GORE-TEX Professional

Archive for the ‘Caveat Emptor’ Category

Caveat Emptor – Counterfeit Tourniquets Remain An Issue

Monday, March 27th, 2017

We first mentioned counterfeit Combat Application Tourniquets back in 2010, and they had already been a problem for awhile. Recently, there has been a rash of these fake products showing up in various supply chains of law enforcement and first responder agencies. For example, this clinical bulletin was issued a few years ago by the New Hampshire Department of Safety.

IMG_6272.JPG

Our friends at CTOMS conducted three tests in which they self-applied two counterfeit Combat Application Tourniquet (E-CAT or Element CAT) and one real C-A-T to a healthy thigh. Continuous Doppler ultrasound was conducted to assess the distal pulse. Tourniquets were tightened until failure or it was too painful to continue to tighten.

While this video is a few years old, it demonstrates how dangerous counterfeit tourniquets are.

According to North American Rescue, they’ve identified six different counterfeit CATs. While this link offers a great comparison between a genuine CAT and a counterfeit, the simplest thing to check is the windlass. If it isn’t stiff, ask for a real one.

The bottom line is, buy your tourniquets from approved sources. The buck you save, may cost a life.

Revision Counterfeit Eyepro Sting

Monday, February 1st, 2016

ARREST MADE IN REVISION-AIDED STING OPERATION AGAINST CHINESE COUNTERFEIT BALLISTIC EYEWEAR

Denver, Colorado (February 1, 2016) – Revision Military, a world leader in integrated, purpose-built soldier solutions, aided a sting operation to arrest owners and representatives of a Chinese company illegally manufacturing and selling counterfeit eyewear. Revision worked in conjunction with the Dearborn and Ohio County Prosecutor’s Office in Indiana to execute this action. The operation was carried out on January 28th at the SnowSports Industries America (SIA) Snow Show in Denver, Colorado. Guangzhou Botai Optical Visor Co., Ltd. (“Guangzhou Botai”) U.S. representative and part owner, Gong Peiwen, also known as Daniel Gong, was arrested on the showroom floor. Arrest warrants have also been issued for brothers Jiang Xingde and Jiang Xinglin, co-owners of Guangzhou Botai, and Ding Xiaoxia, also known as Crystal Ding, Sales Associate for Guangzhou Botai, which is based in Guangzhou, China. The four are facing six felony charges: counterfeiting, theft, corrupt business practices, conspiracy to commit counterfeiting, conspiracy to commit theft, and conspiracy to commit corrupt business practices. These charges are being brought in Indiana.

Guangzhou Botai has been producing unauthorized counterfeit versions of Revision Military’s Desert Locust™ goggle. Additionally, these fake products have been distributed under the pretense of providing military-grade ballistic protection which presents a hazard to the safety of users expecting the high level eye protection of authentic Revision products. After extensive investigation of the company and testing of the counterfeit products it produces, conclusions showed none of the established industry standards for optical or ballistic quality were met by these unauthorized product knockoffs.  

“We were alarmed to learn of these counterfeit products,” said Jonathan Blanshay, CEO of Revision Military, “our customers expect only the best quality and performance from our products. We take pride in exceeding the highest specifications for optics and ballistic impact protection and have invested huge amounts of money to create the best possible protective products. We have built our name and reputation on exceeding standards and will not tolerate inferior, non-authorized knockoff products in the marketplace.”

Mr. Blanshay reiterated that, when it comes to customers being victimized by inferior forgeries, Revision has a zero tolerance approach, stating, “the Revision brand signifies integrity and elite performance. Fraudulent products undermine our core mission to protect the troops who protect all of us. We are taking this matter very seriously and will do everything in our power to ensure that any individuals or corporate entities involved in an illicit enterprise that threatens Revision’s customers and the Revision reputation are prosecuted to the full extent of the law. Our mission is to provide the very best protection to soldiers and we will fight to prevent any undermining of that promise to global warfighters.”

Revision Military maintains all intellectual property rights on all Revision products – rights that are total and international. This includes the distinctive Desert Locust goggle, Revision’s flagship goggle line first launched in 2006 that has proven immensely popular and highly regarded for its superior ballistic protection, craft, and comfort. Revision’s products are designed, manufactured, and tested in-house at state-of-the-art, certified facilities. All of Revision’s protective eyewear has consistently and unequivocally exceeded global military-grade testing requirements and has been proven in action around the world.

More On Counterfeit Tourniquets From CTOMS

Tuesday, September 8th, 2015

CTOMS conducted three tests in which they self-applied two counterfeit Combat Application Tourniquet (E-CAT or Element CAT) and one real C-A-T to a healthy thigh. Continuous Doppler ultrasound was conducted to assess the distal pulse. Tourniquets were tightened until failure or it was too painful to continue to tighten.

While this video is two years old, it demonstrates how dangerous counterfeit tourniquets are. The bottom line is, buy your tourniquets from approved sources. The buck you save, may cost a life.

Caveat Emptor – Counterfeit Tourniquets Are Still An Issue

Wednesday, July 22nd, 2015

We first mentioned counterfeit Combat Application Tourniquets back in 2010 and they had already been a problem for awhile. Recently, there has been a rash of these fake products showing up in various supply chains of law enforcement and first responder agencies. For example, this clinical bulletin was issued just this week by the New Hampshire Department of Safety.

IMG_6272.JPG

According to North American Rescue, they’ve identified six different counterfeit CATs.  While this link offers a great comparison between a genuine CAT and a counterfeit, the simplest thing to check is the windlass.  If it isn’t stiff, ask for a real one.  

Caveat Emptor – Seconds/Counterfeit PenCott Fabric

Monday, February 9th, 2015

Bottom Line Up Front
The only truly authentic, genuine, first-quality PenCott fabrics are the ones that that have been or are being sold by Hyde Definition, MMI Textiles or Tacticaltrim.

Hyde Definition recently issued an alert regarding both the sale of seconds quality as well as counterfeit fabrics.

(null)

For example, this garment sewn in a Crye Precision combat uniform style is made from seconds quality GreenZone fabric. These are ejected off-color and other types of ‘second-quality’ PenCott camouflage fabric which have turned up on eBay and other online wholesale outlets being sold as good quality material. Some customers have already been duped by the low prices on the per-yard fabric and/or by low shipping rates.

If its not genuine first-quality fabric, there could be one or more problems with it – such as; the colors being off, the colors will fade quickly, the fabric will shrink too much when its washed, etc.

Counterfeits on the other hand are originating in China, Indonesia and Ukraine. These are unauthorized reproductions of genuine fabrics. Aside from being thievery, these fabrics suffer from indistinct prints, incorrect colors, and low quality substrate fabrics. Once again, buy fabric from legitimate sources to ensure quality.

Hyde Definition is pursuing legal action against the counterfeiters, and has pledged to take action against any retailer who offers finished goods made from these counterfeit fabrics.

For full details visit www.hydedefinition.com.

More On The Tactical Chaplain

Friday, January 10th, 2014

Turns out, the Tactical Chaplain who recently reached out to a prominent tactical gear producer for T&E samples, actually represents ‘usasoc’ not ‘USASOC’. It looks as though ‘usasoc’ is a “Christian men’s ministry serving the special operations community” that is based in Quantico, Virginia. Considering this, I’m not even sure at this point if he’s actually even in the service.

Yes, we know who he is now, and no, we aren’t going to share his name publicly. I’m not one to undermine confidence in the clergy. Not when guys like this work so hard to do it to themselves. However, if you are in industry and have been contacted by a Tactical Chaplain from usasoc or for that matter anyone with a usasoc.us email, hit me up and I’ll verify the name.

This just gets better and better.

Caveat Emptor – Leupold Counterfeit Warning

Monday, July 29th, 2013

Leupold put out a warning detailing a recent surge of counterfeit Mark 4 and Prismatic riflescopes. The scopes’ apparent origin is the People’s Republic of China, and bear many of the marks and trade dress of current Leupold & Stevens riflescopes. If a scope seems suspect, the serial number can be called in to 1-800-LEUPOLD to confirm its authenticity. The counterfeit scopes can also be identified by several characteristics not found on authentic Leupold scopes, as seen in the images below.

Counterfeit Mark 4

Counterfeit Prismatic

leupold.com/resources/counterfeit-warning/

Caveat Emptor – Why Don’t You…Redux

Sunday, July 22nd, 2012

This article was originally published just last November. An email I received the other day reminded me of it so I thought I’d share it again. The bottom line here is scientific method. It’s boring, and expensive and time consuming, but it’s how you test accurately. Now data interpretation is an entirely different ball of wax, but you’ve got to get there first.

We get email all of the time from readers asking why we don’t test this or that. There’s two simple reasons.

First, we do the news and we don’t have enough bandwidth to do proper test & evaluations which leads us to the second point. We don’t have the access to the right facilities and equipment to conduct proper tests.

We see folks all over the internet throwing products on their charcoal grills saying they are conducting burn tests or taking their latest gucciflauge out in the back yard to snap a couple of photos and saying they are testing camouflage or worse yet, shooting a ballistic material at a random range with some random gun. In all cases, they are wrong. All they are doing is making noise and, filling their reader’s heads full of nonsense that in some cases is libelous and in others downright dangerous.

Our editor actually conducted test & evaluation for DoD and later, after he retired from the military for commercial companies. Consequently, he knows how it is supposed to be done and, that is why you won’t see us doing it. If we aren’t going to do it right, we aren’t going to do it at all.

So, next time you see an internet “test” conducted by amateurs, ask them what qualifies them to conduct that test. Ask to see their test plan and their data collection schema. Ask them how many times they conducted the test and how they ensured that the tests were conducted properly and consistently. We could go on and on but quite frankly, question one will stump them.

Not only are there folks posting this nonsense on the internet but they are taking money from unsuspecting companies. Before you pay someone to conduct RDT&E for your company ask them what qualifies them to do this. There’s an old saying in SOCOM, “Don’t confuse enthusiasm with capability.” There are tons of former end-users out there but DoD’s T&E community isn’t very big. Verify credentials.