It's getting harder to maintain my enthusiasm...

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intense5.5

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With the experience I have had with Porsche, I have to agree. I remember going in to look at a new 911 Turbo a couple years back and having a fantastic experience. The first concern the salesman had was, "have you driven one?". Without a single chatter about price, are you leasing, financing, are you trading your car in, etc... I was behind the wheel of a $150k+ vehicle. No concern over, "Oh, we cant put mileage on a brand new car." They made me test braking, acceleration, handling, etc. They cared about how I felt about the vehicle and how I liked the vehicle. One time I went to go see a Viper (before I purchased mine) and I said I want to see how it drives. The response was, "Well, its got 500HP, so its fast." I could give a **** about the HP if I don't like the drive.

It is just a different caliber of education the sales people are exposed to.
Not that I want to disagree with you, or stand up for srt, but - my local porsche dealer has more cars on the lot then there are vipers in the tri-state area. They are'nt worried about having demo cars. The up side is this situation affords viper owners quite a degree of exclusivity. At our local c&c, there's usually multiples of each model of F cars. I had no idea there were so many in the area, yet if there's 4 vipers, it's a huge turnout and it's all my usuall friends from here. Try to hold out and keep the faith ViperSmith.
 

FLL-B/W-GTS

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For you all that are thinking about a Porsche 911. I have had 3 Vipers(RT10,GTS,Gen 4) and C6 Z06 and ZR1).Last year I bought a new Porsche 911 Turbo S.All I can tell you is the car is outstanding, it runs 10.80s@128 all day long,everytime ,with no drama and when you turn the sport plus off, it drives like a Benz.Dealing with Porsche is at a whole different level for customer service.I love the Viper and will buy a new one,but SRT and the Gen 5 needs major improvement before I get my new one.I could never deal with what friends (who my cancel orders) and others are dealing with.Esp when a local dealer has 2 LE sitting on the floor they can not sell at MSRP down the street

Hope they will improve .....
 

09 Venom

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I don't even want to get started after reading this whole thread..preferential treatment to existing viper owners and VCA Venom members...yeah right!!
 

Paul Hawker

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First of all congratulations to ViperSmith for selling two high technology companies in 18 months. I'll bet that he, more than most of us, understands that it is not appropriate to be totally transparent in all corporate internal discussions. (even though everyone would like them to be)

Maybe the answers have been right in front of us along.

Ralph mentioned he wanted to put VCA members closer to the front of the line. He also planned to make some initial cars for approved dealerships to have in their showrooms and available for test drives and touchy feely at the dealerships.

If Dodge dealerships were offering free test rides to the general public, there would be a line out the door and around the block, filled with every teen age kid with a liscense, along with their dad.

I had a talk with Ralph at Willow Springs and he mentioned they were getting really tough with suppliers to achieve the expectations of Team Viper as per quality. Said some of them were taking longer that he had hoped to get up to speed at the quality they would accept. Knowing this would cause frustration for those wanting immediate deliver, most of us feel that getting the quality control is perhaps even more important than getting them out the door.

It has also been posted by Herb and others that it was taking a bit longer than expected to get Federal Regulators to pass on EPA, CAFE and other manditory items. They had cars waiting in the finished good section, waiting for government approval to go out the door.

I would also suspect that not all the parts for every option were available at the beginning of production. If a customer had ordered special wheels, colors, seats or carbon fiber pieces, it is understandable that those cars would be shuttled further back in the production sequence, but those items that were readily available would be completed first.

I understand that in order to make initial production as efficient as possible the first batches were runs of identical cars, with idential equipment, and pre selected to make sure each package had complete parts availability. They were of all the same color, stripes, wheels, interiors etc.

Once these tranches of cars were turned out, it was probably more capable to build customers cars with more diversity.

No matter what the reality was, getting a personally ordered Viper has always required "the wait". Kind of like a kid waiting for Christmas to come, and hoping Santa would not forget him.

Now that there are literally thousands of different combinations possible with all the options, the wait can seem overly long indeed.

Do not loose faith. Those SRT guys and girls are working their butts off, getting the cars down the line. They take great care, and all the ones I have had the good fortune to meet, are infused with the realization that each and every car will be delivered to a real live person, and that each car will be a treasured item by it's new owner. Nobody is holding anything back to make the wait any longer than it must be.

Early reports from the newest owners is that this new car is perhaps the greatest improvement for any new Generation. They are smoother, faster, better handling, more comfortable, smarter, and more precisely constructed than any Viper that has gone before.

I have a friend that just rec'd his Tesla that he had ordered 18 months ago. He had the same frustration as they had cars like he had ordered in their showrooms, but his was still being built. They had a computerized tracking system, but it did not correspond to reality, and he was checking his computer 10 times a day to attempt to determine the precise delivery day it would arrive. By the time he had gotten his first drive, on the way home, all that frustration had gone away, and he was in complete delight with his purchase decision. Hoping your experience turns out to be much the same.
 

ACRucrazy

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Maybe the answers have been right in front of us along.

I had a talk with Ralph at Willow Springs and he mentioned they were getting really tough with suppliers to achieve the expectations of Team Viper as per quality. Said some of them were taking longer that he had hoped to get up to speed at the quality they would accept. Knowing this would cause frustration for those wanting immediate deliver, most of us feel that getting the quality control is perhaps even more important than getting them out the door.

It has also been posted by Herb and others that it was taking a bit longer than expected to get Federal Regulators to pass on EPA, CAFE and other manditory items. They had cars waiting in the finished good section, waiting for government approval to go out the door.

It would mean so much more if Ralph or the SRT Engineers took some time to personally relay info to the waiting customers who put money down. Honestly, someone from SRT popping in once a week or two over here on VCA would put out a lot of these little fires in a heartbeat. Instead people wait, wonder and worry their way right out of the Gen V. That's too bad.
 

SADVIPER

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Last year, I used to log in here twice a day and call every dealer I googled! This year? I lost a chunk of my enthusiasm.
I still like the car but I couldn't be more dissapointed in the way SRT and Ralph handled road bumbs lately.
Last thing I remember was him intrested in impressing Motor Trend!
If it's going to be better experience Sergio or someone should interfere.
 

SADVIPER

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The worst part I see about this is that ViperSmith has ordered a car. Not potentially a buyer, he is an owner in waiting. And waiting. And waiting. This is supposed to be the top product in SRT and Chrysler's lineup. The halo car. Why isn't there a point of contact from SRT that keeps the custom ordered vehicle owners apprised of what's going on? For 100-150k vehicle I'm kind of dismayed at the disorganization that appears to be going on (admittedly only as a spectator here though).

I'm not dismayed that that there are problems, there are ALWAYS going to be problems, but how those problems are dealt with are what makes or breaks a customer's loyalty to the product/company.

To be honest, Ralph should have a list of all the owners who are being put on hold. He should know that he's two minutes away from ViperSmith's door and he should have called to drop by, even if it's just to apologize. Viper owners are supposedly the ambassadors to the brand, and the VCA is supposed to have a closer relationship to the SRT/Chrysler than anywhere else, but right now I'm not feeling the love for my Gen V brothers and sisters who are in a holding pattern.

It doesn't affect me personally, I've got my car, but I just want to see Ralph/SRT/Chrysler do the best under tough circumstances, and I'm just seeing the same old corporate line. :p And Paul is correct, forum anxiety does ****, but when people are getting the wall of silence, what is one to expect?
Well-put mate!
 

ferraritoviper

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Interesting thread. My thoughts are relax, it is what it is...if you really want the car. I've been waiting 2-1/2 years, when I put a waiting list to order deposit in DEC 2010, after the Viper Oracle told me the Gen V will be bult...while the vast majority here said it wouldn't. Ordered with increased deposit late Nov 2012. My vin 400020 still in production scheduled. As the old saying goes, good things come to those who wait :)
 

Jack B

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Did you see the yellow and red, striped cars sitting together at connors in the tour pics from last week, ours?.


Harold I hate to see you do this, after all the anticipation and waiting. Is your dealer a big one? Have you called and put on any pressure? I know Conner is cranking the cars out a lot faster the last 2 weeks, and I know they are building a lot of white cars now. I think you are very close. Before I would buy the 911, I would hang in until a white one comes available online and then try to work something out to get that car. There was someone on the forum who wanted to cancel a white SRT because of financial reasons. That car was on order from Roanoke. You might want to call John Gastman and see what he knows and can do....Good Luck, and don't buy that 911.

Bill
 

Smog Dog

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Did you see the yellow and red, striped cars sitting together at connors in the tour pics from last week, ours?.

I saw Brian's pictures. I do think they are our cars. His picture shows them at the start of final inspection where the final electric and emission tests are run. The headlights are also aligned at that station. All that remains is the leak test, dry off and detailing. If the tests are all passed and there are no other repairs or flaws to fix, we go to shipping.

Bill
 

Policy Limits

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how many units have been built as of today 5/20/13?

How many custom orders still need to be built? 400?
 

BigBadViper

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Did you see the yellow and red, striped cars sitting together at connors in the tour pics from last week, ours?.

So why is it that you pre-ordered, past Viper owner, pre paid, and a guy in Fayetteville, who has never owned a Viper, but has owned several Vettes, just picked up a Blue/White and ended up paying $142K for it, and just drove it to C&C?

Why is it that our VCA Regional VP who had 3 Vipers, now only has 2 had to drive to Detroit to pick one up so he has 3 again?
 

VYPR BYT 94

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One would have to be a bit naive to think it would ramp up without any issues.
This is not just a newer model rolling out of an already established assembly plant with a few new shapes around the headlights or console. This is basically a new product from the ground up, (with familar design cues), new technology, new productions techiques, new paint/stripes process, new assembly plant, new quality control processes, new training for assembly workers, etc....

Every car out there right now that you can just "hop in and drive away with" has already worked thru all these inherent issues and more - years ago.

Sorry about your "1st buy american experience". I feel your pain but I don't believe for a minute that this is a subpar launch... perhaps a bit of false expectations due to alot of excitement imho. You'll never pull off a ground-up launch of any product w/o bugs... Murpheys Law won't allow it. :)
 

ViperSmith

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One would have to be a bit naive to think it would ramp up without any issues.
This is not just a newer model rolling out of an already established assembly plant with a few new shapes around the headlights or console. This is basically a new product from the ground up, (with familar design cues), new technology, new productions techiques, new paint/stripes process, new assembly plant, new quality control processes, new training for assembly workers, etc....

Every car out there right now that you can just "hop in and drive away with" has already worked thru all these inherent issues and more - years ago.

Sorry about your "1st buy american experience". I feel your pain but I don't believe for a minute that this is a subpar launch... perhaps a bit of false expectations due to alot of excitement imho. You'll never pull off a ground-up launch of any product w/o bugs... Murpheys Law won't allow it. :)

There are delays which I expected. Then there are the delays which we are experiencing. 4 months behind schedule is a bit more than a delay, IMHO. No one can even tell me when mine will be actually built. People still have 2/28 as their 'build date' that haven't even gone into production, so all dealers can say is "We don't know." Chrysler has the tracking systems to update the build dates.

Personally those that put cash down should have been at the top of the custom queue. The fact unsold custom cars are sitting on dealer lots while I sit here twiddling my thumbs is poking me in the eye. Yes, I realize that is how things work, but - hey I am human - I am self centered.

I worry SRT has bigger issues on its hands though, there are three LE within 15 miles of me that are sitting unsold, at MSRP, for 2-3 weeks now. If they aren't even moving at MSRP, thats a problem.
 

VYPR BYT 94

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...Personally those that put cash down should have been at the top of the custom queue...
I totally agree.
...The fact unsold custom cars are sitting on dealer lots while I sit here twiddling my thumbs is poking me in the eye. Yes, I realize that is how things work, but - hey I am human - I am self centered...
LOL, aren't we all like that. :lmao:

Well, one thing for sure... ever since there was a viper, the car has always invoked a ton a passion/attention - both for and against, people just feel strongly about the darn car!
I hope you get soon, really.
 

Smog Dog

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I worry SRT has bigger issues on its hands though, there are three LE within 15 miles of me that are sitting unsold, at MSRP, for 2-3 weeks now. If they aren't even moving at MSRP, thats a problem.

You may be right. The same thought has crossed my mind. Maybe it's just too many of the same color and there will be more demand for the various other colors. Time will tell, but I think the rumored plan of 3000 units in 2014 is a big mistake.

Bill
 

v10enomous

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I am canceling my order tomorrow.

Tired of waiting. On to other things. Wife likes the new 911.

I was looking at a red GTS in a dealer's garage Saturday and I thought... How could anyone possibly want a Porsche over a Viper:dunno: True Story...
 

PeerBlock

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I've been very optimistic and enthusiastic about the premium upgrade design goal for the Gen V, reading all of the info I could find through its pre-release, and recently some new owner feedback. I was initially disappointed to read Randy Pobst's comments about the handling of the pre-production car at Laguna Seca, and then relieved to hear how the SRT tweaks rectified those issues.

His comments could have been paraphrased as "the car scared me" and that's not exactly news. It would make sense that a corvette is a bit more "polished" since it has been on the market for many years and has an R&D department funded by US tax dollars. The viper didn't exactly lose. The margin between the cars in that test was miniscule.

I've also been a little concerned about build quality, and constantly hearing how they had to build the car on a shoe-string budget doesn't instill confidence. While the TA beating the ZR1 was impressive, that didn't factor into my wanting the car at all, nor does it help with my mounting concerns. SRT with Track Pack is what I've narrowed it down to, and it's at a price I felt was fair and affordable for me.

Well this one is anybody's guess, but I think SRT put extra effort into the fit and finish of the car and so I will give them the benefit of the doubt.

But what's making me doubt that value and desirability is the way SRT and dealers are handling their customers. Taking deposits with no apparent intention of filling those orders on a timely basis while building unsold cars to sit on dealer lots, and some dealers price gouging to the point customers won't buy the ones that are built, all reflect so poorly that it's difficult to see that the price paid is buying a premium vehicle, from a premium brand, or from a dealer network commited to premium customer service.

Some dealerships are better than others. I did not experience any such problems so far. The salesman has been communicative and on the ball and I understood that patience would be required if I wanted to own my own custom-built super car.

If you're unhappy with the level of service you were receiving at your dealer, why did you place an order with them?

Chrysler and Dodge established their lacking reputation for build quality and customer service over decades, and if they're hoping to differentiate the Viper and SRT from their other offerings in that regard they're not off to a very good start.

I do not share this sentiment with regards to the viper...yet.

So I'm holding off purchasing one until I see if SRT will turn things around and take steps to make the ownership experience a positive one, and one worthy of a premium brand and price.

I don't think SRT is intended to be "luxury" brand. You're buying a really fast American car. You can buy a slower, uglier euro car and enjoy a complimentary butt-waxing from the dealer - but they need to do that kind of stuff because they know they have to sell you their car; you didn't walk in there already wanting whatever they have.

If I were you I'd wait for the viper. Even if you don't buy it, at least see it in person before making that decision.
 

ViperSmith

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I was looking at a red GTS in a dealer's garage Saturday and I thought... How could anyone possibly want a Porsche over a Viper:dunno: True Story...

Truth be told, the Viper was the only thing that actually excited me in cars (lower than a $300k budget).

The 911 is fun because it is customizable, the performance is more than enough all in all.

I liked the exclusivity of the Viper and the raw power... But, such is life.
 

JLorello

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I am curious if anyone can share experience buying and building the other "traditional" exotics? Is there a strong customer-factory connection?

Pardon my ignorance, but can you even build a 458, superlaggera, or mp12-4c? Or, it is simply, "this is what we are getting in, do you want it?"
 

ViperSmith

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I am curious if anyone can share experience buying and building the other "traditional" exotics? Is there a strong customer-factory connection?

Pardon my ignorance, but can you even build a 458, superlaggera, or mp12-4c? Or, it is simply, "this is what we are getting in, do you want it?"
You build a Ferrari or McLaren however you want, thats really the beauty of the higher end brands.

But, Ferrari dealers do play games. For instance, they get X number of allocations. Well, lets say you want the new Vert 458. Well, if you haven't bought a Ferrari from them before, you may get on the list but you'll be buried. But, lets say you want to get to the front of the list. Well, they can and do offer you to buy another car they may have on the lot - which will in turn get you a decent allocation slot. Ferrari is also "territorial" - where you can't just buy from any dealer you want for a new car.

Also add on, Ferrari requires you to sign an agreement that you will sell them back the car within the first year, a "first right of refusal" for fair market value if you are tired of it.

As far as I know, Ferrari doesn't allow dealer markup. But, you'll see the used vehicles with prices significantly over MSRP.
 

canadian venom

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SRT's product are great and in demand but it seems the problem might be with allocations. They don't go where they should..... There are car sitting on dealer lot unsold while elsewhere there are customer are waiting for it.... They should penalize those dealers that are ordering cars with false contracts; that way real sales would have faster allocations. Instead of doing a first run of first edition that are for ''everybody'', they should have built a VCA edition, intended for present or past VCA member. That way, they are sure that there is no unit sitting on a dealer lot. As for the waiting time, i think it's part of the experience.... Try to buy a 458 Spider and if your not a Ferrari owner you'll have to face the 2 years waiting list while if you're a member of the Ferrari family, you could have a car within a few months.....
 

Matt Houston

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Hmm, keep the cars in a secure place so buyers will get a pristine car when they purchase versus sitting in the showroom for Joe Public to mess with them, what were they thinking? :)

Seriously, Bernie and Morgan are very happy to show you the cars, just call in advance to make sure they are there to help you (I just saw all of them a few weeks ago, no problem). And good luck at Spring Dodge if you purchase from them, my experiences with them have been terrible.

Never thought I'd have to make an appointment to see a Dodge...now I know. Why was your experience so bad at Spring?
 

chorps

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I was looking at a red GTS in a dealer's garage Saturday and I thought... How could anyone possibly want a Porsche over a Viper:dunno: True Story...

Probably because your average Porsche owner doesn't want to get jumped by X number of sales people asking if he'd like to test drive a minivan and then try and get sold into a V6 Challenger, when s/he comes in asking about the Viper. I'm starting to think that Ralph should have tried to wipe the slate clean and started off by building SRT dealerships only, and started off with 20 dealerships led by Woodhouse, Roanoke and Tomball (and Tator's :D) to build the experience outwards.

The existing dealers would have killed him though. :(

New car dealerships are really moving forward, and luxury brands looks like totally different animals when compared to their volume cousins. The Mercedes dealer has a nice full kitchen with chef/bar where you can order whatever you want while waiting, right in the middle of the dealership. The newest Lexus dealer has a bistro as well, but also has a golf simulator, manicure spa, patio/lounge and secure child's play room in 52,000 sq feet. :omg:

Not saying that SRT needs any of that but anyone who is cross shopping a 100k+ car with a Viper might get shocked at the dealer experience when they go into your average Dodge (ahem SRT) dealer.
 

v10enomous

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Not saying that SRT needs any of that but anyone who is cross shopping a 100k+ car with a Viper might get shocked at the dealer experience when they go into your average Dodge (ahem SRT) dealer.

It's nice to be coddled but in reallity you're just getting kissed before you're getting F... well you know:lmao: I didn't see any change in Ford dealerships for the FGT:dunno: Pretentious BS makes me want to hurl... That's one of the reasons I drive a Viper...
 
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