$13k for a TAF

I don't even know that super minty ones go for that much. It would be top money for a TAFG.

Have every sympathy but you presumably knew you were paying top dollar, but you didn't ask for photos of everything for that price? And you'd surely research the name of the company too. Seems a couple of people did a cursory search and found some ominous stories on here alone.

What is the latest with the credit card chargeback, I assume they say they can't do anything?

You’re assuming he didn’t just cut the decal along the edge of the side rail. I find it hard to believe the guy would remove and reattach the rails given the rest of the condition...

Another thing that doesn’t make sense to me.. the guy apparently had a “museum quality” TAF to sell, but he didn’t actually have it for several months. If you know a machine intimately enough to know that it’s “museum quality” then you wouldn’t have to go away and find it, and you wouldn’t have to work on it. It either is as described now, or it isn’t.

So is it confirmed the OP abandoned the chargeback?

I assumed he’d sent it to HEP to get a professional appraisal for the CC company, not to get a top end restore done.

He’s going to end up with the world’s most expensive regular TAF . A real shame.