Dartmoor, again....and not good.

[Great Pebble]

:?: Like I said, not entirely sure what to make of it.

The impression that I had on Friday was that the knife was going to be subject to destructive testing and that a replacement would be sent as they obviously couldn't return my own blade once it had been - well, destructively tested.

After the e-mail I recieved today, I'm not so sure. It could be construed to mean that any replacement will be conditional upon their findings, which, considering that my own knife will by then be no more, does rather leave me wondering.....

 

[Adi007]

Great Pebble,

I suggest that you familiarize yourself with the following acts:

Sale of Goods Act 1979. Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982. Sale and Supply of Goods Act 1994. The Sale and Supply of Goods to Consumers Regulations 2002.

http://www.dti.gov.uk/ccp/topics1/facts/salegoodsact.htm

In particular:

Wherever goods are bought they must "conform to contract". This means they must be as described, fit for purpose and of satisfactory quality (i.e. not inherently faulty at the time of sale).

If a consumer chooses to request a repair or replacement, then for the first six months after purchase it will be for the retailer to prove the goods did conform to contract (e.g. were not inherently faulty)

I would insist on an IMMEDIATE replacement, quoting the above acts and if such a replacement isn't forthcoming, take legal steps. Their process in determining the cause is irrelevant to the issue of their product failing.

 

[Great Pebble]

I'll be on the 'phone in the morning to clarify exactly what the situation is.
As I'd mentioned back up the thread I had found WS to be most efficient and courteous in their handling of the affair, I may be reading to much into today's communique.

 

[dtalbot]

Hmmm....

Having thought the matter closed, to good effect. I've recieved a note from them today asking if the knife had ever been subject to "extremes of heat or cold", "contact with liquid chemicals" or "extremely wet conditions". not sure what to make of that.

Well,
To my mind and given its a survival knife I'd say if you survived then conditions wern't that extreme! Unless of course you dunked it in acid to get some dirt off, then lobbed it in a lake to clean the acid off, retrived it and threw it in the fire to dry it out then stuck it in the freezer to cool it down again ):
Cheers
David

 

[The General]

Irritating to say the least... :shock:

 

[Andy]

what became of this in the end?

 

[dave750gixer]

Well,
To my mind and given its a survival knife I'd say if you survived then conditions wern't that extreme! Unless of course you dunked it in acid to get some dirt off, then lobbed it in a lake to clean the acid off, retrived it and threw it in the fire to dry it out then stuck it in the freezer to cool it down again ):
Cheers
David

Maybe they are just making sure that isnt what happened. After all its gone to the States and look at some of the stupid things people have done there (drying wet pets in microwave oven etc). Maybe they just want to check you didnt try to retemper the blade to a different hardness and then cryogenically treat it to relaeve stresses without dissassembling it first!

 

[Adi007]

What I find odd is how when a product fails there are different responses that a company can give:

1 - Apologize for the failure and give you a replacement and possibly some later explaination of what happened.
2 - Argue the toss with you.
3 - Want to draw you, the customer, in to a discussion with some obscure tech department over how the product can be bettered. This is OK if you have the time and want to put in the effort but having to hang on for a replacement in the interim is not OK. Also, generally consultants need paying and there are times when it's really grated me to have bought something that turned out to be shoddy and then have to become some sort of free consultant to better the product.

 

[JakeR]

As its been said, i'd be on the phone the phone to them everyday, thats an expensive product!

 

[Great Pebble]

Just to keep you informed....

I last heard from WS on Thursday, having contacted them myself that morning and they are "still waiting for a report" from the USA.

I doubt if I'll be contacting them directly again.
I'll give it another little while then see what the options are.

 

[Tantalus]

3.5 weeks , no explanation and no knife?

:yikes:

Tant

 

[Great Pebble]

Actually a month to the day since it was collected (today) :?:

I'm a tad browned off, in fact I was a tad browned off when it seperated into two parts.

It does rather worry me too, it's not as if it's purely a cosmetic defect if it does happen to someone else they might not be as lucky with preventing a blade on it's ballistic trajectory from penetrating something...

Anyway, we live and learn.

Edit:- As an aside, I have a friend who works in the "testing busted things" industry, whatever the proper name is. He works with metal, but according to a colleague of his in the "plastics" bit. They would have returned a job of that nature in 48 hours or less, further he reckoned that in 99% of such cases a semi experienced technician will identify the problem on sight. Possibly apocryphal "in the pub" tales but they are civil servants......

 

[Shing]

Its unexceptable that a company should behave like this. The least they could do is to give you a temporay or permanant replacement or your money back.

I have always been wary of rubber handle knives since the one one my Cold Steel Trailmaster started to melt. Its quite common I think for rubber handles to break from the steel tang under heavy use which is why I wouldn't buy another rubber handle knife regardless of whoever made it.

 

[Great Pebble]

A few years back I bought some bottles of lager, as you do, and upon opening one was met with a distinctly unpleasant smell. Upon examination the bottle appeared to have "something" growing in it, I assume it was yeast or something. Anyway I popped it away under the sink and fired off a letter to the brewery in question.

Within the week there was a pleasant chap at the door apologising, offering vouchers for replacement beer and generally trying to make up for the situation. He didn't want to recover the bottle but suggested pouring it down the loo.

I still buy their lager....

'Nuff said.

 

[Tantalus]

seems to me that ws has done the opposite here tho

equivalent of taking your lager away for tests and leaving you with nothing to drink for a month

Tant

 

[Great Pebble]

Indeed...

 

[Hoodoo]

I have always been wary of rubber handle knives since the one one my Cold Steel Trailmaster started to melt. Its quite common I think for rubber handles to break from the steel tang under heavy use which is why I wouldn't buy another rubber handle knife regardless of whoever made it.

Only the outer portion is rubber. It wraps around a heavy polymer handle which then fits snugly around the tang.

 

[Great Pebble]

I should reiterate that I actually really liked it. It served my purpose admirably.

 

[Shing]

I think the problem with rubber handles is fundemental regardless of wheher its attached to tang handle or not. The rubber will deform locally when stressed and put stress at local points and cause the bond to break especially after repeated high stresses which survival knives are often subject to. A non yielding handle will have to deformed gobally and the stress is spread out and lower because energy is needed to deform the non yielding material. In addition, most handles made from non yielding materials will have additional rivets or bolts to add rigidity and structual strength.

 

[Hoodoo]

I think the problem with rubber handles is fundemental regardless of wheher its attached to tang handle or not.

I've never been a big fan of rubber handles either but the point I'm trying to make is that the handle is not ALL rubber. Even if the rubber part deteriorated and was lost, there would still be a substantial part of the handle left and the knife could still be used. More handle would be left than even on most slab-sided full tang knives if their scales popped off for some reason. And then, even if the polymer part underneath broke, you would still have a substantial tang beneath that that you could wrap with duct tape or rubber innertube to make it serviceable.