Well just when you thought it was safe to go back
in the
water this saga has thrown up some more twists.
Re posts 46258,48000,48229 , this story should have been over when the company acknowledged their error and said they might send us a small gift for picking up the fault.
Well my wife and I joked about perhaps receiving a new flask and promptly forgot the issue.
I mean, whats the point in sending us an example of what we found deficient in the first place !
But on arriving home some days ago I noticed there was a large box of about 1/2 meter cubed on the kitchen table.
Ignored it for a while as I haven't got anything on order but later noticed it was from Shanghai and labeled "Mugs".
Opened it and what a surprise, 5
Stanley products where inside including there full range of 450ml 950ml and 1.9lt vacuum flasks, along with a thank you note.
Well what can you say! Appreciate the thought but we are jealous of our
camping equipment setup and don't carry anything that doesn't measure up, so what use is something that we know isn't the best.
Still they'd make good Xmas presents for someone I suppose.
Anyway - I love testing things. My wife rolled her eyes and asked how many tests I did before deciding she passed.
Well this was a track would definately lead to a long road closure so I did a u-turn and re-focussed on the thermos flasks.
Filled them all up along with our standard control flask and stuck them outside out of the wind where the temperature would average about 8c overnight.
Just before I left them I ran my hands over the side, I've learnt from many tests that you can gauge how good these products are with this quick check. Its very slight,
but if you feel any warmth then they aren't going to last the distance.
Immediately I detected warm from all except the big 1.9lt which was the subject of my original complaint. This was strange and I would need to be careful with these tests.
Next morning 12 hours later would be the big test, and when I checked them the first 3 registered 58,60 and 61 degrees - all much the same but then I came to the last one and a
big surprise.
This new 1.9lt flask measured some 74c, an almost unbelievable figuref or a stainless steel unit.
Previous samples of this type of unit came in at 2c lower than my control flask but this one came in at 14c over - a truly massive change.
Can't be right, but a check at 24 hours, then a complete retest verified the result.
This unit was hot (61c) after 24hours !
Well for some reason no-one else in the family seem very excited but this really had me going.
I simply could not explain the result !
This flask worked almost as
well as my prized Aladdin glass unit I had for ten years before leaving it on the front
seat of a test Nissan Patrol I had and it committed suicide against the car dashboard during a test of the ABS brakes.
So there it is, after this long process I have a product with unparalleled performance. But why did it so outperform previous samples ?
Do they make high performance units for overseas markets ?
I note that the instructions inside this unit were totally in chinese - not 1/2 english as in the Australian product.
Stanley had only really said that they made an error in putting a 26hr performance label on the product instead of 12hr.
One presumes there must be a reason for having a 26 hr label in the first place ?
Was I just lucky and the process of internal vacuum forming just happen to work better on this sample ?
Was I sent a specially selected unit ?
In a previous comment on these posts someone suggested the men in black would be round to visit us.
Maybe they have been - but they work smarter these days.
Robin Miller