FUSION thread deleted

Is there going to be any kind of explanation as to why the thread was deleted or will it be the usual 'no explanation given we do what we want' attitude?

We are interested in improving our products and will listen to any thoughts, complaints, ideas etc.

Feel free to contact me, matt.hulet@fusionclimb.com

Let me see if I understand this situation.

A climber and member of the MP community discovered a safety issue that might affect other climbers and could, taken to the extreme worst case scenario, endanger their lives.

That climber alerted MP to the risk without any sort of inflammatory language or insults.

Others thanked him for his warning and made their own comments - again without any flaming out.

The thread, nothing more than a public safety announcement concerning a piece of gear that climbers trust their life to, was deleted without comment.

Did I get that right? Please explain to me, MP admins, what sort of format a PSA needs to take in order to avoid being deleted. Furthermore, I'm curious as to whether or not Fusion climbing (proud MP member since 2 hours ago!) made any sort of threat. Anyway - I guess I'll have to turn to rockclimbing.com for my hard-hitting Fusion product reviews. ( rockclimbing.com/cgi-bin/fo…)

(Insert Orwell reference here)

If it's any consolation, Fusion had nothing to do with the post being deleted.

And we are contacting everyone who has purchased that anchor in the past year to check for similar problems.

If there's any other questions or interest in what happened I will gladly disclose any and all information about it.

-matt hulet
Fusion

FYI the original post (but not the entire thread) is still in Google's cache and can be found here: webcache.googleusercontent.…

FusionClimb wrote: If there's any other questions or interest in what happened I will gladly disclose any and all information about it. -matt hulet Fusion

Okay Matt, I'll bite.

- In the opinion of Fusion Climbing, were the welds in the original MP post a problem for the structural strength of the rap rings?
- Why were the welds in the photos that were posted here on MP incomplete?
- Furthermore, to what extent does the incomplete weld impact the strength of the rap rings?
- Has whatever problem with your manufacturing process that led to the incomplete welds been fixed?
- And finally, is your hardware inspected before it ships? (and if it is inspected, how did the flawed units pass?)

Austin Baird wrote:Let me see if I understand this situation.... [remainder redacted]

It appears so Austin. I'd like to give them the benefit of the doubt and wait for an explanation, but they're establishing a history of freely editing threads without any accountability or explanation. I would point to a thread I started awhile back asking to discuss this issue, but that too was deleted.

Austin Baird wrote:Let me see if I understand this situation. A climber and member of the MP community discovered a safety issue that might affect other climbers and could, taken to the extreme worst case scenario, endanger their lives. That climber alerted MP to the risk without any sort of inflammatory language or insults. Others thanked him for his warning and made their own comments - again without any flaming out. The thread, nothing more than a public safety announcement concerning a piece of gear that climbers trust their life to, was deleted without comment. Did I get that right? Please explain to me, MP admins, what sort of format a PSA needs to take in order to avoid being deleted. Furthermore, I'm curious as to whether or not Fusion climbing (proud MP member since 2 hours ago!) made any sort of threat. Anyway - I guess I'll have to turn to rockclimbing.com for my hard-hitting Fusion product reviews. ( rockclimbing.com/cgi-bin/fo…) (Insert Orwell reference here)

+1 WTF gives? a safety warning and it gets deleted?

The original poster wanted it deleted, so we obliged.

I too find it odd that the entire thread was deleted. As of last night, the thread was progressing in a mature manner and was extremely relevant to the climbing community.

Thanks for posting the relevant RC links. It appears that there have been issues in the past regarding these products.

I would really like to know why a safety related thread was deleted. Those above all else should remain, regardless of potential embarassment to a manufacturer.

I would add that my personal opinion is that I find it strange that the post was deleted at the same time as the manufacturer started posting here.

Edit - Thanks for the clarification Andy. That seems like an odd request, but no reason we can't continue to discuss the issue.

Andy Laakmann wrote:The original poster wanted it deleted, so we obliged.

And what about the rest of the people that have participated or read the thread? Either the information was incorrect, in which case we should know about it, or it remains a safety issue. I continue to be confused by the ways in which these forums are moderated. Senseless garbage complete with ad hominem attacks are a dime a dozen, but I've witnessed at least half a dozen debates over real issues get deleted without a trace.

Easy folks...I think the admins (including Andy) do a pretty stand up job. Keep in mind that they do all of their MP duties in their free time, i.e AFTER taking care of the kids, their own climbing, life responsibilities etc.

Not trying to discourage questioning the admins necessarily, just encouraging everyone to see things from their perspective. It is not always practical to be able to implement the "best" (whatever that is) solution.

Alerting folks to a potential issue that involves a safety device should overrule the request of the OP. It shouldn't be an automatic switch flip OP request - delete. Or else it could just be programmed into the forum and you could skip the moderator all together.

so by that precedent you could delete Alien recalls, Jetboil recalls, Link Cam recalls, Token cam recalls, Petzl fuse rope issues...

Is this where I call "shenanigans"?

Oh and is there any other safety issues in should know about? Maybe something that might have fixed itself?

Brian Snider wrote:Is this where I call "shenanigans"?

you mean like a Fusion thread getting deleted and then curiously a Fusion Rep instantly responding to a thread about the deleted one?

yes...

As for my personal end result...

I think that a major safety issue such as this should outweigh the OP's request. At the least, a subsequent thread could be started by admins to make sure that crucial safety information does not slip through the cracks. I simply can't understand why the OP would want the thread deleted after they took the time to post pictures and an honest assessment of the issue. It makes me feel like the OP was either pressured or sweet talked by Fusion to request the thread deletion. That's just my personal opinion.

I have never encountered gear from this manufacturer and after the now deleted post, along with other reports about this manufacturer, I will never consider purchasing their products.

There is a silver lining to this cloud, though. I can't remember the last time I took more then a cursory look at a weld on a rap ring. The original post made me realize that, and that's a good thing. Being as the ASCA has been notified, hopefully we will be able to prevent any possible incidents from occurring due to this problem.

I am still very interested in hearing Fusion's response to the questions that were put to them earlier in this article by J. Albers.

+1 that the thread should not have been deleted. The interest to the larger climbing FAR outweighs the request of the OP. The OP may delete his/her own content, but not the thread as a whole.

Fusion climbing itself has a history terrible gear design, shady marketing, and outright fraud. rockclimbing.com/cgi-bin/fo…

I know there are people at Fusion who genuinely want to produce quality gear and get it in the hands of climbers. However, given their history, it will take extraordinary circumstances for me to forget about their past transgressions and current crappy gear.

+1 that the thread should not have been deleted. The interest to the larger climbing FAR outweighs the request of the OP. The OP may delete his/her own content, but not the thread as a whole.quote>

Without bashing Fusion etc., I would concur that the OP can delete their own content, but they do not have the right to have control over the content of other members. I wouldn't like anyone (and it has happened here) to delete my thoughts and comments. I don't see how someone can request that.

OK. I'll do my best to answer your questions.

- In the opinion of Fusion Climbing, were the welds in the original MP post a problem for the structural strength of the rap rings?
- Furthermore, to what extent does the incomplete weld impact the strength of the rap rings?

Yes. Improperly welded rings definitely effect the maximum load the rings can hold. We are strength testing an unwelded ring here tomorrow so I will be able to tell you exactly how strong an welded ring is. The rings are solid stainless steel so the corrosion factor is little to none. Our properly welded ring will hold 30kN. In my thoughts one of the bigger immediate issues with an improperly welded ring is the potential for running a weighted rope over a sharp edge. So I have contacted everyone who has purchased this product in 2010-11 and informed them of the potential dangers and offered full refund or replacement product. Fortunately we did not sell very many so there are only a handful out there.

- Why were the welds in the photos that were posted here on MP incomplete?

Our rings are machine welded, so obviously we have a problem with the machine. We have pulled ALL backstock of welded rings and are no longer selling this product until we have fixed the welder. We are inspecting the machine to find out the "why and how" of this issue, but this will take some time.

- And finally, is your hardware inspected before it ships? (and if it is inspected, how did the flawed units pass?)

Our product is inspected before it is shipped to our warehouse. Once again something definitely failed here and we are looking into it.

Just so everyone here knows, I am a real climber and have been working in the climbing industry for the past 12 years. I recently signed on with Fusion (with some hesitation given their issues in the past) to bring a climber's perspective to the company. Fusion and our parent company Ace Metal Products does a majority of it's business in the tactical and industrial markets. Given that the factories were also making climbing gear they thought it made sense to do both. As you all know they found the market a little more difficult than expected and have definitely made some mistakes in terms of marketing and advertising etc. I came on board because I think that the products are solid and they have expressed genuine interest in learning from mistakes and taking the time to better the products.

I have also spent the past two weeks rewriting the product descriptions and finding every little error on our website. It will be a little time still before those fixes are implemented though.

As a climber I understand what it is like to trust your life to a piece of gear. The only reason I'm posting all this is to show that we are handling the issue and learning from our mistake.

Thanks for your time. As always, if there are more questions or concerns don't hesitate to bring it to the forums or to me directly.

-matt hulet
matt.hulet@fusionclimb.com

Scott McMahon wrote:+1 that the thread should not have been deleted. The interest to the larger climbing FAR outweighs the request of the OP. The OP may delete his/her own content, but not the thread as a whole.quote> Without bashing Fusion etc., I would concur that the OP can delete their own content, but they do not have the right to have control over the content of other members. I wouldn't like anyone (and it has happened here) to delete my thoughts and comments. I don't see how someone can request that.

+1
I recall trying to delete a thread (as the OP) and an error box poped-up not alowing it to occur if others had posted. Q? -If there was a rule important enough to *code-into* the website, why also make it easy for that same rule to be broken merely by asking (maybe just a coincidence)

I have also noticed several other unrelated posts mysteriously deleted by admins recently (maybe also another co-inky-dink :)
There may have been a thread started up regarding, hmmm maybe that is gone too.. (?)