Cord reel

[iwannadie]

I have a craftsman professional cord reel that is a few years old and lightly used. It stopped retracting last night and sounded like the plastic that holds the spring had broken free. I took the metal housing apart and inside is a plastic cage and the spring is inside the cage. I see no way to open the cage to repair anything.

Has anyone dealt with a cord reel that won't retract and fixed it?

Or, does anyone have a reel they could recommend(harbor freight need not mentioned)? The idea of buying another one with a plastic spring mount seems like a sure bet of a repeat breaking. At 50-70 bucks it sucks it didn't last longer.

On a side note, I took a leap and tried to exchange my reel at sears. I don't have the box and there is no warranty marking on the reel so I figured might try since it is the professional model. They promptly acted as if I had stolen something and treated me as such, even walking away when they felt they said enough. I was polite and not arguing, just trying to get confirmation on the warranty. I've never had a problem with warranties before but the 2 people who looked like managers decided before I opened my mouth that they weren't not exchanging anything.

 

[lazyxj]

I have an old Craftsman reel that does not lock anymore. I use a spring clamp, on the cord, to keep the cord extended. There is nothing inside that can be repaired.
http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/WESTWARD-Steel-Spring-Clamp-5A317?Pid=search

Years ago almost anything that had the Craftsman name on it could be exchanged but not anymore. I had a Craftsman 1/2" torque wrench that broke after a couple of years. Sears would not exchange it unless it was less than a year old and, of course, if I had the receipt.

 

[xcm]

craftsman warranties hand tools for life, all the other stuff has shorter term warranties....

while an infinate magical warranty, that didnt impair on tool price, but would replace any broken tool weather you broke it using it sanely, or broke it doing stupid shit WOULD BE NICE.... this is the real world. if someone uses a socket extension daily, everyday for 10 years, and it breaks on them... its of my opinion that craftsman owes them NOTHING.... yet this is covered.... boggles my mind how people have come to expect disposable products covered under warranty.

i want products that dont NEED a warranty... and lately sears is NOT those products. sears in many cases has the same shit, if not worse shit than harbor freight. sure they dont have the ultra-cheap versions that harbor freight does, but their 2ton racing floor jack is 3-4x the price of harbor freights, and ive had nothing but trouble with it. the harbor freight version is better in this case.

wake up sears, or your gonna lose more customers.

 

[iwannadie]

Just to be clear, I was fine with my cord reel not being under warranty. I went into the store for clarification as there was no mention of warranty on the cord reel labels. The way I was treated when I asked about a warranty was just rude and uncalled for.

I hear you on rather not needing a warranty and goes back to my biggest complaint on tool recommendations. People always recommend tools that they have had for 10-15 years, well they don't make them like that anymore even if it is the same brand and model.

I just don't understand why my cord reel has a rugged heavy metal casing but the part that sees the most stress is plastic...

 

[xcm]

Thats the worst thing... stuff is designed to fail. if it works for 50 years, they cant sell you another...

I know, tin foil hat land... but I cant figure any other reason.
Nothings worse than something designed to fail... if i ran a company that sold consumer goods, i would market torwards this, and have an email address on the packagaging that someone could email with comments on the product. I think this POV that the customer deserves the best product would resonate well with people like me. I want to buy stuff from companies that play no games... one reason why i like fox shocks.

 

[kastein]

It's slightly cheaper to build a part that will fail faster than a part that will last longer. AND you get to sell them the replacement!

I have a couple of old jeep alloy rims and parts off a 2wd beam axle I'm going to use to build an extension cord reel at some point. Stole the idea off a friend of mine.