate building funds permitting.
We won't really know until we talk to a builder, but building costs have skyrocketed and a 2000sq/ft post and beam is 250/300$ a sq/ft and we don't quite have that.
I can't talk in great depth regarding the cause of the fire as there is an ongoing investigation. We were cleared and just thankful it wasn't worse or later than it was, when were were sleeping or fully moved in. I wouldn't wish this on anyone, as a man it shakes me to the core wondering
what I would do had my wife or daughter been in the home, or gotten hurt. Or if my wife, daughter or the people that rely on me didn't have me around. Ultimately we may never know the true cause but given things we have discovered and found out since the fire, this may be a blessing in disguise.

We are facing new hurdles now trying to remain in our duplex, and extend our lease. my landlord is trying to capitalize on our misfortune and I am stressed to the max. I am moving all of my shop equipment to another location, and will prioritize getting the shop built on the property as we wait for an available contractor.
My wife lost her cat, a rescue i nearly tripped over when i was rushing out the door one early morning to make the plane for a deployment or TDY in japan, we are remaining optimistic that it got out and is surviving in the Maine woods...
I lost my wedding band but after sifting for some time we were able to find it, and I have talked to a jeweler who said she can reform and solder it into one piece again.

I can't explain what its like to sift through the ashes of your home hoping to find some semblance of something you once cherished, we have gone back to the property almost everyday looking for th cat or to just sit in shock or sift through the shit that is left.

While the contributions of the community, family and friends has been great. There have been several people already trying to capitalize from this, or donate their way into free parts. Ultimately for every couple positive messages, there has been someone in my inbox that just angers or infuriates me...
I'm probably going to settle up with the people i owe and walk away less i become homicidal.

I have no clue how this will work out, but likely there will be a lot of sacrifices, a lot of setbacks. I wont make it to SEMA like was planned, I wont be producing or working on new parts or new designs, I had to break many promises and now owe many people for their patience or kindness.
I will likely need to devote a large portion of my time to getting the new home and shop set up. We lost our dream home and shop after getting a small taste of it, now we will never sleep easy, constantly living in fear. What a fucked week, what a fucked feeling.

I lost so much headwind and I will likely lose what will have been the biggest year for DRAKES.
Already I am understanding that there are people who will despise or talk shit if we end up on the other side of this any better off than we were, and that just pisses me off. A lot is pissing me of, and 99% of it revolves around people who base their lives off of the pursuit of money or goods.
This is precisely why I was against the go fund thing, because ultimately I will be alright, I could sell a lot of stuff if i was in a pinch and people have tragedies every day who don't have a following, so as helpful as it has been, I could have avoided the people who are looking down on me for getting 4k we badly need.
I am thankful, but people are already making me regret it, by messaging me about getting a free part or shit down the road because they gave 20$. Or acting like since we got 4k, that shit is just perfect in the world and suddenly I should be jumping up and down for joy and devote my life to the homeless or feel shame.
I mean I will pay back anyone who donated in some way or another, but it hasn't been a fucking week. Everyone messaging me wants to know how much the insurance is going to give us, will we end up making out in some way, will i just give them the file since i'm not making anything right now, did the parts survive the fire,
can they have what is on my shelves if anything. So many money minded people it makes me fucking sick, I love capitalism, it is the only reason I am where I am, but if your first thought when you hear someone has insurance is how you can capitalize from that or transposing yourself into that situation wondering how you can benefit or would... you're a giant piece of shit.
I cannot explain that feeling of not only having lost the house and shop, crying together for hours pleading for it to be a cruel joke. Then thinking that we would have to sell everything, declare bankruptcy figuring that the insurance somehow hadn't kicked in yet.. For anyone to suggest that we went through this for money, makes me fucking sick.

Right now i'm just dealing with sorting our current living situation, making sure my family is safe and fed. I could really give a fuck about a lot of things and a lot of peoples shit to be honest. I love and appreciate everyone, who messaged me with kindness and love and showed me that i have true friends out there all over the world.
if somehow we come out on top and can pay it forward, we will. until then, if that's your focus from this situation, fuck off. Man I fucking hate money minded people. If you never hear from me again its because i took a crowbar to some assholes face who probably deserved it.



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*unsolicited advise warning*
You are only really obligated to validate the concerns and opinions of three people - your wife, your daughter, and yourself. Everyone else is choice.

It's smart of you to recognize that you've been able to benefit from your following. That's good awareness. And it's not weak or opportunistic for you to leverage that network in your time of legitimate need; asking for help is brave and too few of us even have people to ask. Everyone contributing to lessen your hardship is a consenting adult and anyone giving you grief or attempting barter false sympathy for material gain either lacks the maturity to understand the difference between a donation and a transaction or is a predator looking to extort your vulnerability. Neither are worth acknowledging, let alone validating.

As for those that have graciously supported you - focus your energy on yourself, your family and moving forward because seeing you avoid misfortune and reclaim what you have lost is the only reward they hope to see.

Good luck

Damn man, that's terrible news. I'm glad you are both ok and I hope you guys get back to normalcy soon.

If there's anything you need, don't hesitate to ask here. Our community tends to rally around our members in these situations. You're doing the right thing keeping everyone in the loop and taking care of the orders you can and refunding the ones you can't. I wouldn't worry about anyone complaining, you got more important things to deal with.

It's a shame some people are trying to take advantage of the situation, but assholes exists in all groups. I hope when you are able to rebuild, you can continue providing your products, they fill a hole that others have failed to fill. I say this selfishly, as I need a few things for my car and will be first in line when your site reopens for business. I hope that doesn't offend, I was just really looking forward to getting some of your stuff.

It takes a lot of courage for you to be so open about the entire situation, and I can't imagine what you are going thru right now let alone try to put it all down in a post.

Keep your head up and don't let others pull you down.

Vince

Just reiterating that you've done some awesome work and I'd love to collaborate even if its just on personal bits in the future if you're able and so inclined. Also, everyone that expected something in return for their GoFundMe donations can go jump off a bridge after choking on a bowl of dicks.

Take care of yourself and the family first. Just a little set back in the big picture, 2020 will be the year you hoped 2019 would be be.

Jack