June 2009 Editorial
My bad experience
with
Rymals restoration / Rymal's restoration / Randy Rymal
By my recollection, about
two years ago I manged to crack the glass in my Buick trishield side
view mirror. I had taken it off the door to protect it from harm, and
while doing so, managed to inflict harm. I was mad at myself for such a
clumsy act, but that's life. I sat the mirror aside.
A
few weeks after that, I was searching eBay and came across a listing
along the lines of "First Mirror Surface mirror glass Buick". As I read
through the eBay auction, I found it to be a product from "Classic
Specialties", which is the company Randy Rymal is doing business as on
eBay, based on the shipping address. This was actually a good thing, as
I had done business with Rymal's in the past and had come to know them
as the place with hard to come by parts. The mirror glass that was for
sale was exactly what I needed. And by reading the description, it was
perfect. I don't have the auction anymore, but do remember the bullet
points were first surface mirror, and cut for exact fit. I did find it
peculiar in the directions it stated if the glass didn't fit exactly to
put some RTV on the mounting posts and glue it down. I pulled the
trigger on the auction, and I am pretty sure it was about $40 for that
piece of glass.
When
I took my old glass out, it set on three nubs and was held in
place with a snap ring. There was no adhesive, and the glass fit the
factory opening with no issue from side to side. It is my belief it was
factory glass because the car has been in my family since the 70s, and
has had the same mirror. If you look at the parts numbers below, I
think it will clarify the mirror is original GM.
Randy's
glass arrived and I placed it in my mirror. I found it odd that the
glass would not fit just sitting on the three nubs with the snap ring.
If I held the mirror vertically, It would shimmy to the bottom and
rattle around. It did not fit as my factory glass did. I e-mailed
Randy, and he wrote back basically what was in the instructions above-
put RTV on the nubs to glue it. This was getting to me as I knew my
"factory" glass just sat with pressure and filled the hole, wheras
Randy's glass didn't fit the hole. In my opinion, the glass he provided
was undercut.
I
tried Randy's method of gluing the glass in. I put RTV on the nubs and
set the glass down, but it would barely sit on the edge of each nub,
wheras my factory glass sat fine. It was taking both hands to keep this
glass where it needed to be and it still moved. I attempted to install
the snap ring to keep things in place while it dried. The mirror ended
up falling out of my hands.
I
broke the $40 glass. Coupled with the fact I cracked the first mirror
glass, I gave up. I sat it on the shelf and walked off. I was stewing
about the wrong size glass, but it was my fault I dropped it.
I
regret not returning the product the split second I found it wasn't
exactly as described. I expected no result of our Randy Rymal, so I
didn't e-mail him. Around a year later, it was still eating at me so I
fired off a e-mail to Randy telling him he had good products I still
wanted to buy but there was this issue between us. Randy and I
exchanged about four e-mails where he blamed me and my mirror, and
asked for part numbers, but in the end Randy did just what I expected
him to do a year ago- he gave no result.
You
can see my mirror below and decide if it is factory or not. If you wish
to do business with Randy, you can find his website at
http://rymalsrestorations.com/
and his eBay store at http://stores.shop.ebay.com/classic-specialties.
I have chosen to no longer do business with Randy Rymal. He seems willing to lose a repeat customer over $40.
