Dude...you're the one that's making all the fuss and dismissing everyone else's opinion about Kinetix as "NOT FAIR". We're simply stating what we know of the product and just because you have them doesn't make them better or worse than any other.

I can't understand why you're so caught up on defending them...what's the big deal???? If you haven't had any problems, you should be happy and we wish you well. Get over it and move on!!!!!

 

No, my problem is with people turning them into a doomsday company and sucking Crawford's nuts. I'm only trying to open people's eyes - Crawford's products arn't a godsend, but because of the cost most would just bury their heads in the sand and pretend any problems are in the extreme minority.

 

99atlantic,

you're right, all products are good and bad. the reason why crawford's products do get a lot of positive press is because people post positive reviews about them. i already knew about crawford's cats having their problems before, so your links weren't news to me. i think the main thing is that people who have crawford cats love them and post lots of good things about them. i might have missed it, but i don't recall anybody posting about how they love their kinetix cat. (this is where i think you'll find a link and post it to prove your side)

either way, people like what they like; you like what you like. deal with it.

 

You'd be amazed how much free time I have ^_^

From my350z:

 

It seems to me that those cats are poorly designed and manufactured. If I were you I would sell those new ones and buy Crawfords. I have inspected Crawfords and they are well made.

Those welds probably do not have any penetration(from what I can see), it is just weld metal on top of the thicker pipe. The company doing the welding is definately not certified.

The problem is that the thick pipe is welded to much thinner material. This product is just not engineered.

The cat stays intact for a while because its a slip fitting. The weld is just keeping the two pieces together. The weld itself is not the connection. The thinner material fails due to fatigue in the heat afftected zone in time. The material is not thick enough and the weld is not appropriate.

Poor quality control may have something to do with this, but my guess it that this happens a lot and will continue to happen to others in the future. This is why they are so nice about it. They don't want you to smash their name.

I think this product is of poor quality compared to Crawford's equal.

I am a structural engineer and this is my opinion. My firm specializes in welding design and certification.

Someone should forward this info. to Kinetix, so they can smarten up.

 

To be fair ( man, i'm starting to sound like their salesman ), they have re-designed the manufacturering process and increased the gauge metal.

Out of curiousity, how do you explain the multiple the posts about people with Crawford cats blowing out and/or cracking (a few posts above are some links where people are bitching about them)...........fault tolerances, or perhaps just from an old batch?

Btw, did you get the SES sorted out?

 

last may or june is when i purchased... bought it after a month or two after i got my car

 

yea, that would be one of their earlier batch designs....the newer ones (which i assume is what they replaced your broken ones with since, like you said, you noticed differences out of the box) shouldn't have brakage problems (hopefully :/ )

 

i hope so too but i dunno why i had to pay 120+ for new set...

 

yea, that part does suck

only thing i can think of is that since only 1 cat broke, they give you 1 cat for free, and make you pay for the other cat (since it's being used to replace a non-broken one)

 

I still havn't got a chance to get the SES checked out. I will this weekend. Watch me have to put my foot in my mouth after I find out my crawford cat is cracked. LOL.

Well I know more ppl have Crawfords than kinetix so that makes a difference in terms of statistics and the number of problems. I have only heard of 2 individuals having problems with Crawfords before today and I know Doug replaced them for free. He even told me he would.

Kinetix may have improved there product but I believed Crawford had a better product when I purchase my cats. The welding on the Crawford units was very good. I didn't realize kinetix product has changed. I didn't read the whole tread. I was basing my analysis on this particular case and things I've read before.

 

that's ****ed up

 

okay i'm sooo freakin pissed... so i went out to install my new cat... and wat do you know my right side cat flange where y-pipe bolts up does not match up with my y-pipe flange.. looks like they welded wrong... so my car is still sittin in my garage on my jack stand.. i can't believe i paid 120+ and can't get it to install.... and no way in hell am i gonna force this in cuss i don't want anything breakin again...

 

i'm assuming u mean they increased the thickness of the pipe material. this isn't going to do squat if they're still welding the way they are. in fact it will make matters worse. without a fully penetrated weld that thing is gonna fall apart.

 

I don't really understand anything about welding, hehehe.....I'm just basing my information off my information when I talked with the owner, as well as reading his posts on my350z........the term 'penetrarted weld' did come up, but I have no clue what that meant and/or if it was important, so I didn't take note of it. Yea, yea, my bad for incomplete information

Although that would suck ( ), I would have to giggle just a ~little~ if that were the case. lol