555 replies to this topic

[Zoobeef]

Is this a spot the difference because i cant find any

[Scotsdave]

I think those pictures proove that Thorney was just trying to destroy sales for the tullett's. There nothing alike. John are you trying to enforce a stealth ban on commercial posts by sabotaging them.

[Muncher]

A few better shots of the prototype so just tack welded together.

[Anarchy]

its a question of honour.

Go on then well see if you honour this offer and stick me name down.

1. rcvaughan
2. joe_589
3. Sticky
4. The Fat Man
5. chrisculpt
6. Windy Miller
7. Chris_uk
8. PiperRS
9. Cliffie
10.Rocky
11. Darrylb
12. crazyfrog
13. EdButler
14. Jameshs
15. XXX
16. Sicey
17. VXR 43
18. Flashash123
19. m4t7y
20. TIP
21. Drpau
22. cthomas443
23. Stefan_A
24. Davemate
25. 2-20
26. Robin
27. AndyJay
28. FreeStyleWave
29. FLD
30. R20BY_M
31 lightning024 ill have one too
32. gb170 yep me too
33. Chazuwe
34. SWORKS
35. Mandarinvx
36. Covert Ops.
37. Morgan9122 (mine's OE's developed a crack!!)
38. Ouchie
39. AMOSS
40. SteveM
41. Sutol
42. Pincher
43. ANARCHY

[AMOSS]

Hi, I think the contentious point here which has not yet been noted is the fact that Chris Tullet was a piece in the Jigsaw of Thorneys original manifold design. He would have a lot of hands-on experience in the problem areas associated with it. I think this is where the 'copying' lies. Thorney would have invested a lot of money developing it from scratch. It is always easier and simpler to modify a design rather than start with a blank sheet of paper after all. I would expect that Chris Tullet might have suggested improvements on Thorneys earlier design. Design changes are very expensive and not 'value adding' if the design will not improve the product significantly. I myself work in a design office where our products are 'copied' and modified, I know what goes on. The flanges will always be the same on them all regardless. The routing of the pipes etc would be the key to the performance and the angle of entry into and out of these parts. The welding will be one of the most cost cutting factors in the design as less welding will bring the labour hours down. Only a few people will know what the real truth is and all this bitching is pointless!.... Cheers Andy

[Winstar]

Hi,

I think the contentious point here which has not yet been noted is the fact that Chris Tullet was a piece in the Jigsaw of Thorneys original manifold design. He would have a lot of hands-on experience in the problem areas associated with it. I think this is where the 'copying' lies. Thorney would have invested a lot of money developing it from scratch.
It is always easier and simpler to modify a design rather than start with a blank sheet of paper after all.
I would expect that Chris Tullet might have suggested improvements on Thorneys earlier design. Design changes are
very expensive and not 'value adding' if the design will not improve the product significantly.
I myself work in a design office where our products are 'copied' and modified, I know what goes on. The flanges will always be the same on them all regardless. The routing of the pipes etc would be the key to the performance and the angle of entry into and out of these parts. The welding will be one of the most cost cutting factors in the design as less welding will bring the labour hours down. Only a few people will know what the real truth is and all this bitching is pointless!....

Cheers

Andy

Firstly the main factor that defines a mnifolds performance in length of the runners as this determines the pulse tuning effect across the rev range. The routing of pipes, junction angles are very much a secondary considerations. The only advantage chris would have is he would know the length of the runners of the TMS one, which TBH would take anyone about 2 minutes to figure out with some water and a jug by reverse engineering. The fact that the runners are a lot shorter means that the pulse tuning effect will occur higher up the rev range (or be of a lower order low down the rev range).

[Thorney]

No you didn't. The manifold was designed by primary designs while Chris was working there.

Correct, and Chris (whilst still working at Primary Designs rings me, says they're all crap and that he is approaching everyone to get them to come over to him. Seeing as I'd had a few issues on costs from Primary Designs and as we own the moulds we agreed to come along. In other words Chris has a history of poaching other peoples work and customers.

Chris leaves to set up his own company. You take the jig made by primary designs and get him to produce manifolds from it cheaper.

The jig is owned by us, we are free to take it where we want. But yes, I meet with Chris and his dad and we have several meetings about what we want and how we want to do it and it was expressly discussed that any work we did together would be exclusive for TMS, we even agreed that to create promotion for Tullet Exhausts (who were new) we would openly market them as being done by Tullet on the express basis that we had complete exclusivity - hence we openly told people where they came from (if we didn't have exclusivity then we simply would tell people who made them - simple business sense) This was expressly agreed with Chris and his dad at several meetings. For them (or you) to suggest otherwise is complete bolocks and potentially actionable.

Chris makes a few, says it's not ideal in a number of ways and suggests changing the design. You won't allow the design to be changed.

Again complete bollocks, we went through numerous design adjustments even one where they screwed up and it didn't fit because it was too close to the clam that required them to come over to MK to see it for themselves (Chris just didn't believe us). At each change of design we again expressly said that the designs were ours and Tullet agreed, this was completely agreed upon.

He carries on producing them for you as and when you want one.

No orders from you in over a year.

During this time we made numerous requests to see if the price could be brought down as at £1k each there was little interest. Seeing as we were making under £100 profit it was not about us triyng to make money on it just that the costs were simply too high for the item to sell. At each time Chris said he couldn't make them cheaper at all and that was the best he could do. We asked for any method possible to get the price down, to suggest that we didn't is a bare faced lie.

I turn up asking if he wants to develop a 3" system, I suggest he may want to do a 2.5" system with normal manifold position as quite a few people would be interested in one. So together with the 2.5" system he makes, he designs and makes his own 2.5" manifold which happens to be of equal length, absolutely nothing like yours which he didn't even design!

Well there's a shock, he designs and makes up some for us, via various design changes and we dont sell many due to high price (their price, not ours) and lo and behold when he thinks he can make some money for himslef all of a sudden he's got a new design which is much cheaper to make - that is complete an utter bollocks and you know it. What you're saying is that desite nearly 2 years of us asking for a cheaper system which he says is not possilbe he suddenly has an epipany and comes up with a new design which is half the price. Rather than accept that we had a mutually exclusive deal on the application he just decides to retail it out himself?

No matter how you look at it it is sharp practice and simply wrong, and you are just as wrong to present it in any other way. The more I read from what you say and what they say the more and more angry I get about how they have treated us (and a few others I'm now learning) at this rate I may just bite the bullet and issue proceedings such is the anger about this.

[siztenboots]

This is the Piper M044 , I think this retails around £350

[snoopstah]

Their just sooooooo alike its uncanny!

* but then I know sweet F A about manifold design, but I'd recon you'd have a very hard time trying to say one was a 'copy' of the other...

They both start and finish in the same place.

[Muncher]

Of course the designs were yours, it was your jig. You seem to think you had some formal agreement in place whereby Chris would not under any circumstances produce anything, for any VX. According to Chris that is not the case at all. What is exclusive, quite rightly is your jig, he's not going to produce anything for anyone off that as you own it. There are two sides to every story and I'm more inclined to believe what he has told me.

Edited by Muncher, 11 June 2009 - 11:30 AM.

[Scotsdave]

X million. I wandered how long it would take for you to mention your lawyer. You must have him on speed dial the amount of people you have issues with.

[RacerJo]

1. rcvaughan 2. joe_589 3. Sticky 4. The Fat Man 5. chrisculpt 6. Windy Miller 7. Chris_uk 8. PiperRS 9. Cliffie 10.Rocky 11. Darrylb 12. crazyfrog 13. EdButler 14. Jameshs 15. XXX 16. Sicey 17. VXR 43 18. Flashash123 19. m4t7y 20. TIP 21. Drpau 22. cthomas443 23. Stefan_A 24. Davemate 25. 2-20 26. Robin 27. AndyJay 28. FreeStyleWave 29. FLD 30. R20BY_M 31 lightning024 ill have one too 32. gb170 yep me too 33. Chazuwe 34. SWORKS 35. Mandarinvx 36. Covert Ops. 37. Morgan9122 (mine's OE's developed a crack!!) 38. Ouchie 39. AMOSS 40. SteveM 41. Sutol 42. Pincher 43. ANARCHY 44. RacerJo

[LazyDonkey]

1. rcvaughan 2. joe_589 3. Sticky 4. The Fat Man 5. chrisculpt 6. Windy Miller 7. Chris_uk 8. PiperRS 9. Cliffie 10.Rocky 11. Darrylb 12. crazyfrog 13. EdButler 14. Jameshs 15. XXX 16. Sicey 17. VXR 43 18. Flashash123 19. m4t7y 20. TIP 21. Drpau 22. cthomas443 23. Stefan_A 24. Davemate 25. 2-20 26. Robin 27. AndyJay 28. FreeStyleWave 29. FLD 30. R20BY_M 31 lightning024 ill have one too 32. gb170 yep me too 33. Chazuwe 34. SWORKS 35. Mandarinvx 36. Covert Ops. 37. Morgan9122 (mine's OE's developed a crack!!) 38. Ouchie 39. AMOSS 40. SteveM 41. Sutol 42. Pincher 43. ANARCHY 44. RacerJo 45. LazyDonkey

[Astranomical102]

1. rcvaughan 2. joe_589 3. Sticky 4. The Fat Man 5. chrisculpt 6. Windy Miller 7. Chris_uk 8. PiperRS 9. Cliffie 10.Rocky 11. Darrylb 12. crazyfrog 13. EdButler 14. Jameshs 15. XXX 16. Sicey 17. VXR 43 18. Flashash123 19. m4t7y 20. TIP 21. Drpau 22. cthomas443 23. Stefan_A 24. Davemate 25. 2-20 26. Robin 27. AndyJay 28. FreeStyleWave 29. FLD 30. R20BY_M 31 lightning024 ill have one too 32. gb170 yep me too 33. Chazuwe 34. SWORKS 35. Mandarinvx 36. Covert Ops. 37. Morgan9122 (mine's OE's developed a crack!!) 38. Ouchie 39. AMOSS 40. SteveM 41. Sutol 42. Pincher 43. ANARCHY 44. RacerJo 45. LazyDonkey 46. Astranomical102

[Sutol]

Can Chris Tullett come on here and defend his own corner rather than us getting his point of view third hand via Muncher.

[Muncher]

He won't because it's not very professional to have that kind of an argument on a forum, he's quite happy, people can write what they want but it's not something he's going to concern himself with. Besides, the best use of his time is making exhausts. I'm sure people can make up their own minds.

[AMOSS]

Hi,

I think the contentious point here which has not yet been noted is the fact that Chris Tullet was a piece in the Jigsaw of Thorneys original manifold design. He would have a lot of hands-on experience in the problem areas associated with it. I think this is where the 'copying' lies. Thorney would have invested a lot of money developing it from scratch.
It is always easier and simpler to modify a design rather than start with a blank sheet of paper after all.
I would expect that Chris Tullet might have suggested improvements on Thorneys earlier design. Design changes are
very expensive and not 'value adding' if the design will not improve the product significantly.
I myself work in a design office where our products are 'copied' and modified, I know what goes on. The flanges will always be the same on them all regardless. The routing of the pipes etc would be the key to the performance and the angle of entry into and out of these parts. The welding will be one of the most cost cutting factors in the design as less welding will bring the labour hours down. Only a few people will know what the real truth is and all this bitching is pointless!....

Cheers

Andy

Firstly the main factor that defines a mnifolds performance in length of the runners as this determines the pulse tuning effect across the rev range. The routing of pipes, junction angles are very much a secondary considerations. The only advantage chris would have is he would know the length of the runners of the TMS one, which TBH would take anyone about 2 minutes to figure out with some water and a jug by reverse engineering. The fact that the runners are a lot shorter means that the pulse tuning effect will occur higher up the rev range (or be of a lower order low down the rev range).

Agreed!.. but it will also depend on what other modifications you have installed on the engine which can cause adverse effects. The aim is to get the lowest KPA reading possible.

[Sutol]

As a potential purchaser the one thing that worries me is if corners are going to be cut in order to converge with the £200 price tag. Reassurance on this would be helpful.

[Mike (Cliffie)]

This is getting tiring and I for one have had enough of this argument. It is an issue between Thorney and the Tullets and that is how it should stay. Why don't we all back off defending people; move this list to a seperate thread in group buy, then Thorney can deal with satisfying orders and Muncher can carry on promoting Tullets. It really doesn't matter who owns what to anybody but the lawyers. If John wants to undercut Tullet then good luck to him, it is a free market after all and the winners are us punters. Loss leaders are not a new thing to any of us and if John loses #200 per manifold that is his business...maybe, just maybe he will get to fit and make that money back in labour charges and maybe, some customers out of the 50 will have an exhaust fitted and maybe a remap. I remember when cans of beans were 2p and there was a price war on between all the supermarkets. A classic case of loss leaders as it got people going to a supermarket that was not their regular to buy cheap beans and whilst they were there, did the weekly shop. Sound business sense to me. Can we now close this thread in case there is a legal case?

[Sticky]

This is getting tiring and I for one have had enough of this argument.

It is an issue between Thorney and the Tullets and that is how it should stay. Why don't we all back off defending people; move this list to a seperate thread in group buy, then Thorney can deal with satisfying orders and Muncher can carry on promoting Tullets.

It really doesn't matter who owns what to anybody but the lawyers. If John wants to undercut Tullet then good luck to him, it is a free market after all and the winners are us punters.

Loss leaders are not a new thing to any of us and if John loses #200 per manifold that is his business...maybe, just maybe he will get to fit and make that money back in labour charges and maybe, some customers out of the 50 will have an exhaust fitted and maybe a remap.

I remember when cans of beans were 2p and there was a price war on between all the supermarkets. A classic case of loss leaders as it got people going to a supermarket that was not their regular to buy cheap beans and whilst they were there, did the weekly shop. Sound business sense to me.

Can we now close this thread in case there is a legal case?