# Question about ordering a lighting kit from a member on this site



## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

Back at the beginning of February I ordered a lighting kit from "secretreeve" for my voyager model. I am in the USA and he is in the UK. He suggested I start a log of my build on this site, which I did, and sent me pictures of the kit as he was building it. After a lot of delays on his part, he finally shipped it in late March. He then informed me that the package was stuck in UK coustoms and was being sent back to him with different coustoms paperwork so that it could be sent again. Finally in late April, he sent it again. I suggested he send it not via airmail and I would pay to have it shipped through FedEx or DHL. He never responded to any of those emails and he sent it Airmail and he claimed he sent it tracked. But after several days and many emails, he told me that he lost the tracking number. So now it's early June, over 4 months sent a ordered this kit and over a month since he sent it and I have no proof that he actually sent the kit to me, nothing in the mail at all, and he has not responded to my emails in several weeks. The last email I got from him said that he sent it and that I should stop asking about it. But, according to everything I have read and several emails I have sent to Royal Mail in the UK is that it should only take 7 days for a package to get here from the UK, and that after 25 days its officially lost and I should file a lost package claim. The only thing is the sender has to file the claim and even if he did, from what he tells me he has no proof he ever did send it.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should do? I have had a voyager model sitting incomplete on my table for 4 months now. There's nothing I seem to be able to do from the US and secretreeve claims to be to busy to help me out or even respond to my emails. I hope someone has an idea that I haven't thought of. This whole situation is getting to the point of ridiculous.


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

That is assuming he actually sent it. If someone mailed a package they would have a receipt and could provide a copy of that. The fact that he says he mailed it, has no proof, but you should stop bothering him about it does not sound well. 

Having said that, I ordered a package from a well known Ukrainian vendor that I have dealt with for years. Normally I get my kits from the Ukr to Florida in 10-14 days. But, in this case, it took 3 months. The parcel was mailed on time when the vendor indicated he shipped it. It arrived in good shape and had not been opened. Possibly it was stuck in customs or had just been lost. This is a very RARE event though. I have over 1500 ebay buying and selling transactions and I have not had any delays past a week or so. And I probably buy 4-6 things a month online and never have had a big delay. But, it can happen...


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

:drunk:http://www.hobbytalk.com/bbs1/showthread.php?t=373281
http://www.hobbytalk.com/bbs1/showthread.php?t=389888&page=2

Here is my little run-in with Chris Marsh "secretreeve"......:drunk: The first 
thread are the months spent trying to help him with very simple electronic
problems and his inability to understand, the second thread (post #21), was how he thanked me for building the circuit for him..... I think you just learned a valuable lesson here. Be thankful that if you ever got what ever he sent, if he really sent it, you'll not be ripping your build apart when it fails. I know you don't want to hear that you just got burned, but I doubt you will ever see the item or hear from Chris again, I could be wrong, but he hasn't posted for months.


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

Hmmm why anyone would send money to a guy with this attitude is beyond me. Note that 15 GBP also only equals about $23 USD. I don't know what his week full of dinners are but I spend more than that on my cats in a week.



"i didnt reply to your last pm because your attitude stank. might be pocket change to you but im unemployed, on income support so take your high and mighty attitude and DO ONE.

honestly, what makes you think if I cant afford to buy paint then i could afford to get that over to you immediatly?

circumstances change!

you will get your damn money when I have the money to send back to you, which due to a problem with the bank and the income support i dont have, which i tried to explain to you already. £15 is a full weeks worth of dinners over here when your unemployed and even more valueble when the income support isn't paid or the banks screw up. of course, if you had sent it in a box that wasn't 5 times to long or twice as wide as it needed then it wouldn't have cost so much to ship and you'd have had it back by now

by the way, the board you sent required modifications in any case"


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

Wow. I should have researched a little better before buying from him. Didn't know any of these things about him. 

I'm out $111 on that lighting kit. Wish there was a way to get my money back. But after 45 days Paypal cannot do anything about it. 

I guess my next mission will be to build my own lighting kit. Evidentially I should be able to do as good of job as Chris even though I know nothing about wiring LEDs, where to buy them, or even where to start. 

And yes, his attitude that you are describing does not surprise me. The few emails he has sent have been very questionable. 

"with ALL due respect, its been sent, started a new job and work 7 hours a day with a 2 hour one way commute, getting to the post office is not that easy at the moment.

keep checking with your local office and stop making threats. I have more going on at the moment and if it gets returned here then the ball will be in your court."


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

I suck at lighting stuff but made my own animated LED set for my AMT TOS Enterprise quite easily. I got my stuff from http://www.modeltrainsoftware.com/ledlights1.html and it is about as simple as it gets. 










Cool thing is that it only cost me about $25. They have solid lights, flashing lights with different speeds, various colors, different length lead wires, etc. You can't go wrong.


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

The guy's attitude stinks and I feel sorry for anyone who has lost money.

By chance I just read the following thread over at Britmodeller where he replied to a query about Iron Man lighting kits....

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234941166-iron-man-lighting/

He replied today so he is still about.

One route you could possibly take is if you know his home address then contact his local Trading Standards office. This is a department of every local council in the UK who deal with rogue traders. I think he might be in breach of the Distance Selling Regulations for not supplying goods as advertised.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

miniature sun said:


> One route you could possibly take is if you know his home address then contact his local Trading Standards office. This is a department of every local council in the UK who deal with rogue traders. I think he might be in breach of the Distance Selling Regulations for not supplying goods as advertised.


I can help with that, anyone who has gotten burned by Chris, send me a PM and
I'll forward his address......:wave:


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

I don't know his home address. I only know his full name, email, Skype, and general area where he lives. I know he was using the Cecil square post office is Margate, Kent, UK. So he has to live close by. At this point yes I want to
Contact someone because he shouldn't be running a business with this attitude and I don't want anyone else to have this happen to
them. 

The one think I have researched that I can do is if I can get in contact with someone at the post office where he sent it from, they should be able to
Provide me the tracking number based on the time of day that he sent it. But I have had no luck calling because there is no phone number, only the number for the Royal Mail central automated help line. And calling from the US scares me because I don't know how much it's costing me.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> Wow. I should have researched a little better before buying from him. Didn't know any of these things about him.
> 
> I'm out $111 on that lighting kit. Wish there was a way to get my money back. But after 45 days Paypal cannot do anything about it.
> 
> ...


I know it doesn't help with the money you lost, but feel free to ask any question you'd like, I may be able to help get your ship lite.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> I don't know his home address.


Send me a PM, I've got it.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> I don't know his home address.
> .


Address sent.......:thumbsup:


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

There's no phone number given but the address of that Post Office is....

Post Office
22-23 Cecil Square
Margate
Kent
CT9 1AA 
UK

The address for Kent Trading Standards is....

Trading Standards, 
Kent County Council, 
1st Floor Invicta House, 
County Hall, 
Maidstone, 
Kent 
ME14 1XX
United Kingdom

Email is....

[email protected].


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

I have a general knowledge or electronics but just don't know anything about LEDs and the whole resistor thing. The link that someone posted earlier with lee wired LEDs, I have seen a lot of stuff like that, but for the number of LEDs that I am going to need for the model, I'm afraid it's going to cost way too much money. I know it has to be cheaper to buy everything and wire it myself if I can just learn what I need to buy, from where, and how to wire it all up. And then there are two sets of strobes on the model that flash at two different rates. Chris had someone build a circuit board for this so I'm not sure how to reproduce that. 

I have already drilled 3mm holes in my model for 3mm LEDs. That's about all I have don't. I do have a 12v power supply already hooked up for when the lighting kit did show up.


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

miniature sun said:


> There's no phone number given but the address of that Post Office is....
> 
> Post Office
> 22-23 Cecil Square
> ...


Yeah i have that address for the post office. I'm just don't know how to contact them since the address does me no good here in Texas. Haha. I'll send the trading standards an email with his address and information that I have.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> Chris had someone build a circuit board for this so I'm not sure how to reproduce that.


Did it look like this?


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

teslabe said:


> Did it look like this?
> 
> Enterprise lighting circuit - YouTube


Yes. The exact flashing rate that I would need and the circuit look the same. It wouldn't even surprise me that the person who made the one you sent pictures of is the one that made mine.


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

Here are the two images Chris sent me of what was supposed to be my circuit board. They look identical.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> Yes. The exact flashing rate that I would need and the circuit look the same. It wouldn't even surprise me that the person who made the one you sent pictures of is the one that made mine.


That person is me.....:wave: I made that for chris and he stiffed me on the shipping, I did make extras...... I'm not surprised he was selling it......:drunk:


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> Here are the two images Chris sent me of what was supposed to be my circuit board. They look identical.


That is way tooooo funny.......


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

teslabe said:


> That person is me.....:wave: I made that for chris and he stiffed me on the shipping, I did make extras...... I'm not surprised he was selling it......:drunk:


Wow.....just Wow. If you have a skype or a chat or something PM me your name so we can talk. That would be awesome.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> Wow.....just Wow. If you have a skype or a chat or something PM me your name so we can talk. That would be awesome.


My name is Kent and please don't take this the wrong way but we can talk here in HobbyTalk so anyone could follow along......:wave: Please tell me you were paying for more then just this board.


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

haha. Thats fine.

Yes I was paying for the whole lighting kit. LEDs plus the board. He told me that he was building his own board for me, and eventually he said he couldn't get it to work so he told me he was going to have one of his friends build him one that was in the US. So I waited for this person to mail him the circuit board from the US and then for him to mail it all to me from the UK back to the US. 

Did you build him this board for me or was the board you built him for his own model? Just wondering if the pictures he sent me where of his own board or where of the one he was planning on sending me. It would have been in early March when he told you me you sent that circuit to him.

And on another note, if I do not hear from him soon, do you have another one of those boards which you are willing to sell? I would pay you up front and wouldn't stiff you on the shipping. Haha. I would just need help figuring out the whole LED situation and what to buy.


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

Heres the link to his site where I bought the lighting kit

http://secretsmodelling.webs.com/apps/webstore/products/show/3629856


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> Did you build him this board for me or was the board you built him for his own model? Just wondering if the pictures he sent me where of his own board or where of the one he was planning on sending me. It would have been in early March when he told you me you sent that circuit to him.


I only built and sent him the one board because I felt sooooo sorry for him, he couldn't understand the simplest of directions when I tried to walk him through the schematic he posted, so I can only think he had planned to send you that board. The other boards I built later just for something to do one weekend as a break from my model building. I don't sell F/X kits, too many already doing so. If you don't hear from him let me know and I'll send you a board, just cover shipping. You do understand that this is just the Nav/strobe light controller, nothing else, right?


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

teslabe said:


> I only built and sent him the one board because I felt sooooo sorry for him, he couldn't understand the simplest of directions when I tried to walk him through the schematic he posted, so I can only think he had planned to send you that board. The other boards I built later just for something to do one weekend as a break from my model building. I don't sell F/X kits, too many already doing so. If you don't hear from him let me know and I'll send you a board, just cover shipping. You do understand that this is just the Nav/strobe light controller, nothing else, right?


Yes I do understand. I just need some help figuring out what to but as far as LEDs and resistors and I can do the rest. Like I said I have a general knowledge of electronics and with a little help I think I can do it myself. But yeah building that circuit board would be out of my skill range. If you know of a place where I can get all the other parts I need that would be great.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> Yes I do understand. I just need some help figuring out what to but as far as LEDs and resistors and I can do the rest. Like I said I have a general knowledge of electronics and with a little help I think I can do it myself. But yeah building that circuit board would be out of my skill range. If you know of a place where I can get all the other parts I need that would be great.


http://stores.ebay.com/Asia-Enginee...43688018&_sid=149380788&_trksid=p4634.c0.m322

I get my 3mm LEDs here, they offer free shipping and include the resistors for free, just tell them in the notes what voltage you're going to be running them at, they will send the right value.....:thumbsup:

http://stores.ebay.com/TopBright-Le..._fsub=13&_sid=190959565&_trksid=p4634.c0.m322

For small surface mount LEDs I go here, free shipping but no resistor, but you can use the same value with these as you would your 3mm, just want to wire
the LEDs first and place the resistor inline.


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

As far as I know I do not think I need any SMD for my model.... do you think I would for the voyager model?


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> As far as I know I do not think I need any SMD for my model.... do you think I would for the voyager model?


Not sure, but thought I'd post the info anyways, can't have too much info....


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

Yeah thanks for the info. Just wanted to make sure on my end. 

I sent chris one last email giving him a chance to respond before I contact the trading authority that was posted earlier. In the meantime I went ahead and ordered the LEDs to just build my own. 

I wish there was a better way to warn people not to buy from this guy. Haha. I guess I should have just named this thread "do not buy anything from Chris marsh". Or someway to report his website so other people don't get scammed. Maybe when I email this trading authority there is something they can do about it. 

Thanks everyone for all your help and information that you have provided. It was very helpful and I am very grateful.


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## J_Indy (Jan 28, 2013)

Thanks for posting this warning.

At least we all know what Chris Marsh "secretreeve"'s secret is now....... 

I don't look in the electronics thread much, but I happened to peek in out of curiosity once and saw this back-and-forth where he didn't seem to even be trying to understand the explanation being given to him.

It was when I was looking around for a circuit to build an asymmetric flashing timer (2 sec off/1sec on), which I subsequently found using Google (listed as a "light-house" effect).


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## JediPuju (Oct 12, 2009)

He's very active at present over at Britmodeller. Check the SciFi threads.


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

I finally heard back from him. He is going to try and work it out.


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

Yeah it would be a shame if you had to join Britmodeler and other forums and rat him out.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

J_Indy said:


> I don't look in the electronics thread much, but I happened to peek in out of curiosity once and saw this back-and-forth where he didn't seem to even be trying to understand the explanation being given to him.


If I knew he was going to be selling the board I made for him, it wouldn't have been made. As I said before, "No good deed goes unpunished".....


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

jsimpson746 said:


> I finally heard back from him. He is going to try and work it out.


I hope it all works out for you and I hope everyone sees the kind of person 
Chris is.


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## Richard Baker (Aug 8, 2006)

Sometimes you try to help out a fellow builder and everything works out great, 
sometimes it doesn't and it makes you wonder why you bothered.

The real problem with all of this is not now but the next time- there will now be a nagging question in the back of the mind...


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

Richard Baker said:


> it makes you wonder why you bothered.


For me it's simple, because I can. I'll not let someone of poor character kill my
wanting to help others if I can. If I stopped then they've won.


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## DCH10664 (Jul 16, 2012)

I know that getting burned by someone can be discouraging. And I hope that this one bad apple doesn't spoil the whole bushel. 
But on a more positive note, I can honestly say that I've bought from several people here on Hobbytalk. And it has always been a positive experience for me. Which just goes to show you, that there are more good people here, than bad.


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## Sparky (Feb 21, 2004)

jsimpson746 said:


> I finally heard back from him. He is going to try and work it out.


Not sure what he means about trying work it out. There should be a prompt, full refund or a fully functional lighting kit delivered ASAP and an apology to make it right. It is just irritating to hear of a forum member treating another in this manner. Sorry you have to be put out like this.


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

I will say that out of thousands of on line and mail order transactions, sales, purchases, trades, etc. over a 15+ year span, I have had only one with a thief and have just had four or five minor issues. Myself I have had zero problems with anyone here on HT. The one that got me, while he is a well known online scammer, had contacted me directly at my shop as a mail order customer and I didn't put 2 and 2 together. Odd thing is he probably bought (promptly) hundreds of dollars worth of stuff from be before he stiffed me for a $10 magazine and $25 kit. Go figure.


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## J_Indy (Jan 28, 2013)

teslabe said:


> If I knew he was going to be selling the board I made for him, it wouldn't have been made. As I said before, "No good deed goes unpunished".....


One can only hope he learns a sense of ethics and honor from your behavior....

Because lord knows, you've got nothing of value to learn from him.... 


And your good deed will always be a good deed and speaks well of you - regardless of how it was received.


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## Chuck_P.R. (Jun 8, 2003)

Is this Chris Marsh somehow connected to other aliases,

I found this post by chiangkaishecky in a closed thread.

"Chris Larson aka Chris Lee aka John May aka 25zz aka minimodelmadness has been mentioned before.
Most recently
http://www.hobbytalk.com/bbs1/showthread.php?t=118980
and no so recent
http://www.hobbytalk.com/bbs1/showthread.php?t=117889 "

I have no experience with the guy, but was thinking of a K-7
build offered for sale by the guy.

The only website still active for minimodelmadness is this one:
http://newminimodelmadness.synthasite.com.synthasite.com/

It may not be the same guy at all.
But if you go to the sight you'll notice there is no contact info
or real world info at all, not even product descriptions to speak of,

so I can't see just blindly sending money to that paypal account
without even knowing where the receiver is located, or having
any kind of contact info.

Anyone know more?


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

I don't think it's the same guy as the Paypal links show the prices in dollars wheras Chris Marsh is in the UK and if he used a Paypal account it would automatically default to sterling.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

J_Indy said:


> One can only hope he learns a sense of ethics and honor from your behavior....
> 
> Because lord knows, you've got nothing of value to learn from him....
> 
> ...


Thank you for the kind comments.....:wave: As for Chris making good on the kit he sold to jsimpson746, we can only wait and see, but he's yet to come in and explain himself. Can't believe he hasn't been lurking........


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

*Update*

Hey guys sorry for not responding here for a while. I was out of town and very busy with life as it were. haha

So when I finally did get in contact with Chris at the beginning of the month, he said the lighting kit was sent back to him from customs and that he never knew that it got back to him. He also said a lot of stuff about working two jobs and just not having the time. Most of it I tend to believe just because of the fact that he still tries to talk to me. But that doesn't mean there isn't something fishy going on. 

When he contacted me he gave my two options. One was to have him send the kit he made me again via a 3 day currier service. The second options he gave me was to make me a knew a better kit as compensation for all the problems with getting me this kit and the length of time. He said he was going to replace all the white leds with strip lighting and all the external lights with fiber optics. In addition, he was going to replace the circuit board with a computer micro controller to enable a kind of startup sequence and a more controlled flashing on all the nav lights and the strobes. He sent me a demo and each different section of the ship fading from off to on in sequence was very cool.

So i told him that if he can get that new kit done in a reasonable amount of time and send it via the currier instead of airmail, that i would go for that. Mostly i wanted this because it cuts down on all the wires for each individual white LED. 

So far he is still working on it waiting on all the parts to come in. He is keeping decent contact with me so I am hoping that it all works out. I would let everyone know the outcome. Regardless, the way this has all be handled on his part is poor to say the least. Considering I paid him for this on February 14th and its now into July and the way he had presented himself to me is not the way a seller should talk to a buyer. 

Thanks you all for you comments on this matter. It means a lot to me that all of you are so helpful when I don't know any of you. haha. I will let everyone know whats happens. hopefully i will get a fully lit voyager model at some point, she looks really sad still in pieces....janeway would be very unhappy


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## Neo-uk (May 6, 2007)

teslabe said:


> For me it's simple, because I can. I'll not let someone of poor character kill my
> wanting to help others if I can. If I stopped then they've won.


What a great point of view Tes. :thumbsup:


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## jsimpson746 (Mar 14, 2013)

*Again*

It's now been about 4 months since I have heard from Chris. Never updated me on his progress except like the day after. I have sent tons of emails and have gotten nothing at all back. I am completely tired of this whole situation. I really don't have the motivation to finish my voyager because of this whole mess. Maybe one of these days he will at least respond so maybe I can get my money back.


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## Wattanasiri (Aug 15, 2010)

He also has what appears to be a functioning web site at: http://secretsmodelling.webs.com/

This is the whois.sc report for the webs.com domain:

Domain Name: WEBS.COM
Creation Date: 1995-04-04 00:00:00Z
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2021-04-05 04:00:00Z
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Registrant Name: WEBS INC.
Registrant Organization: WEBS, INC.
Registrant Street: 1100 WAYNE AVE.
Registrant Street: SUITE 801
Registrant City: SILVER SPRING
Registrant State/Province: MD
Registrant Postal Code: 20910
Registrant Country: US
Admin Name: WEBS INC.
Admin Organization: WEBS, INC.
Admin Street: 1100 WAYNE AVE.
Admin Street: SUITE 801
Admin City: SILVER SPRING
Admin State/Province: MD
Admin Postal Code: 20910
Admin Country: US
Admin Phone: +1.3019609000
Admin Phone Ext: 
Admin Fax: +1.3019609010
Admin Fax Ext:
Admin Email: 
Tech Name: KATYA MARIN
Tech Organization: WEBS, INC.
Tech Street: 1100 WAYNE AVE.
Tech Street: SUITE 801
Tech City: SILVER SPRING
Tech State/Province: AL
Tech Postal Code: 20910
Tech Country: US
Tech Phone: +1.3019609000
Tech Phone Ext: 
Tech Fax: +1.3019609021
Tech Fax Ext: 
Tech Email: 
Name Server: NS1.WEBS.COM
Name Server: NS2.WEBS.COM


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## Paulbo (Sep 16, 2004)

Unfortunately all of that concerns webs.com, not secretreeve.


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## DL Matthys (May 8, 2004)

Me having just seen the web site and experienced the Voyager video...
Five word review offered up as acronym.... FUBAR
Should use some eye shades and earplugs...
DLM


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