KC Turbo Imitators

KCTurbos

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Copy Cats strike again!!! There will be innovators, and then there will be people that wait for innovation and do their best to imitate.

We have been inundated with messages and emails about these "gt40 covers" showing up on ebay (along with lots of our other products). We wanted to put out a post to save the industry some time.
NO they are not a dealer of ours. These products are imitations with unknown quality, specs, clearances, and wheels. It is a sad truth but a lot of companies, especially turbo companies, know NOTHING about turbo performance. They sit back and let others do the r&d to come out with great products and then they just buy something they know works and get it copied... they often don't know the exact specs that need to followed, but as long as it looks close they have done their job right and can sell cheap crap to whomever thinks it looks good from a picture.

It is sad/funny that we have seen a few videos of guys talking about how they came up with the idea... ya you saw KC Turbos success and decided instead of coming out with something to compete or even better the market, you would just dilute the market with a similar cheap knock off.

Many people might not know this, but KC Turbos is a very small family owned business with big ideas. These imitators really hurt our business and make it hard for us to justify spending time/money innovating when others just come along and take the market share by offering a cheaper imitation. Many of these imitators were once dealers of ours... usually just long enough to buy a few products at a discount and send them off to be copied.

Support those who support you and don't take chances with imitators.


PS6L8op.jpg
 

Kyle308

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That's some bull... but that part of being a successful amazing business. Just as I was reading this post my stage 2 polished cover turbo showed up from you guys at kc and holy **** is it a thing of beauty! Fast shipping too! You guys keep doing what you are doing! Thanks for the great products!
 

KCTurbos

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smeding copy it yet ?

Not yet... but I am sure they will soon. Sad that I can't stop them but I am working with my lawyer.

Sad that some of these guys literally used to be dealers of mine... just long enough to buy at a discount and get them copied. One of them literally called one of my suppliers while I was there picking up parts and said "I want to copy KC Turbos exactly, can you help with that?". Now they are our biggest competitor on facebook.

I know the 6.0 and 7.3 markets are small... but we have dedicated a lot of time/money/effort to try and make our drop in turbos the best they can be.
 

KCTurbos

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That's some bull... but that part of being a successful amazing business. Just as I was reading this post my stage 2 polished cover turbo showed up from you guys at kc and holy **** is it a thing of beauty! Fast shipping too! You guys keep doing what you are doing! Thanks for the great products!

Thanks for the support! Glad you like it!
 

Jennifer@Dieselsite

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I'm so sorry about this - I'm glad you're posting publicly too because even though it's probably a dealer that copied you, there's no shortage of customers willing to buy the cheaper and even encourage the copy.

We know customers do it for our products and it absolutely takes all of my control to hold back on my temper when a customer suggests I do it to someone else. It's disgusting to hear and then I have to read the hypocrisy when I come to the forums or social media and there they are saying they love "company X and their products" and they'd never buy anywhere else. JERK - YOU JUST TOLD ME TO COPY THEIR PRODUCT ON THE PHONE AND YOU SAID IT WITH A @%$ING GIGGLE!

Seriously though. I'll keep my integrity and just recommend you purchase the product directly through the original manufacturer. It's so gross.

It's funny too that of all the shops, its you posting...

It's crazy how many calls I take with people for the ball-bearing turbos who want to just assume you copied ours or just come right out and ask if we copied yours. Good lord, they don't even look the same (srsly dem covers tho!) and yours came out quite a bit before ours released I think.

I highly doubt you've seen one of ours (OMG HAVE YOU?) and we've never seen one of yours and I guess the idea that two companies just happen to be working on the same idea in different ways is way too unbelievable for people. Frankly, I love that there are some companies still trying to be creative - seriously, the website is censoring me when I say inn0vative - with new products and ideas. River City releasing a high volume cast iron pump around the same time we were? AWESOME, I'll recommend it until ours is done! (Sorry to throw you in here RCD, just an example! No beef!)

I remember when Corey told me about the TP38 BB when you were in BETA - ours was still in Alpha testing in our own fleet - and my instant thought of "Holy ****, I hope no one thinks we copied that" because we hadn't publicly announced anything yet, just dropped the original journal bearing builds with a lengthy out of stock message. O_O

Glad you made the post because it's something every shop and customer needs to think about before purchasing yet I doubt it's given a second thought most of the time.

(sorry for typos or ****ty grammar, I was typing fast and angry)
 

KCTurbos

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I'm so sorry about this - I'm glad you're posting publicly too because even though it's probably a dealer that copied you, there's no shortage of customers willing to buy the cheaper and even encourage the copy.

We know customers do it for our products and it absolutely takes all of my control to hold back on my temper when a customer suggests I do it to someone else. It's disgusting to hear and then I have to read the hypocrisy when I come to the forums or social media and there they are saying they love "company X and their products" and they'd never buy anywhere else. JERK - YOU JUST TOLD ME TO COPY THEIR PRODUCT ON THE PHONE AND YOU SAID IT WITH A @%$ING GIGGLE!

Seriously though. I'll keep my integrity and just recommend you purchase the product directly through the original manufacturer. It's so gross.

It's funny too that of all the shops, its you posting...

It's crazy how many calls I take with people for the ball-bearing turbos who want to just assume you copied ours or just come right out and ask if we copied yours. Good lord, they don't even look the same (srsly dem covers tho!) and yours came out quite a bit before ours released I think.

I highly doubt you've seen one of ours (OMG HAVE YOU?) and we've never seen one of yours and I guess the idea that two companies just happen to be working on the same idea in different ways is way too unbelievable for people. Frankly, I love that there are some companies still trying to be creative - seriously, the website is censoring me when I say inn0vative - with new products and ideas. River City releasing a high volume cast iron pump around the same time we were? AWESOME, I'll recommend it until ours is done! (Sorry to throw you in here RCD, just an example! No beef!)

I remember when Corey told me about the TP38 BB when you were in BETA - ours was still in Alpha testing in our own fleet - and my instant thought of "Holy ****, I hope no one thinks we copied that" because we hadn't publicly announced anything yet, just dropped the original journal bearing builds with a lengthy out of stock message. O_O

Glad you made the post because it's something every shop and customer needs to think about before purchasing yet I doubt it's given a second thought most of the time.

(sorry for typos or ****ty grammar, I was typing fast and angry)


Thanks for the great post... it is sad, but it makes me feel better to hear from a shop like you that struggles with the same thing. NOT THAT I WANT YOU TO STRUGGLE... but I don't feel so alone.

I am ALL FOR innovation and competition. That is what makes the industry better. As business owners... if we are always competing to put out the best products then that is better for EVERYONE. The worst thing that can happen is the products get better and customers reap the rewards. SADLY a lot of business models are simply to try and make the same thing for cheaper (which is easy when you don't do any R&D and don't care about the quality). When that happens it HURTS the industry because it STOPS all innovation, all that does is cheapen the market and people end up cutting corners and making the products WORSE to try and gain market share. Then that leads innovators to stop innovating... because why bother investing your time/money into a great product that will be quickly imitated and sold for cheaper.


I have never seen one of your new turbos in person and know very little about them, except what I have read on the internet... but I have also had the same "questions" about who is copying who. I sometimes laugh, because of the little I do know... they don't share hardly any specs at all. Kudos on your innovation and I hope the turbos work great for you!
 

white59rt

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I am going thru this in my business with chinese copy cats, its about to put me under. And IMO the only way to eradicate this is to name drop, if people dont know who the below average people are its hard to get them to stop doing business with them. Just sayin.

Good luck to you man and sorry it has come to this for you. I have been fighting the fight for half a decade now.

Todd
 

powerlifter405

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Not yet... but I am sure they will soon. Sad that I can't stop them but I am working with my lawyer.

Sad that some of these guys literally used to be dealers of mine... just long enough to buy at a discount and get them copied. One of them literally called one of my suppliers while I was there picking up parts and said "I want to copy KC Turbos exactly, can you help with that?". Now they are our biggest competitor on facebook.

I know the 6.0 and 7.3 markets are small... but we have dedicated a lot of time/money/effort to try and make our drop in turbos the best they can be.

I admit I can be one of those cheap a$$ customers but even I have my limits. There is a time and a place and in the end CS is such a driving factor.

Before getting my turbo I shopped around and one of the qualities I looked for was how customers of product X were treated in follow up service. Time and time again, Charlie popped up as someone bound on making QC and CS his top priority. I saw nothing I conceived as bashing or angry posting against other vendors or customers who didn't agree with KC philosophies or product. You did not get caught up in someone else's drama. Charlie focused on his products and his customers.

I did have a few hiccups in the beginning and I even reached out to a buddy who owns a shop up north as I was scratching my head at the issues, and he assured me that Charlie would make it right and Charlie did (without hesitation I may add).

After the nothing short of awesome and exemplary follow up service I have zero regrets about going KC and I am happy to highly suggest KC as a product vendor.

It sucks to see this happen but we live in a day and age where everyone wants something cheap and easy. There is no longterm investment, instant gratification; cell phones, TV's etc. something breaks no big deal go find a new one on sale.
I'd rather do it once, do it right and forget about it.
 

quick_draw

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I admit I can be one of those cheap a$$ customers but even I have my limits. There is a time and a place and in the end CS is such a driving factor.



Before getting my turbo I shopped around and one of the qualities I looked for was how customers of product X were treated in follow up service. Time and time again, Charlie popped up as someone bound on making QC and CS his top priority. I saw nothing I conceived as bashing or angry posting against other vendors or customers who didn't agree with KC philosophies or product. You did not get caught up in someone else's drama. Charlie focused on his products and his customers.



I did have a few hiccups in the beginning and I even reached out to a buddy who owns a shop up north as I was scratching my head at the issues, and he assured me that Charlie would make it right and Charlie did (without hesitation I may add).



After the nothing short of awesome and exemplary follow up service I have zero regrets about going KC and I am happy to highly suggest KC as a product vendor.



It sucks to see this happen but we live in a day and age where everyone wants something cheap and easy. There is no longterm investment, instant gratification; cell phones, TV's etc. something breaks no big deal go find a new one on sale.

I'd rather do it once, do it right and forget about it.



Ditto for me . They have been great to work with.
And got a lot more performance than I expected.
Once and done for me,
Kc turbos for me always.


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jrex2506

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everyone wants to make a fast buck but not many people put in the hard work. its good to see people like KC and other companies still have faith in making the 6.0 a better truck. I was going to purchase a kit from a company named above but due to the comments about them I think ill stick with kc.
 

DieselDC

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I bought your st2 snail for my 7.3 all b/c it looked bad ass - o yeah did I say bad ass??? When j received it in person - the OMG factor hit me - Corey done sold me a piece of art haha.

There were other competitors but none did so much machining work like yours - plus yours has proven itself.

I tried to buy tunes from irate - they said they can't do it b/c they don't know what a Kc turbo is lol. Back to Corey to sell me a php tuner and some tunes lol.

You guys rock - don't you forget that!


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powerlifter405

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Ditto for me . They have been great to work with.
And got a lot more performance than I expected.
Once and done for me,
Kc turbos for me always.

Exactly!

When I had my issues it always was on a weekend, as thats the only time the truck normally gets driven and he answered his phone right away and continued w/ texts when necessary. He went above and beyond and I sincerely appreciated it.
 

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