Vendor complaints versus design discussion

Meta
5

There was sooooo much discussion about this within the mods. Every point you raised was weighed. I myself, a fan of darwin and letting the beaten exit on their own, even saw the light eventually.

when it was all said and done, we decided to get firm with vendor bashing and make sure it didn’t take away from the rest of the forum.

Thankfully the new guys have no idea how bad it was. Every other thread was “where’s my order” and “that guy’s a jerk” and “holy shit i just got refunded and told to fuck off”

You see, the truth is we’re terrible people.

Maybe we should have a section off to the side for it. Maybe that should be reconsidered. But then the issue will move from “we don’t have a place for it” to “oh look how neatly they shove our concerns to the side”.

I’m game for re-debating it if the rest of the mods think its worth it. Just know that we don’t make these decisions lightly and that we’ve been here since the beginning. like the literal beginning. Jason invited us here to start this thing up right and we’ve watched everything since that time. These types of decisions are based on those things we watched and learned from.

3 Likes
6

you’ve been here long enough to know exactly what i’m talking about. We’re either up to our nuts in bullshit posts or we’re explaining why seemingly legitimate complaints are being brushed off.

We had to pick one.

4 Likes
7

I think what my side lady friend’s son is trying to say is we don’t need to neatly balance every thread with a side of negative bullshit.

Thanks for the effort though! A+

2 Likes
8

So you agree with me. Good.

2 Likes
9

waiiit a minute…

YOUR FACE.

2 Likes
10

@Deckoz in case you hadn’t seen it, below is the guideline we mods all agreed on. There’s a difference between design or product observations, and complaints about a single order.

I have to make this argument every few months, nothing new here. We close threads that are related to a single order or JUST HOW MAD someone is about the speed of their order, return, or refund. The rationale is in the post below.

People get really upset when they’ve paid money and don’t get what they expect, we all understand that. But the drama doesn’t serve anyone.

Feedback about products is 100% welcome and always will be. Even if it is criticism. Especially if it is criticism. Did a product fail? Write about it! We all want to see that.

11

full disclosure, a lot of us actually are in cahoots, but i didn’t think pointing that out would be helpful.

1 Like
12

Just a thought but…

Instead of making a post dedicated to complaining about an order or vendor why don’t you just make a build thread for your board. Then if there are any updates with your build progress you can update the post. Updates can be anything from new wheels, motor, paint, etc… to blown out bearing trying to break a speed record or even a delay cause items aren’t arriving on time so you haven’t been able to complete your awesome ride.

We’re all builders here and we love to help and see different build ideas.

If you’re having a set back because of a particular issue we can usually provide suggestions to dealing with it. As well as the issue will remain visible for other people too see and notice trends.

8 Likes
13

@Deckoz we had a truly BS “vendor” here a few months ago. Without going into specifics or naming names, that vendor was quickly and readily shoved out of the community and off of the forum. The forum and its members created an environment where that person couldn’t continue. We look out for each other.

4 Likes
14

There’s such a range of ages on here now though some kids dont know any better,but saying that there’s a lot of adults in this world that act as morons too,the only time I would open a thread up about a vendor would be for not receiving a product or felt I was being treated unfairly or being blatantly lied to,all after actually trying to work it out behind the scenes of course! I think it’s safe to say most people are honest and probably give a accurate time of turn around and shipping,patients is something iv gained with age but some just don’t aquire better characteristics and stay the same and it shows in there childish posts bashing vendors,but not all of us are listening to them,it’s quite clear what some people’s motives are,my advice to people waiting on products is to weigh up how much you actually want it and is it worth the wait and just be prepared to be patient should it take longer! Vendors are people just like me and you and have lives to live as well as a business to run,so respect them and they will respect you and at the end of the day your problem will get resolved!

15

Not my forum, relative new comer…not sure if my comments have any value :stuck_out_tongue:

Noticed that this forum attracts allot of people who are unfamiliar with ESK8 tech. Some of them are considering building their own board without even having any prior experience riding a longboard or mountain board. They come across certain vendors spamming this forum in a strategic manner (posting products multiple times, posting ‘‘specials’’ several times, etc.) without any repercussions. Those vendors also tend to hide certain specifications on the items they offer and obviously, none of the downsides of their mass production designs are listed/mentioned (discharge rates, BMS specifications, lack of replacement parts, etc.).

High exposure, low prices results in lots of newcomers asking about these products. I tend to see the same questions on ‘‘eBay ESCs’’ and cheap Li-Ion packs, horridly designed motor mounts, etc.

Those actually selling good products and offering excellent post sales support do not nearly get the attention they deserve. They don’t spam the forum, nor excessively highlight their products. Some of them get rightfully deserved referrals when people ask for advice, but that is about it.

Would be good if there is a better balance there. Single threads for vendors, excessive posting of ‘‘Black Friday’’ deals etc. could maybe be removed. Is there for example really a need to list the entire inventory of a shop here one day/post at a time?

Would also be nice if people could list recommended components and list downsides of certain brands without getting into trouble (Maytech VESC is bashed beyond any reasonable point, but discussing design issues of certain other products is at times considered problematic).

Typical shipping times of vendors is also something that I find valuable. For example, waiting for about a week for a replacement VESC from the same country as opposed to 1 day from Italy (more than 1000km away, props to skating.eu) is something I would have loved to know about :grin:

16

I’m not sure why this was split but since it was

-build threads. Meh cool and all. But not for me. -issues are typically on failed products that shouldn’t be for sale due to failure vs success rates

Ie: TB VESC - out of 26 of them, 100% failure rate TB antispark - out of the 11, 100% failure within 1-2 on/off cycles Kaly and BKBs original motors(same manufacturer) had under sized shaft set screws, bell spins on shaft. Focboxes - not all are created equal(97% of them are just fine lol)

I’m not here to argue about whether a someone’s order took to long or shipping,or even refunds. I’m saying these vendors should act like businesses. Sell a defective product, not offer a replacement, and ignoring your customers isn’t how companies grow.

Its your business. Own it along with all of its downfalls… Oh wait that might mean more money out of your pocket vs lining it with the stones you sold to a poor smuck. But that poor smuck wasn’t trying to be your beta tester…or maybe he was.

I don’t care for the drama either, but watching people buy the same shit over and over, and it failing, and customer services stop responding or ignoring. Then someone brings it to light here, the thread gets opened, everyone except the purchaser supports the vendor, thread gets closed. Off to never land it goes. More then likely won’t get a replacement or refund unless you use AMEX or Paypal like a champ. And then the next person falls into the same hole, because all the information of failures lives in Neverland, an unsearchable place. And the cycle continues.

Sometimes if your lucky the vendors fix the issues for future batches via design changes. But more then likely your still stuck with that one shitty broken thing that didn’t work from the start.

Do I have setbacks? Sure. Do I have any vendors to complain about their semi half thought out engineering? Personally, not anymore, as I’ve been building everything myself with the exception of motors, the wood plank and the truck. So the only one at fault can be me. But not everyone has this ability or tools.

and yet there is censorship…what the post is about…

4 Likes
17

Learning what is and what isn’t a failed product, is part of that. Otherwise we’d all be building the cheapest rideable failsticks around.

5 Likes
18

You mentioned TB vesc as a failed product and 100% fail rate but iv ran 2 for over a year on bldc to look after them and they have never let me down!

4 Likes
19

I’ve got a dual and a single with TB VESC’s, only problem I ever had was a single running FOC and @torqueboards replaced it. Its been running fine for months. My dual has been running for over a year in BLDC without an issue at all. I’m wondering how much of this user error or environmental maybe.

5 Likes
20

I’m still working on a new ESC still in testing phases but hopefully this should be the last testing phase! I want absolutely zero issues what so ever besides you breaking it with a hammer! :slight_smile: It will be an on-going effort to make the ESC better each iteration. I’ll probably do a test beta run sometime in a few months so for those that seriously have tremendous DRV issues. Please PM me as I’d like some hardcore testing done. I have a few people in mind but the more the merrier. This would not be a free testing product :).

5 Likes
21

send me a set i’ll give them to Jake. If he can’t cook them your golden.

2 Likes
22

@longhairedboy sure thing :slight_smile: I will do.

1 Like
23

if we sent you a faulty product & you have photos to prove it please send an email/chat showing the issue… we have 24/7 chat/support so we are ready to discuss it now.

24

I think it is one of the coolest aspects of this forum, having so many founders, vendors, innovators reading and posting here among us mortals! They get the most direct feedback possible and can keep everyone in the loop about what is going on in their supply, development, specials etc. Also they are the ones that know their products the best and can give good advice or resolve problems, when they feel like it.

What really impresses me is also, how peacefully they usually coexist, without trying to badmouth competition, get more attention than the other etc etc. Even during black friday, the advertising posts were extremely modest and definitely far more informative than annoying. When I found out that this forum is owned by Jason, the enertion boss, I could not believe, how fairly criticism is handled here.

Esk8 parts being produced/sold professionally and in large quantities is a fairly new thing as I understand. This means that a certain level of human chaos should definitely be allowed regarding the shops because there is no one brand that has been in the game for 20 years and should have perfected everything by now. You are right saying that we should not be beta testers but we are still early adopters and that is where shit sometimes still tends to happen. Be grateful that we don’t all have to work with lame rc parts like the pre 2013s builders!

I don’t think there are many setups, where customers and vendors have such a tight connection than in the Esk8 community and in this forum. As I said, it is a privilege, to have the vendors here and It is so easy to contact them for personal issues. This and their patience should not be abused by creating flame threads because something did not go as planned and you are trying to get their attention. You can flame banggood as much as you like but I doubt the owner will give 2 shts about your issue.

Also I think most of the vendors are in the game because they love skating and not because they are getting crazy rich while screwing over poor customers on purpose. You said tb vescs arent the best quality and cant handle foc? Faulty Enertion Focboxes exist? Anybody who has read 3 threads in here knows that so I don’t think there is crazy censorship going on. I know I am new here but I still wanted to give my 2 cents on this topic and the overwhelmingly positive experience I had on this forum so far. Mods, please keep deleting uninformative hateposts by people that take themselves too seriously!

tl;dr Thanks vendors for not being normal ecommerce CEOs!

2 Likes