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My friends, welcome to this episode of the Outdoor Gear Review. I hope you all are doing well. Roughly 1 month ago, I put up a preview concerning an ultra-light chair that was made from the best of materials. This product was ultra high-end and at the same time, it was very, very inexpensive. Inside of this storage bag is the chair and this comes from a company known as M Snail. I think that's how you pronounce it. Once you get past the name, the actual product itself was very, very impressive. This entire setup weighs only 1.6 lbs. The frame is made from carbon fiber and the seat itself is made from Dyneema. Just in case you do not know, these materials are some of
the most advanced being used currently in the outdoor space. But yet, this chair was very inexpensive. Speaking of price, this chair goes for roughly $60 to $70 depending on the day, the hour, the minute on Amazon. As you know, on Amazon, the prices of things fluctuate somewhat. I've seen it for as low as 60 bucks. I've seen it as high as $70. Generally speaking, when it comes to outdoor products made with these materials, they cost hundreds of dollars if not approaching the $1,000 mark. That's what makes this chair so very impressive. Over the last month or so, which accounts for roughly four trips out, everything has gone very well with this chair until things didn't go so well with this chair. On the last
adventure out, I had a catastrophic failure with this product. I was out on a backpacking adventure, evening was approaching and I was sitting in the chair eating my dinner. That's when I got up to move the camera, right? When I got up, the chair broke. Broke in a way that it cannot be fixed. In this episode, my friends, I'm going to talk about this chair, what I experienced, and what is taking place right now. I think you all will find this very, very interesting. So, let's just go ahead, let's play the clip of this chair breaking. Oh, Oh, no. Now that you've seen the clip, let me go ahead, take this chair out of the storage bag, and set it up as far as I can, so I could show you all the problem.
With the frame being set up as far as I can set it up, we have the four legs, the two front supports, and here we have the back supports. This one is fine. This one here is now broken. It simply cannot be used, and it will not hold itself in the place. The failure point is right here between these two poles. The shock cord is still there. The materials are for the most part fine, but yet, as you can see, this will not stay together.
The reason why is quite interesting. Focusing on the back support pole that is not broken, check this out. Watch what happens when we separate these two components. Do you see something that's missing from the other side? The side that broke is missing the connector pole that basically connects this portion to this portion of the pole system. That piece is lodged up inside of this pole. This is the connector pole that I'm talking about that is now lodged inside of that pole there. This is glued to this section here. And this pole goes in just like that, and that's what supports this entire thing.
Without the connector pole, these two pieces do this. So, again, that connector pole has come unglued and is now lodged way up here. So, it can't connect these two together. When the connector pole came unglued and shifted, it caused a great deal of force to go through this pole system here, and it did splinter and crack this carbon fiber. As far as the issue goes, that is basically it. It is not a failure of the materials themselves, but rather a defect with the manufacturing process. Now, I need to mention that doesn't mean that every chair is going to have this problem. This may be unique to me. Stuff like this certainly does happen. For an example, when I take a tent out and I waterproof test it, just because the
tent that I purchased may have leaked, doesn't mean that every single tent will leak. Now, of course, it does depend on the issue and what the reason is for the leaking. If there was an imperfection with the seam tape, that could be unique to the tent that I have, and no other tent is going to have that problem. If a tent is leaking from the vents because the design is poor, that's more than likely going to affect all of those tents with that design. With that said, again, there's no telling if this is a widespread issue or if it's unique to this chair and this chair alone. As it stands right now, we simply do not have enough information to go on, and that's why I wanted to get this video out
there. I wanted you all to be aware of the issue that I had, just in case you have one, you could be looking out for this issue, too, which may or may not present itself. Or, if you're considering one of these chairs, it's something that you are at least aware of. By the way, folks, it should be mentioned that the weight limit of this chair is 330 lb, and I am on the closer side of 200 lb, which is far from 330 lb. So, no, this is not an issue as far as the weight limit goes. Now, when it comes to this chair, I have to say I am disappointed with this failure. This product has a lot going for it. Super high-end materials, ultra lightweight, technically very strong, and at the same time very inexpensive. Again, especially
for these materials. It is my hope that this issue is isolated to this chair and this chair alone, and it's not some sort of larger defect with the chair overall. As soon as I had an issue with this chair and I got home, I sent this company an email. Well, technically it was a message on their website. I could not find an email address. Also, I purchased this on Amazon and it was outside of the return policy. So, I had to contact the company. I did so through their website, and unfortunately, I did not get a response. Or at least, that's what I thought. This morning before I left the house, it dawned on me, maybe I should check the spam folder, and I am glad that I did because I had a response
from the company. And that response came in the exact same day that I sent them a message. Do note that I contacted this company with a burner account. They do not know that my name is Luke, this is the Outdoor Gear Review or anything like that. It's not like I'm getting any sort of like preferred treatment because I do YouTube or anything. As far as the company's concerned, I'm just a typical purchaser from Amazon. Their response was excellent. All that they wanted were two things: pictures of the issues, well, I guess three things, a description of the issues, and they wanted an address to send a replacement chair to. That, everyone, is a very impressive response. Now, assuming that everything goes well, I get a
replacement chair, this sort of response is better than what you will experience with many companies in the United States. And that's pretty crazy to say. Sometime back, I had an issue with a Nemo sleeping pad. I emailed the company. A couple days go by, I get a reply. I respond, handful of days go by, I get a reply. Incredibly slow, very poor customer service with a very expensive product. Ultimately, I did get a replacement for that pad, but I had to jump through so many ridiculous hoops, and it took forever to get it all resolved. With this company here, this is a very inexpensive product and their customer service seems to be excellent. And again, so far my experiences with this chair have been very good up until
this point. With that said, I do want to talk about two issues that I've heard of from you all. I had one viewer write in who purchased this chair from the M Snaily website. That name, everyone. They purchased it from the website. It took a little while for it to arrive because it was coming from China. So, they wrote the company and they never got a response. I suspect that the response actually went to their spam folder, just like it did with me. I suspect this because when you get a response from this company, it's not like it's like so-and-so at M Snaily. It's very much like someone's personal email address. So, obviously this is a small company and if they're using
personal email addresses to write back, it could cause an issue and it could go to spam, just like it did with me. I heard from another viewer named Jeff who purchased this chair after my preview. And when it arrived, there was an issue. The frame and the poles were put together incorrectly. Luckily for him, this was an easy fix. He undid the shock cord, took everything apart, put it back together, and now the chair works perfectly. Thank you to both of the viewers who wrote in and shared their experiences. I do appreciate it. When it comes to the products that I'm testing out, I can only share my experiences.
What I find really helpful is when you all share your feedback as well. And as you can see, I do include that feedback in the videos that I do. And that, everyone, wraps up the story involving this chair as it stands right now. Another one is on the way and my testing will continue. And it will be interesting to see whether or not I have any other issues. Again, when it comes to this chair, it wasn't a failure of the materials. It was a failure of the manufacturing process. Specifically, the glue that holds the connector pole into place came undone and that's why the chair failed. Have to fix this myself? Absolutely. Unfortunately, that connector pole is really lodged inside
of that pole and there's no getting it out not without breaking something. Anyways, folks, my testing with this chair, the replacement, will continue and I will be back with my ultimate review after I thoroughly tested out the second chair. If you have purchased one of these chairs or if you plan to and you want to share your experiences with me, I would appreciate it and I will include those in a future review of this chair. This everyone is why this channel exist. I test out products so you all don't have to and at the same time I can help companies make better products, which is really awesome to say because over the last 12, 13 years the Outdoor Gear Review has helped countless
companies make much better products. Products that better serve their customers. Dozens and dozens of times revisions of products have hit the market because of this channel and our testing. Products that were dangerous for people to use. Walmart, I'm talking about you. Do you all remember the Lithic line of products from Moose Jaw and Walmart? That's right, the Outdoor Gear Review was solely responsible for having that entire product line shut down. Backpacks, tents, stoves, sleeping bags, all of it. It goes back to being agenda free, which this channel is. This channel is about information, it's not about selling products and that's what
separates it from the vast majority of outdoor channels on YouTube. If you can respect that sort of thing, please hit the thumbs up. I do appreciate it. Also, you can support the channel, Patreon, YouTube. Oh, yeah. Until next time everyone, take care. Be well. Strength and honor. Bye for now.
