Their quality is a shit. I bought a wave+ 2 years ago, broke within a couple months (spring in pliers broke making pliers unusable). Sent it back and they say it’s not repairable so they give me a different one (mine was laser engraved). Then the replacement breaks (spring that holds pocket clip in place). I don’t even use the Leatherman that much, and wasn’t doing anything that could be outside of light use.
Leatherman sucks now, they source cheap Chinese steel that’s doped with cheap filler. Gerber also sucks, but slightly less compared to Leatherman
I have a Free P4 and feel it’s on par with their earlier products.
That said you can always smell the influence of an MBA screwing stuff up for an otherwise good company to “make them more profitable”.
More companies need to tell these idiots to pound sand because their paper education is worthless.
The only good MBA is an unemployed MBA.
watched this week ☞ Leatherman’s Misstep: How The Iconic Brand Has Gone Astray! by TX Tool Crib
I have been a longtime supporter of Leatherman multi tools. For the past 25 years, hardly a day has gone by when a Leatherman tool hasn’t been on my hip. My Leatherman has bailed me out of numerous situations time and time again. Lately though, it seems they have strayed too far off course from what made them they company they are today. Multitudes of people have echoed these same thoughts to me. So in this video, I would like to hear your opinions on the direction Leatherman has gone in recent years.
Thank you!
Hmm. I’m assuming like every other sector there are lots of fakes of dubious quality that are virtually indistinguishable from real ones except they break much more easily.
Unless you’re buying from Leatherman directly you have a much greater chance of getting a fake that’s priced high but made cheaply with inferior materials to scam people. Just try and get a real SD card on Amazon. Probably 60% or more fakes for the big name ones and huge profits for the criminals.
I have a Wave and a PS4. Great tools, had them for years.
I bought a Wave 2 with the flat bits about 4 to 6 years ago? What a piece of junk. All the bolts were tightened so much I could barely open the damned thing. I contacted Leatherman about this and they said “just use it and it will loosen up”. Apparently, poor workmanship isn’t a warranty issue.
For a while, it stayed at home on a shelf. I kept applying oil in the hope it would loosen enough I could use it. After several months it sort of loosened enough I could use it.
The belt case is the perfect example of bad design. Made of webbing, which I knew at the time of purchase. What I didn’t know is the bit holders can fall out the bottom of the belt case. Total crap.
I lost the tool and I don’t even care. Never again will I buy a Leatherman. I expect better workmanship from a company not located in a third world country.
Most everything I’ve acquired made in this capitalist shithole has been shit. Always there are exceptions but generally nationalism, a cunt hair away from racism, is a poor way to judge quality…
That’s not exactly nationalism.
Whether you call it “third world” or “developing” the fact is that nations without the resources to hire and train skilled workers and purchase and develop high-quality machinery will generally be limited in their ability to produce high-quality products.
I mean, not even just that; companies don’t move manufacturing overseas to build a better product. There are plenty of product segments and individual products that demonstrate China and Taiwan are more than capable of producing high quality stuff with good QA, but no one moves manufacturing there to make high quality stuff, they do it because moving to a place with poor labor laws, cheap labor, with low expectations of health & saftey in the workplace, and weak environmental regulatory oversight is a unchecked-capitalism wet dream, and allows for more “competitive pricing” (a race to the bottom), and better profit margins.
Companies don’t move or start manufacturing overseas because they wanna build a good product, they do it cause it’s cheap as shit, and that’s reflected in a lot of what we associate with things being made poorly made. The manufacturing groups set up in other contries are perfectly capable of hitting QC goals, but it’s not like the folks doing business with them are generally asking for much with respect to product quality standards.
that’s a big part of how I look at it anyway
And the countries you mentioned can produce quality products if the company ordering the products cares enough to demand it and reject anything substandard.
See Apple. But you better believe they have QC experts at every level and if the suppliers don’t deliver they’ll never see another dime from Apple.
Bit surprised to hear that, they were able to repair a customized / engraved Wave that I’ve had for 14 years.
It saw heavy (ab)use, locking mechanism for the knife blade got stuck/damaged after I used a baton to split wood.
I wonder if they just gave me someone else’s refurbished but much harder used one
huh. ive been using mine for 3 years for work. the only thing that broke so far is the small screwdriver
80s made some decent ones, but mid 90s I got some crap. Stopped trying after 3rd model that just sucked… Not smooth after a few weeks, or quality control from day 1, etc… Just not pleasing and certainly not worth the cost.
I’ve gotten Gerber most other times, and have been largely happy with their stuff… Usually if something happens, it’s obviously my own stupid fault like over torquing with the pliers or snapping the blade doing something really stupid.
Were they better before?
My Skeletool has mostly held up for a decade and I’ve beat the shit out of it. I had a rivet break once but that was doing something really stupid that I shouldn’t have expected it to withstand. I sent it in and they fixed it. That was the only problem I’ve ever had with it. It’s one of my favorite possessions. Sad to see others have had bad experiences with the quality of the brand.
From what it sounds like they hit the enshittification trap too. I’ve had one from the late 90s that is still going strong. But now I’m hearing of more and more issues with them.
I have had one for almost 25. In constant use without fail. That and a Victorinox Cybertool have served me well since the Dot-Com boom days.
EDIT: Looked it up and it seems that my Cybertool is from the first year it was produced. Neat.
This is my first Leatherman, but so many people recommended them to me, and they’ve been around so long I presume they were actually good not shit like I’ve experienced.
I haven’t had any problems with them but I have older ones and the only service I had done was on my partner’s Wingman, which has been going strong for years. Just got a Wave+ for a family member though, so I guess we’ll see how it goes.
SOG makes a decent multitool line if you’re looking for a replacement.
This makes me glad I chose to replace my leatherman with a Swiss Army knife lol. I have the orange juice s2 and the only issue is a chip in the small screwdriver from trying to turn a different screwhead type. I keep it in my work bag but wanted something for personal use and decided on the deluxe tinker and am happy with it. The leatherman tools I looked at just didn’t vibe with me.
