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ZF repair backlog; and a solution

G Guest
I've been reading through the posts and it seems Lloyd Butfoy is buried with work. Customers can't be happy waiting 3 to 6 months to get their transmission back. Lloyd can't be happy having the stress of ZF's piling up on him and never being able to catch up. When you're so busy that you don't even answer the phone when your customers are calling you, you know you're too busy. I'm sure Lloyd is a great guy. I'm not pointing fingers here. I'm trying to start a forum here to solve the problem. Believe me this is no small matter about these ZF's being so backlogged. I've already read that one Pantera owner has had enough and intends to sell his car because of the headaches associated with repairing a ZF. How many others feel the same way but don't post here? I am looking to buy my first Pantera and I am becoming a bit reticent after finding out if I blow up my ZF in my future Pantera, I am up a creek for months. You guys want Pantera's to go up in price? How many prospective Pantera owners are looking elsewhere because of bottlenecking on repairing the ZF? Why do you think a '68 Shelby goes for 200k while a Pantera sells for 40k? I think a lot has to do with Shelby's being easy to repair with parts readily available anywhere. If we can get the bottlenecking of the ZF repairs under control it can only help make the Pantera a more attractive car to buy, which will increase prices. Again, I want to make it clear I am not pointing fingers at Lloyd Butfoy. He is doing the best he can. But sometimes we could all use some help solving problems. I am here to spearhead conversation to solve the problem. So... I have an idea. I've read that repairing and rebuilding a ZF is no more complicated than rebuilding any other transmission. So that must mean the only reason other transmission repair shops don't fix the ZF is because they can't get the parts. And apparently that is because Lloyd Butfoy bought the rights to all factory ZF parts and thus he has an exclusive. That was a very smart move by the Butfoy family and it puts Lloyd in a very good situation, but right now it's not being utilized to its full potential. I have an idea where Lloyd won't have to work as hard but he'll be making much more money. It's called a licensing agreement. Let me explain. For example, I live in the Los Angeles area. There is a successful and well run transmission repair shop here in L.A. with a very good reputation called Leon's transmissions. They are a fairly big operation with many stalls and technicians, and I am sure they would like to pick up more work. I am using Leon's Transmissions as an example only. Of course Lloyd would have the final say which transmission shop he provides the licensing agreement to. Anyway, Lloyd could provide a licensing agreement to Leon's Transmission's for example, which in essence would be a Lloyd Butfoy authorized ZF repair shop. Lloyd would make a small commission on each ZF rebuilt by Leon's transmission, which means Lloyd would be making money on jobs he isn't even working on. There is no reason Lloyd should object to this, because it is a win/win for everyone. Lloyd will be making even more money than before with the licensing agreement. And customers will have a faster return time because now more players are out there repairing the ZF. One possible rebuttal to my idea is the fact that Leon's transmission's may not know how to repair a ZF. That is not a problem at all actually. I am sure Leon's would be happy to send their top technician over to RBT's shop free of charge to watch Lloyd do his repairs. Soon the technician could repair the ZF while Lloyd watches to make sure it is being done right. When Lloyd is satisfied that the technician is competent, Lloyd signs off on a form that states that this technician is authorized to work on ZF's. Since Lloyd himself said repairing the ZF is no harder than any other transmission, the ramp up time for an experienced transmission technician to learn from Lloyd would be minimal. Lloyd would be completely protected because whichever repair shop Lloyd chooses to provide a licensing agreement to would have to buy their parts through Lloyd. If this experiment worked out then Lloyd could repeat the formula and hand pick another transmission place and provide them with a licensing agreement too. Heck, Lloyd could retire if he wanted to and just collect all the money from his licensing agreements. Lloyd would be a Horatio Alger story come true. The ZF repair bottleneck would be solved. Any good business man knows that you never ever want to have your service bottlenecked, because it means lost revenue. The licensing agreement would eliminate the bottleneck on the ZF's and Lloyd would probably become rich and all of us Pantera owners would never have to worry about being without a ZF for 3-6 months ever again. Next, how do we get this idea transformed from theory to reality? Well, we need someone in the Pantera community who is preferably already friends with Lloyd to present this to him to see if it is something that he finds appealing. And assuming Lloyd was interested, naturally he would want to use a lawyer who he could trust to handle the contract and paperwork. If Lloyd knew a personal lawyer friend who also was intimately familiar with Panteras that had the where-with-all to put this together, that would be optimum. There are probably several good candidates amongst us. But I can think of one right off. Dave Adler, are you listening?

David in Tujunga
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K korina (Guest)
The bottleneck has bypassed. If you go to gt40s.com you can see that there are some newer designs that the GT 40 guys have come up with. They should be available soon and priced like a ZF. The guys I know who are familiar wih transmissions say he the ZF is almost agricultural. It is a 40 year old design. We really aren't held hostage to anymore. There are good alternatives coming.
T tomsealbeachMember
I think you're blowing this way out of proportion...don't forget there are others that service the ZF's such as Wilkenson. Lets say you have a Ferrari 250LM, transaxle parts can't be plentiful nor are they cheap...and you possibly might have to get it from Italy, do you really think that hurts the value of the a 250LM...Supply and demand actually would push the price up if parts are more scarce or rare.

The Shelbys and Cobra's have a different lineage and history, hence a different demand...not quite an apples to apples comparison.
DI David in Tujunga (Guest)
quote:
Reply

Thanks for the replies guys. Remember, I am on the outside trying to look in. I have never owned a Pantera yet and I'm starting to wonder if I should. Korina posted that the bottleneck has bypassed. Maybe, but from reading through the posts it appears there was quite a bottleneck for Mark6808. He just got his gearbox back a few weeks ago and his original post was way back in January about RBT M.I.A. A post by Mark Menson stated that he heard lead times for a gearbox overhaul at RBT was 5-6 months. Mike Drew posted that if you drop your gearbox off in October hope to get it back in late Feb. Yikes! Pantera874 wrote that after sending more than 10 faxes and dozens of e-mails with no reply he finally just gave up. He's so sick of it that he intends to sell his Pantera. Korina, if there are fresh alternatives available where you can get your gearbox repaired quickly and reliably please tell me where? Tom@SealBeach, you wrote that other places repair the ZF including Wilkinson. I plan to call Wilkinson and ask them about that. If so many people who are upset with RBT's slow service and 3-5 plus months lead time for ZF repair and the fact that he doesn't return calls, faxes or e-mails, why are they sending their gearboxes to him if there are other alternatives like Wilkinson who can do the same thing and get it done much faster? Anyway, Although I've never met Lloyd, I've read through enough posts to see that Lloyd Butfoy must be a super nice and good guy. I have not seen one post written on this board who personally attacked the man. Their complaints have been restricted to undeniable facts of not returning calls, not returning faxes and e-mails, and slow service. That is not criticism, that is objective reporting. None of this is Lloyd's fault per se, he is simply overwhelmed. I get that. None-the-less, if I blow up my ZF I don't want to wait 3-5 months to get it fixed- even with the knowledge of knowing that Lloyd is a great guy. If I can find conclusive evidence that the bottleneck has truly past, and that there is a way to get a Pantera gearbox serviced in a timely manner through Wilkinson or whoever, I'm all in and I will continue my search to buy a Pantera and I'll look forward to being part of the Pantera community. I've already reconciled the fact that these are old cars and I need to have lower expectations for repair lead times than a new car. But if I am faced with the prospects of buying a Pantera for a shload (compound word)of some 50k or more and then possibly having it down for the count for 3-6 months if I have ZF problems, that far exceeds my personal pain threshold and count me out of the Pantera community. If any one of you guys, especially the longtime Pantera veterans and/or Pantera vendors, can shed some light on whether or not a ZF can be fixed within weeks and not months, I'm listening. Because right now I'm under the impression that it is months. Thanks, David in Tujunga
George PGeorge PAdmin.
David,

It is not normal for Lloyd to be backlogged as he has been of late. This is very unusual. Normally you take or ship your gearbox to him and get it back within a reasonable amount of time.

I want to make it clear, this is not a condition that has been with us for a long time. Not at all. Its a new development, and a temporary development.

Several things combined (ganged up) to create unusual circumstances for Lloyd and created this situation. Lloyd is still buried at this time, but eventually things will return to their normal pace and the backlog will disappear. Lloyd has adopted a policy of not answering the phone and telling everyone to fax him. He answers the faxes he feels requires answering. He is also trying to finalize transmission repairs based on the owners needs. So some owners are getting their ZFs repaired more quickly than others.

Its not likely you're going to buy a Pantera that will immediately require transmission work. I've owned 6018 for 3 years now, still no trip to Lloyd's.

The ZF was designed to work behind the Ford 427 FE race motors as used in the World Endurance Racing Series back in the 1960's, its a robust gearbox. Serving behind a 351C in relatively standard tune on a street driven Pantera is a piece of cake for the ZF. You are not going to "blow it up". It takes mondo horsepower coupled to the tarmac via racing tires to do that to a ZF.

The one thing you can't do with a ZF is rush it from gear to gear, you have to let it engage at its own pace, which is by no means slow, but an owner can try to coax the gear changes a bit faster than the ZF wants to shift.

As a young man I was taught to shift a manual box with floor shift by cupping my hand over the shifter knob and applying a light force on the lever, allowing the lever to move at its own pace. This is as apposed to grabbing the knob tightly and jamming the lever from gear to gear. This approach works with the ZF too. It is perhaps the proper way to shift any gearbox designed in the 1960's.

I also want you to read complaints from Pantera874 with a grain of salt. You must understand the negative & dramatic personality you are dealing with. He has threatened to sell his Pantera, drop membership to these forums, and other things, on several occasions. He's still here.

Dennis Quella of Colorado rebuilds ZFs, so does Les Gray in Arizona, there is a gentleman in Texas as well.

Its really nothing I would ever consider to be a deal breaker.

cowboy from hell
T tomsealbeachMember
David, I wouldn't let the ZF issue steer you away from a Pantera unless you plan on running a 600+ hp small block 460 (World Crate motor)or a twin turbo whatever AND some monster tire to get you some grip to the road and drive like the Tazmanian devil. Cowboy from Hell puts it well...there are other who can service the box and from what I understand with some consistent service (fluid changes, safety wiring the ring gear bolts)...the last issue you will have is the ZF. I know quite a few guys locally and their issues aren't the ZF and they pushing 500 to 550 hp, doing open road races and track days regularly. Fortunately I have not had any issues with my box...(knock on wood). To ease your mind try to find a car that has a box that's been serviced and inspected by RBT or others in it's recent service history.

Plus you will find a really great group of guys in the Pantera community that really go out of their way to help out fellow Panterians. Most recently I noticed a someone who was having a block issue and ran out of dough...and two GREAT guys stepped forward offering a free block and another offered to pay for shipping to help this guy out so he could keep his dream car...that's pretty spectacular and something you probably won't find often.
T tomsealbeachMember
David, forgot to mention I bought my car almost a year ago and have called RBT several times and got him on the phone at least three times...maybe that was before he got buried, but I found him to be very easy to get ahold of and he answered any questions I had regarding service to my box...fortunately my box is ok and he did try to pull me in for unneeded service. His current situation is in my estimation a bump in the road. GOOD LUCK
markmmarkmBuy now, pay later!
David I had heard the lead times where 5 to 6 months, but I have also had two different gear boxes rebuilt by RBT in the past 5 years that only took about a month to rebuild including polishing.

I have also been extremly satisfied with the quality of Loyds work. In fact I would have no problem personally waiting the 6 months for his work before going to another vendor should I need another box rebuilt. I'm not bashing the other vendors just stating how happy I have been with Loyds work.

Finally the ZF is a great gear box the only thing that is critical is that the ring gear bolts are safety wired. If you don't know for sure it is money well spent to check. If those bolts come loose they shear off and can crack the case and damage the ring gear assembly in a worst case situation

If you are looking for a Pantera and find one that has the ring gear bolts safety wired and it shifts fine between all the gears cold and hot you will probably never have any problems with your gearbox. Both my boxes worked fine however the rebuild came into play with the safety wiring and polishing of both.
lf-tp2511lf-tp2511Member
quote:
and then possibly having it down for the count for 3-6 months if I have ZF problems, that far exceeds my personal pain threshold and count me out of the Pantera community.

Well then you surely don't want to know how long you will be without your Pantera should you find it involved in a custom-by-crunch.

If you want dependability and easy parts, fast repairs and little down time, buy a new car with a warranty. BORING Frowner

If you want to own the most beautiful, wonderful half-breed mid-engined car ever built, keep looking for your Pantera.

What a Pantera owner gives up in ease of repair and maintainance is replaced by the immense joy of Pantera ownership - we all know that feeling and hope you will, too.

Each day brings you one day closer to owning YOUR Pantera - keep up the search.

Larry
DI David in Tujunga (Guest)
You guys are really starting to grow on me. I really appreciated your comments, your insights and especially your encouraging words. People who venture out to own a Pantera are people who are willing to take a different path than most. Maybe that is the one common link we all share that binds the Pantera community together. Whatever the reason, you guys all seem to be a great bunch of guys. I've already decided, I'm all in. I will continue my search till I own a Pantera. It will be a pleasure to be part of the Pantera community and I hope to contribute in some positive way to keep it alive and well. Thanks you guys. David in Tujunga
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