I started shopping at West Marine on Basin St. I needed work done on my outboard motor for my boat. One of the employees there said he worked on them, his name was Blake. My motor was locked up. After speaking with Blake, he seemed very knowledgable. Unfortunately, he was nothing but a con. He picked the motor up and told me it would be about a week to fix it. I told him I would like it for Memorial Day weekend, which was 5 weeks away. He said no problem. I called to check a week later and was told that he had it apart and it was the lower unit bearing that was bad and would need replaced. He also asked if I would like a new impeller while he was there and I said yes. I called a week later to check. He told me he couldn't get the bearing out and would send it to the machine shop to have it removed. I waited another week. I called and left a message for him. When he called back, he left a message that he had the motor running and was tuning it now. He said it ran for 1 1/2 hours and he would tune and check it again. I tried back three days later and was told he ran it again for two more hours and it started running bad and he shut it down right away. At this point I was frustrated with what was going on, so I told him I would pick it up and don't go any further. He returned the motor to me. When I tried to turn it over, it was locked up, same as before. He said it seized again, but it was nothing he had done. I then had the motor taken apart by a qualified Tech. The bearing was never replaced, the impeller was never replaced, the carb was gummed up and after removing the head, there was rust in the cylinder. He said it hasn't been run in years. Everything I was told over the month that Blake had it was a lie. Needless to say, I didn't make the holiday. I no longer shop at that store and I would definately not recommend using or dealing with Blake for anything.
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