leatherman versus coathanger

[varmint]

i probably own a dozen leatherman tools. keep one in the garage, kitchen, under the seat of ever bike. carry one with me at all times. but this skeletool has been a huge disappointment. the belt clip bent the first day. the bits are constantly falling out.

this morning i was making a trellis for some tomato plants.








i paid almost $70 for this piece of crap.

[vash]

my stepdad has the original leatherman..it is well made. i bought the exact unit a few years ago, and it is a different animal.

that sucks..i would be bummed.

[m21sniper]

That really does suck, i would definitely see if the company is willing to make it right.

[varmint]

Originally Posted by vash

my stepdad has the original leatherman..it is well made. i bought the exact unit a few years ago, and it is a different animal.

that sucks..i would be bummed.

i'm back to carrying the 20 year old PST. i hate seeing a product i like take a nosedive.



i finished bending the hangers with my bare hands. that should tell you how weak this thing was.

[porsche4life]

Were you cutting them with that? I coulda told you that would happen...

Good thing they have a 25yr no haggle warranty....

[varmint]

Originally Posted by porsche4life

Were you cutting them with that? I coulda told you that would happen...

Good thing they have a 25yr no haggle warranty....

thanks, i'd completely forgotten about the return policy. never thought about it because breaking one never crossed my mind. will look into it.

hadn't got around to cutting yet. was still just unbending/straightening out the things. and still. it was a COAT HANGER. if a tool can't cut a goddamn coat hanger then it is not a tool. they should call it the "leatherman skele-decorative object".

[porsche4life]

Thats just un acceptable...

We all carry at least one leatherman... I carry a Kick and a wirestripper one, my dad carries three different ones. We abuse the crap out of them and just plan on sending them in at some point. We keep a few extras to throw into rotation when one gets sent off....

[sc_rufctr]

Originally Posted by varmint

...

i paid almost $70 for this piece of crap.

Are they still US made?

[gr8fl4porsche]

I have been carrying the Buck multi-tool for at least 10 years - no issues.

[pwd72s]

Far as I know, Leatherman is still in Portland, OR...Hell yeah...send it in!

[javadog]

Next one you get, look at the package before you open it and see if it says "Made in China."

JR

[red-beard]

I have a couple of Gerbers that are very veyr nice. I had an Original Leatherman fail like yours, but then I was standing on it to try to cut something...

The tiny gerber I carry on my bike. It gets used to dig glass out us the tires. It was really handy when I had a tiny wire filliment in the tread. I would never have removed it any other way.

[Taz's Master]

After years of abuse, mine did the same thing. I really liked the toolset on it and they don't make that model any more. I called and they told me they'd probably replace it with a comparable model. I sent it in with a note saying if it could be repaired, that would be my preference, but a replacement would be fine if a repair wasn't practical. It was returned repaired, cleaned and sharpened.

I'm pleased with the product and service, and I hope they treat you as well as they have me.

[M.D. Holloway]

Made in China! Looks like they went cheap with the alloy and the quenching process. Too bad really. I've been seeing a bunch of failures with sockets sets as well - mostly from S&K and MacTool. Same issue, bad alloy.

[red-beard]

The whole reason Europe did the PED (Pressure Equipment Directive) was to exclude Chinese pipe and steel, while still meeting WTO rules.

[lane912]

leatherman will replace it just call them, i have destroyed 8 of them with each one i took it to the factory out by the airport and each time they handed me a new one no questions asked.

[lane912]

Originally Posted by javadog

Next one you get, look at the package before you open it and see if it says "Made in China."

JR

they are made in portland oregon u.s.a.

[javadog]

Originally Posted by lane912

they are made in portland oregon u.s.a.

Yep,

that's where the plant is. The question is this: where do the materials come from? In particular, things like the forging blanks that end up as a plier jaw half?

See: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data2/californiastatecases/b176953.pdf


Colgan v. Leatherman Tool Group, Inc., --- Cal.Rptr.3d ----, 2006 WL 45836 (Cal.App. 2 Dist.) (amended)

A summary, sourced from the web:


"Leatherman labeled and advertised 22 multifunction tools as “Made in U.S.A.,” when in fact parts were manufactured outside the US. The trial court granted summary judgment to the class plaintiffs under California’s (say it with me) False Advertising Law, Unfair Competition Law, and Consumer Legal Remedies Act, awarding restitution, an injunction (which included a mandatory component requiring corrective advertising on Leatherman’s website and in California newspapers), and attorneys’ fees.

The California Business & Professions Code prohibits Made in the USA representations when the goods or any part thereof “has been entirely or substantially made, manufactured, or produced outside of the United States.” Even though Leatherman’s products were designed, processed, and assembled in the US, parts of the tools were still “substantially made, manufactured or produced" outside the United States” as a matter of law. Significant working parts were cast, stamped, formed, hardened, cut, forged, polished or machined in various foreign countries. Plier jaws cast in Mexico, which were used in 20 of the 22 products at issue, had “USA” stamped onto the jaws themselves. After the lawsuit was filed, Leatherman stopped stamping “USA” onto the plier jaws and changed its packaging to state “Made in U.S.A. of U.S. and foreign components,” but didn’t do anything about existing packaged inventory, and didn’t change its unqualified “Made in U.S.A.” advertising.

Leatherman offered a number of reasons why it didn’t violate the law; the court rejected them all. As noted above, the court declined to rely on the fact that the tools were designed in the US; not only is design not manufacturing, but “made, manufactured or produced” is disjunctive, so all parts of the definition must be satisfied in order to make a Made in USA claim.

Leatherman also argued that “substantially” should be measured quantitatively rather than qualitatively, and that the comparison should involve an objective measure such as domestic and foreign production costs or relative worker hours. Domestic and foreign production costs … I wonder which of those is likely to be greater, and why, and whether that has any relationship at all to why a seller might want to make Made in USA claims without actually making the whole product in the US. In any event, the court declined to adopt such a standard. Its determination was bolstered by the FTC’s 1997 inquiry into the meaning of Made in the USA claims, which found that consumers are likely to understand such claims as meaning “all or virtually all” US origin.

In an unusual move for a consumer lawsuit, Leatherman alleged that extrinsic evidence such as a consumer survey was required to prove its advertising deceptive. The court of appeals disagreed, holding that the evidence that components were manufactured abroad was sufficient to make Leatherman’s claims deceptive without further evidence. Under California law, the primary evidence of whether an advertisement is misleading is the words of the ad itself, compared to the actual facts. Leatherman cited various federal cases that had applied Lanham Act standards, requiring a consumer survey, to misleading claims under the Unfair Competition Law. But the federal courts simply had not applied the proper standard under California law, as several California appellate courts have already held."


Bottom line, a tool such as that should not self-destruct when cutting a coat hanger. If it does, there's something wrong with it. Usually, it's made of poor materials, or has a manufacturing defect. Get used to it, that's the future of our sorry-ass world.

JR

[Joeaksa]

Was at the factory a couple of weeks ago. Nice people and would without a doubt send it back for replacement.

[varmint]

have filled out the repair form. am sending it in.


will update in a few weeks to say how leatherman handled it.