A call to all those interested in sending Leatherman a message.

[ducttapetech]

Dear Leatherman,

    Thank you for your multitools.

+2   

[Sea Monster]

Who owns the designs after all this?

We're (mostly) good spirited and fine folk here, but let's say drawings and maybe even a prototype gets made up and someone (existing producer, freelancer, whoever) decides to build it - Who has rights for the IP?

[gregpost]

Dear Leatherman,

    Thank you for your multitools.

+1 also

[Marc_in_NS]

I'b be more than happy with a mini Surge, how hard can that be Leatherman 

That's what I thought of. A Surge TTi, in the Charge chassis but with big scissors, blade exchanger and awl. Keep the Charge TTi blades. Voilà!


On the other hand, I'm not sure I would use that instead of the Spirit.


So I might ask for:


1. Tighter tolerances.
2. Shinny brushed steel.
3. No rust please. No rust, you hear me?
4. Musical opening and closing.
5. Springs! Individual and precise.
6. Rounded edges, for us that work mainly with our mind and our hands are better suited to women caressing than rope climbing.
7. Can you make it slim and slender? (That's a difficult one).
8. Add some kind of a ratchet.
9. Ask a reasonable price for it. By reasonable I mean less than 1/2 of what you are thinking (as your greatest antagonist does).
10. Finally, make it yodel, if you know what I mean.


(Image removed from quote.)


Then I would (maybe) EDC it.

+100 absolutely best response I have read in years...

[ducttapetech]

I'b be more than happy with a mini Surge, how hard can that be Leatherman 

That's what I thought of. A Surge TTi, in the Charge chassis but with big scissors, blade exchanger and awl. Keep the Charge TTi blades. Voilà!


On the other hand, I'm not sure I would use that instead of the Spirit.


So I might ask for:


1. Tighter tolerances.
2. Shinny brushed steel.
3. No rust please. No rust, you hear me?
4. Musical opening and closing.
5. Springs! Individual and precise.
6. Rounded edges, for us that work mainly with our mind and our hands are better suited to women caressing than rope climbing.
7. Can you make it slim and slender? (That's a difficult one).
8. Add some kind of a ratchet.
9. Ask a reasonable price for it. By reasonable I mean less than 1/2 of what you are thinking (as your greatest antagonist does).
10. Finally, make it yodel, if you know what I mean.


(Image removed from quote.)


Then I would (maybe) EDC it.

+100 absolutely best response I have read in years...

Almost, I don't want it to yodel, I want it to rock and I don't it to be slippery.

[Aloha]

Who owns the designs after all this?

We're (mostly) good spirited and fine folk here, but let's say drawings and maybe even a prototype gets made up and someone (existing producer, freelancer, whoever) decides to build it - Who has rights for the IP?

Great question.  I thought you guys were the brains around here?

[jaya_man]

Interesting thread... Don't know If I can contribute much though...

Here's something that's been on my mind... Any reasons why the juice line has the pivot and tool pins (if that's the correct term) peened instead if torx screws? Why kill the KF4? Why not have something like a KF4 but with scissors instead of serrated blade?

Beefier plier heads like the skeletool's would also be nice.

I like the wave... just lacks the awl... a ratchet device would be nice too...

On a local LM users community, I see a lot of questions daily how to go about claiming warranty and with pictures of broken tools... All praises for LM in making customers happy, but is this a sign of a drop in QC?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Aloha]

Broken LM tools and warranty claims have got to be big part of their "business".  I saw a y-tube of a guy telling people to buy broken tools off flea bay so they can return them to LM for new tools  .

I'd say a broken parts is both user error and abuse as well as QC issues like heat treat.  I have not broken any part off my Wave but my Juice back springs have broke.  I have also snapped the tip off my small flat driver un screwing a screw using my ST300.

I recently decided to carry my Charge TTi.  I originally got this tool from a guy who barely used it.  I carried it but the CC plier head turned me off.  Anyway, after going thru the tool I was saddened to see how crappy the S30V blade grind is.  I also noticed how uneven the Ti scales are.  The file has an awful rub either opening or closing.  The diamond side hits the inside of the frame and is filing away material. 

The inside tools don't clump and the plier head is well done tho.  It also looks like theres different torx on one side.  The star is set deeper on one side while the star is "raised" on the other.  Not sure if its meant to be that way or what. 

On a tool at this price point I'd really expect higher FnF.  If you are going to use S30V you should really take the time to do it justice. 

IMO the tool should be gone thru a lot more closely vs the Wingman for instance prior to shipping.   

 

[SteveC]

Dear Leatherman,

    Thank you for your multitools.

+2   

+3 

[Yalius]

I'b be more than happy with a mini Surge, how hard can that be Leatherman 

That's what I thought of. A Surge TTi, in the Charge chassis but with big scissors, blade exchanger and awl. Keep the Charge TTi blades. Voilà!


On the other hand, I'm not sure I would use that instead of the Spirit.


So I might ask for:


1. Tighter tolerances.
2. Shinny brushed steel.
3. No rust please. No rust, you hear me?
4. Musical opening and closing.
5. Springs! Individual and precise.
6. Rounded edges, for us that work mainly with our mind and our hands are better suited to women caressing than rope climbing.
7. Can you make it slim and slender? (That's a difficult one).
8. Add some kind of a ratchet.
9. Ask a reasonable price for it. By reasonable I mean less than 1/2 of what you are thinking (as your greatest antagonist does).
10. Finally, make it yodel, if you know what I mean.


(Image removed from quote.)


Then I would (maybe) EDC it.

1. Tighter tolerances.
    No. I want something that will still function when I pick it up after dropping in the mud, not something that's going to bind up and jam because a fleck of something is inside the pivot.

2. Shiny brushed steel
    No. I want something with a bit of texture so I have grip in less-than-ideal conditions.

3. No rust
     Fair enough.

4. Musical opening and closing.
    No. I want something that can be tweaked to be able to flip it open when I have only one hand free, not an aesthetically pleasing but useless snicky-snack.

5. Springs! Individual and precise..
     No. Again, I don't want something that will jam and make my life more difficult when I just dropped my tool in mud or other assorted crud.

6. Rounded edges,
    Fair enough, just not so rounded that they eliminate all purchase or traction.

7. Can you make it slim and slender?
    No. Give me meat that I can torque down on and fills my hand.

8. Add some kind of a ratchet.
    No. I'm not driving 3" screws into wood or assembling an engine with my multi. Use a power driver for that.

9. Ask a reasonable price for it
    Fair enough.

10. Finally, make it yodel, if you know what I mean.
     No. I want a tool that I can do work with, not play with the joy of using a tool.

I don't want a copy of a Swisstool, I want a grippy, ergonomic workhorse that doesn't fight me every step of the way and make my every task slow and frustrating.

To my mind, Leatherman stakes out the happy medium... better QC and friendliness than Gerber, better ergonomics and usefulness than Victorinox.

[zoidberg]

Ok so did this move underground and I can't see it or did the conversation just stop.   

[Kev D]

I think it just stopped

[AimlessWanderer]

To my mind, Leatherman stakes out the happy medium... better QC and friendliness than Gerber, better ergonomics and usefulness than Victorinox.

Whatever Leatherman tool is being referred to here, is one I have never seen or heard of.

[Vidar]

Multi-tools are necessarily compromises between different features and priorities. What someone considers an optimal mix for them will to a large extent depend on the intended use and what the person values in a multi-tool.

Many of these considerations and priorities are also mutually exclusive. For a thread to come up with useful concrete suggestions, and reduce the number of opposing wishes for a single same tool, I believe it would be helpful to divide the wishes into a few broad categories. Weight and size are key limiting factors for all tools and largely drives the necessary level of compromise and function. So it might make sense to sort suggestions by three categories because wishes within one of these categories will often not make sense in the others:

Keychain sized for light duties
Everyday pocket size for general use
Belt carry sized for heavier use

 

[Douglas]

Multi-tools are necessarily compromises between different features and priorities. What someone considers an optimal mix for them will to a large extent depend on the intended use and what the person values in a multi-tool.

Many of these considerations and priorities are also mutually exclusive. For a thread to come up with useful concrete suggestions, and reduce the number of opposing wishes for a single same tool, I believe it would be helpful to divide the wishes into a few broad categories. Weight and size are key limiting factors for all tools and largely drives the necessary level of compromise and function. So it might make sense to sort suggestions by three categories because wishes within one of these categories will often not make sense in the others:

Keychain sized for light duties
Everyday pocket size for general use
Belt carry sized for heavier use

 
  Excelent point   With so many difering needs/ desires/ a few catagories like this should be very productive.  I would love to see a leatherman I could belive in.  Leatherman did get me hooked on Plier based MTs, but quickly let me down when I had the handle break on three original style Waves in one year.  I was just useing the pliers as pliers NO abuse.  My victorinox Swisstool has been with me 20 years now and never let me down even with considerable ABUSE. 
Hope to see something come from this as I would like to give Leatherman another chance, but don't see any thing on the market tough enough or inclusive enough with out extras to keep up with.

[AimlessWanderer]

Multi-tools are necessarily compromises between different features and priorities. What someone considers an optimal mix for them will to a large extent depend on the intended use and what the person values in a multi-tool.

Many of these considerations and priorities are also mutually exclusive. For a thread to come up with useful concrete suggestions, and reduce the number of opposing wishes for a single same tool, I believe it would be helpful to divide the wishes into a few broad categories. Weight and size are key limiting factors for all tools and largely drives the necessary level of compromise and function. So it might make sense to sort suggestions by three categories because wishes within one of these categories will often not make sense in the others:

Keychain sized for light duties
Everyday pocket size for general use
Belt carry sized for heavier use

 
  Excelent point   With so many difering needs/ desires/ a few catagories like this should be very productive.  I would love to see a leatherman I could belive in.  Leatherman did get me hooked on Plier based MTs, but quickly let me down when I had the handle break on three original style Waves in one year.  I was just useing the pliers as pliers NO abuse.  My victorinox Swisstool has been with me 20 years now and never let me down even with considerable ABUSE. 
Hope to see something come from this as I would like to give Leatherman another chance, but don't see any thing on the market tough enough or inclusive enough with out extras to keep up with.

I've been hit and miss with the brand, and knowing what I know now, if I was starting from scratch I'd be happy to buy a couple of their old tools, but aside from the Wave, I'd not buy any of their current line. There are several tools I would be happy to buy from Gerber and Victorinox in their current lines. If they (as we suspect they will) replace the Wave plier head with the Rebar one, there will be NO tools in the current Leatherman range that I would buy

That's quite a sad state of affairs.

SOG are another company that doesn't offer anything I'd hand over money for. The PowerAccess showed promise in concept, but the one I handled made me very happy I didn't take a chance with buying one.

[Wallace72]

Are your concerns with the changes to the rebar plier heads the loss in durability due to the void that the cutters occupy or the loss in precision? Not that it's a huge deal but the casting  imperfections on the newer plier heads leave a little to be desired in the QC dep. I think the replaceable cutter hold value for some tools but I dislike the push for making it standard. For instance, there are a light of offsetting things about the Signal that make me question its intended superiority as a survival/camp tool compared to a wave. Replaceable cutters don't seem to have much merit in the woods and that tool would be better off with more elongated pliers for fishing, removing splinters,etc. Leatherman knows that people will buy their products regardless of their faults so they don't feel pressured to innovate which is why they can get away with slapping a whistle on a tool and marketing it as an outdoor survival tool.

[AimlessWanderer]

Are your concerns with the changes to the rebar plier heads the loss in durability due to the void that the cutters occupy or the loss in precision? Not that it's a huge deal but the casting  imperfections on the newer plier heads leave a little to be desired in the QC dep. I think the replaceable cutter hold value for some tools but I dislike the push for making it standard. For instance, there are a light of offsetting things about the Signal that make me question its intended superiority as a survival/camp tool compared to a wave. Replaceable cutters don't seem to have much merit in the woods and that tool would be better off with more elongated pliers for fishing, removing splinters,etc. Leatherman knows that people will buy their products regardless of their faults so they don't feel pressured to innovate which is why they can get away with slapping a whistle on a tool and marketing it as an outdoor survival tool.

That can only last so long, and I think more and more people are becoming less than enthralled.

As to my views on the Rebar plier head:

1) They increase handle splay in my experience.
2) They impede the main gripping area even worse than the standard design.
3) They need more force to cut the same wire in comparison with the standard head due to changes in geometry
4) They're bloody ugly

Also, I'm not altogether convinced that they're as strong as the original design, despite adding the 1980's shoulder pads.

[ThePeacent]

Even though I own most LM multitools than any other brand, with time I've gotten to appreciate and prefer Gerber and SOG for tough tasks, hard jobs and heavy use.
I now prefer Leatherman for their smaller offerings, and the 3 I carry the most are simplistic and light duty (Micra, Squirt, Skeletool). Victorinox Spirit is also used and trusted for every kind of job and any task.
Leatherman lost much appeal to me with the replaceable wire cutters, that's the reason I prefer my CORE to the ST300 in the plier head, the reason I keep my old Surge and haven't gotten a new one (even though I had an absolute steal of a price for it, $40 almost like new) and the very thing that kept me from getting a Rebar for so long.



Now, of my last 10 MT purchases, 8 have been SOG and Gerber, 1 Victorinox and only 1 Leatherman.
That is no casual thing. I prefer older tools, as I've said many times in this forum, and I am disappointed by Leatherman's direction and decision of these last years.



I'd send them a message if they were open to changes, but it doesn't seem so judging by their latest products