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KA-Models - Poor experience


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After quite some thought I decided to post about my poor experience with KA-Models
 
I had seen some posts here on ARC about the 3d-printed exhaust nozzles and ended up buying 4 sets from Ebay back in mid-May. 
I got the items and was disappointed in the quality, which can be seen here: 
 
I contacted the owner Lawrence soon after and was told he'd ship replacements to me. 
To date, all I've gotten is a tracking # and empty promises for checking up on the hold up for the replacement parts. 
Emails responses take over 2 weeks with no real follow up. 
 
I did tell him that I'll be posting on ARC due to my poor experience, seems as though 6 months is a reasonable time for someone to follow through. 
 
Buyer beware!!
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9 minutes ago, modelingbob said:

Yikes!!!! Those are nasty!!!! I'd file a complaint with Ebay. But the time elapsed may not work in your favor. 

I did; but past the dispute time limit; made the mistake of trusting the seller. 

Never again. 

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While I hate to hear about your experience, I just wanted to let you know I think this probably belongs in the Bad Trader alert section and not in the General Discussion. It's not my place to enforce that or anything just thought I'd let you know they may move it.

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I am wondering if Lawrence has bitten off more than he can chew. This isn't the first time someone has posted about problems with the quality of the nozzles. His product is obvious very popular, to the point were it appears Hasegawa has now contracted him to do nozzles for some 1/72 scale kits. That's got to put an enormous amount of pressure on him to move product. I don't know how many printers he has but last time I had an e-mail exchange with him, he was bringing new printers online. I wonder if he is pushing things too fast and not paying attention to product quality. If so this is a shame. Right now, his product is unique, but soon others are going to start copying his techniques and give him direct competition. I know he has read ARC in the past. I hope he sees this thread and takes steps to correct the problems, and more importantly, deal positively with signals problem.

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Is he printing them himself? or contracting out to a print shop?

 

If the latter, and they are being shipped directly from the shop to the buyer, he could be unaware of any quality problems.

 

The alternative would be for him to personally inspect/QC each printed item before shipping.

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2 hours ago, Mstor said:

I am wondering if Lawrence has bitten off more than he can chew. ... to the point were it appears Hasegawa has now contracted him to do nozzles for some 1/72 scale kits. 

 

KA has been around a long time, and it's not their first time working with other manufacturers (they did a bunch of PE and machined parts for Fujimi), so they should have some idea what scaling production entails.  Granted, the direct 3D production stuff is relatively new, but still, they're more experienced than most aftermarket manufacturers.

 

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2 hours ago, habu2 said:

Is he printing them himself? or contracting out to a print shop?

 

If the latter, and they are being shipped directly from the shop to the buyer, he could be unaware of any quality problems.

 

The alternative would be for him to personally inspect/QC each printed item before shipping.

 

He was doing the printing himself. Talked about adding printers to increase output as it took so long to print the parts. At one point he said he had 45 days of printing to catch up on orders. This was over a year ago though. Whether that has changed and he is outsourcing I don't know.

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 I’m also very sorry to hear of your dilemma! It’s unusual compared to my story.

 I purchased a pair of KA Models A/B cans for the SR-71’s J-58’s from BNA in Australia. I received both sets  and found them to be highly outstanding albeit extremely delicate. Unfortunately, one can was toast because of this. I contacted BNA (those guys are simply FANTASTIC in my many dealings with them) and they offered to replace the two damaged parts. To make a long story short, three weeks later, I get an ENTIRE set of cans AND a letter of apology from the manufacturer (owner?) for any inconvenience. These had come from Korea, to Australia, and then to Texas USA! No damage! Perfect! And they replaced the entire set.The original damage had apparently occurred in production because the BNA chaps pack things to withstand a nuclear blast.

 To me, this was outstanding service; above and beyond. I don’t dispute your situation and wish it had come out much better for you! I just lucked out, I guess.

Regardless, Best of Luck,

Foxbat

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