Unhappy buyer .What to do ???

My eyeballs hurt from staring at the screen and this ended up longer than I expected. I really don't care for drama or over-speculation. Unfortunately I got sucked into this and figure it would be best to give my side of the story while offering some of my own speculation, but trying to be objective.

* I believed everything Daniel said and everybody, including my differential guy, agree that the pattern looks great! The gears sat for 2 months because the car didn't need new gears and I didn't have a 7260 billet yoke to put on, like I have on my other rears. Then I took it in for a professional inspection and yoke installation not expecting any issues.

* I never made any demands or accusations about the situation (At least he mentioning that.) and figured he had given the best possible and honest desciption he could. I admitted that on the surface it "appeared" that there was nothing wrong with the gears, but since I felt there was, I offered my suggestions and asked for his opinion on how we could come to a compromise. I didn't want a full refund and shipping it back was simply not practcal. But I offered to return just the gears to prove that they weren't any good to me.

* It rubbed me the wrong way when in only my 2nd email to him about this issue I tried to address many of the incorrect speculative accusations by others on the forum and simply asked what he would do if he were in my situation. His reply was that he was "done" with this and threatened to reveal my identity on the forum if I contacted him again. (Kinda funny since there was little doubt that I was buying it, as noted by several members.) Did I hit a nerve with my question?

* My differential guy said that the gears were "tweaked" (forgot the exact word), likely from improper break-in and/or HARD use. (I've read and heard many times that a R&P should be put through several cycles under light use before racing/towing.) Spinning it by hand one way was nice and smooth. Spinning it the other way had a roughness you could feel as well as hear. Kinda like a wheel bearing on its way out. (He's been at it for as long as I can remember, probably 30 years, doing everything from VW's to supercharged mud drag vehicles.) I'm no expert, but he's earned my trust, plus, I figure that a properly set-up gear with 10 or 20 runs will not have time to develop a bad pattern if it's just starting to have a problem after being beat-on.

* I made the mistake of not asking quite enough questions about the rear, but he didn't volunteer all of the details either. Otherwise I wouldn't have bought it. What I found out was:

- In his original ad for the rear on 9/17/2010, he wrote: "with 20 easy passes on it"

- In the last ad from 1/08/2012 that I replied to, he wrote: "only about 10 low 7 second passes". (So was this an honest mistake or a way to make it a more attractive buy since it didn't sell before?)

- In a 5/13/2010 post about testing the car he mentions running the 4.86 gears "launching on the Tbrake at 3800 and sticking the throttle as I drop the button".

While what was described in the ad was MOSTLY correct, the "easy runs" and # of runs is suspicious. 20 runs became 10 and the most important piece of info that was left out was the trans brake use. Most will agree that trans brakes will shorten the life of an 8 3/4. Some do it, but that doesn't change the facts. Again, I don't know if it was intentional or an honest mistake. I made a mistake by not asking enough questions. I didn't make any accusations or unreasonable demands, just asked about a compromise because I can't trust the gears. My idea of a "spare" is something I can rely on about as much as the original part in use just in case something happens to the original that routine inspections didn't catch. I can't afford not to be nit-picky like that. I figured that properly set-up gears with about 10 runs would fall into that category.

SIDE NOTES:
* Too much speculation and outright accusations on the forum, especially when someone doesn't know all the details is not a good thing, whether it applies to me, Dan or anyone else. Even then, it's one persons word against another with outright proof not always available. So some opinions are best kept under wraps.

* Buyer beware" is good advice, especially in this day and age. But I'd like to think that its more applicable to places like Ebay and CraigsList, not as much to a forum community with better known and very active members.

Daniel already made it clear that he doen't want to discuss this matter any further. That's his choice and I'm ready to put this behind me as well. I just have to take it as a learning experience and be more thorough in my questions next time to make sure the seller is providing ALL of the relevant details. I just don't like the idea of being made out to be the "bad guy" trying to screw somebody.

Thanks for your time and patience in reading this.