Does Reese = Junk?

Francesca Knowles wrote:

jerem0621 wrote:
Is this feeling unfounded

Sorta hard to tell if it's "unfounded" or not...can you hook us up with links to some of the "multiple failures" of Reese components that have led to this feeling of unease? And are there no such stories out there about other mfr's hitch component failures?

Or is it just sort of a general perception?

I am with most of you as far as personally experiencing failures. I have not really experienced a failure per say. I know that I specifically mentioned Reese but this is really an issue with Cequent. I have had some QC issues with some of Cequents parts.

My initial post was made on a phone, hence no links... here is some specific instances of QC or Failure that I have observed/experienced..

Personal QC experience

My Kia Sorento had a Tow Ready (Cequent compay) T-adaptor for the flat four vehicle side plug before our accident. The part worked great, but the flat four was not sized correctly and I had to trim the adaptor with a knife to get the adaptor to fit. Minor QC issue here.

My son and I went to Wal-Mart last night and looked inside of the Reese shanks, the "welded" draw bars looked okay.. however the one piece draw bars were rusting like crazy on the inside... I am specifically referring to these.

I also had a hitch head failure caused by Reese Dual-Cam but this was user error and not a Reese failure. I do not blame this on Reese. The DC was doing exactly what it was supposed to do (I mention this because I have talked about this failure before)

Instances of failure (not personal experience)

Pro-Series (Cequent) fifth wheel failure

Dropped my Fiver

Another 20k Reese failure

Scroll to post # 13

Reese Shank/WD hitch failure

Shank failed

Vintage Hitch Head Failure

More hitch head failure

Spring Bar Broke

BRUTAL 16k Carnage

Welds Coming Apart on a Signature Hitch

Another hitch let go of the king pin

I'm tired of researching for now :)

I know that this sample size is small.. but ANY of these failures could have killed someone. I personally do not feel like accepting these types of failures, especially the total failures.

Even if Reese is 99.9% okay, thats still too high of a failure rate.

Remember that if the airline industry was 99.9% safe that means that only 810 airline flights would crash every month.

Thanks!

Jeremiah