Orange Vise Quality Control Issues?

Houdini · Sep 20, 2020

Hello all, Has anyone else had any quality control problems with Orange Vises?
I ordered 2 double vises last year, and 2 more this year, and in a couple months I will need to order 3-4 more.
My next purchase will be around $8,000 with Serra inserts and Mitee Bite jaws.

But On all 4 of the vises i have purchased there was between 2-5 quality control problems with each vise,
some of the issues rendering it unusable until replacment parts were sent others were dent ding gauges, undersized openings,
pins out of alignment.....

Anyone else running into these issues?

I really want to keep the whole shop using the same interchangeable vises, and this is a new shop, we are buying a VMC in a couple months, and 2 next year.
A lot of money in vises.

mutiny · Sep 20, 2020

It obviously sucks that there were QC issues, but just to be clear, it sounds like you were made whole in all of these cases?

I sell something extremely different from vises but we nonetheless pride ourselves on excellent QC. However, we've had one unlucky customer who has had 3 issues that should have been caught. He's been very friendly each time and we've always addressed the issue. But even if you have a very small defect rate, it's likely that some repeat customer will eventually get the short end of the stick multiple times. From my experience, it's how the situation is handled that ultimately matters.

Houdini · Sep 20, 2020

mutiny said:
It obviously sucks that there were QC issues, but just to be clear, it sounds like you were made whole in all of these cases?

I sell something extremely different from vises but we nonetheless pride ourselves on excellent QC. However, we've had one unlucky customer who has had 3 issues that should have been caught. He's been very friendly each time and we've always addressed the issue. But even if you have a very small defect rate, it's likely that some repeat customer will eventually get the short end of the stick multiple times. From my experience, it's how the situation is handled that ultimately matters.

I can understand having a QC problem on a part, but this is a assembly, and to have an average of 3-4 problems with the assembly in most cases is not acceptable.
For example one of the issues was the grind on the bottom of 2 vises literally was wavy, and this was sent out.
And opening, checking, packing up and shipping back these vises is quite the cost in time $$.
I just wanted to see if other had the same experience.
I mean Ive purchased 2 vises 2 different times, with 3-5 problems per order, that is excessive in my opinion.

mutiny · Sep 20, 2020

I definitely agree that it's excessive. No real doubts about that. It's also much more expensive for Orange to fix these problems after they've shipped to customers than before. If many others have had the same issue, I do hope they'll speak up -- perhaps some additional QC steps need to be put into place. But if very few others (or no others) post with similar issues, I'm only noting that it *is* possible to get unlucky.

triumph406 · Sep 20, 2020

How much of a discussion with Orange did you have before you came here to vent?

I don't think there's been any comments about Orange quality that I can remember up until now. You have 4 out of 4 vises with quality issues, seems strange.

empower · Sep 20, 2020

got one single station vise and 3 delta 4 vises from them, nothing but perfection for us so far.

Houdini · Sep 20, 2020

triumph406 said:
How much of a discussion with Orange did you have before you came here to vent?

I don't think there's been any comments about Orange quality that I can remember up until now. You have 4 out of 4 vises with quality issues, seems strange.

I did'nt come here to vent, I came to find out if I was extremely unlucky to have issues with 2 different orders, and wanted to see if this was common.
These vises are awesome, and I will continue to buy them.

I have talked with Orange Vise (Eric), sent images, sent replacement parts back and forth....

They said they are outsourcing some things and some of these issues were from the out sourced parts, but you should be doing QC on out sourced parts, even more so.

SOunds like their volumes may be too high to keep up with QC

Orange Vise · Sep 21, 2020

Quality issues stress us out more than anyone. Some issues are directly our own fault, some issues indirectly.

We've gradually eliminated the majority of outside processing. Everything except case hardening of a few jaw components are now done in house, including flame treating and black oxide.

Other process refinements are ongoing, including tighter climate control in the shop and stricter replacement of consumables. The striped grinding patterns were a result of bad wheel dressing diamonds that couldn't be replaced as quickly as we wanted due to supply chain delays. Solution: stock up on diamonds, since the supplier won't.

Behind the scenes, we're currently experiencing supply chain delays on grinding wheels (20" OD x 4" width). These usually have a four month lead time, but that's increased due to COVID. Luckily we've been able to get on top of this early and are good through 2021. We previously stocked a 1 year supply of wheels, and are increasing that to 2 years.

Lastly, with regards to assembly and packaging issues, the solution simply boils down to increasing employee experience levels. Someone six months on the job simply isn't going to have the same expertise and ability to catch mistakes as someone with many years under his belt. Thus, our focus on employee retention.

Mike1974 · Sep 21, 2020

triumph406;3626937[B said:
]How much of a discussion with Orange did you have before you came here to vent?[/B]

I don't think there's been any comments about Orange quality that I can remember up until now. You have 4 out of 4 vises with quality issues, seems strange.

THIS ^^^

I don't think I have heard anything but good about Orange. IF OP did get 4/4 bad vises... wow?! And someone may want to call me out on this, but OP being new seems "odd" as well*....

I know everyone starts as new, but new and issues to me are different....

primeholy · Sep 21, 2020

Mike1974 said:
THIS ^^^

I don't think I have heard anything but good about Orange. IF OP did get 4/4 bad vises... wow?! And someone may want to call me out on this, but OP being new seems "odd" as well*....

I know everyone starts as new, but new and issues to me are different....

He's been a member since 2017. He seems to be looking for reassurance, not trying to crap on orange IMO. I'm glad not many people have issues, cause I'm trying to get my boss to approve 2 20 inch single station orange vises.

Mike1974 · Sep 21, 2020

primeholy said:
He's been a member since 2017. He seems to be looking for reassurance, not trying to crap on orange. I'm glad not many people have issues, cause I'm trying to get my boss to approve 2 20 inch single station orange vises.

Ok, but 21 posts in 3 years? Sounds like he joined, and sort of checked out for a period of time, but meh...

For the record, I am not arguing someone to join this site to ask questions, gain some experience, etc etc. But I find it very strange 4 vises in 2 years have QC issues. I get sometimes crap happens. I could see if 2 ordered came from the same "lot" and a deburr op (or whatever) got missed. But 4 in 2 years, all having issues?

Houdini · Sep 21, 2020

Thank you all for comments, Thanks to orange for posting on here, more reassuring for future larger purchases.
And to the the keyboard commando's Im not new to machining, I just don't get on message boards and chit chat,
Ive been in the computer industry since I was 17, now 45, have no interest in chatting every day on a message board anymore.
I own a machine shop, and before that was the head Machinist and Tool and Die Engineer at a large manufacturing facility.
I have also worked in positions of Manufacturing Engineer, Production Engineer in the Dental Field.
And the issues with the vises that seems you dont believe, are documented by me and by Orange, as can be attested by the message above from orange.
In the end it is what they will do for the customer, and they have done anything to get me usable vises, great customer service,
and great vises, engineering and quality.
Some QC issues don't detract from the function and quality once remedied after a email.
I just wanted to see if my experience was similar or a fluke, because I couldn't find any issues on the net, so mine as well ask some people.
Thanks .

ChipSplitter · Sep 21, 2020

The salesman sells the first vise (or lathe, mill, etc.) but the service sells the rest.

SRT Mike · Sep 22, 2020

Orange Vise said:
Quality issues stress us out more than anyone. Some issues are directly our own fault, some issues indirectly.

This is an important point sometimes people fail to grasp. There are two kinds of companies out there, those that stand behind their product and will "make it right" and those that will do everything to weasel out of responsibility. Issues can and will happen with products from both, but the former will spend money fixing it and the latter won't. My company is the former, so NOTHING is worse than a customer who gets a bad product, because I know I'm going to lose money on that sale or at best break even. That gives me more incentive than anyone (including the customer) to make sure their parts are good the first time around.

Houdini · Sep 22, 2020

The striped grinding patterns were a result of bad wheel dressing diamonds that couldn't be replaced as quickly as we wanted due to supply chain delays. [/QUOTE said:
When you say that diamond dresser couldn't be replaced as quickly as you wanted, I hope your not stating that you knew it was creating flawed product, yet were shipping them out anyway?
Instead of back ordering vise order's until you received more dressers?

mutiny · Sep 22, 2020

Houdini16 said:
When you say that diamond dresser couldn't be replaced as quickly as you wanted, I hope your not stating that you knew it was creating flawed product, yet were shipping them out anyway?
Instead of back ordering vise order's until you received more dressers?

I appreciate what you're suggesting here, but... Beyond the aesthetics of the grind, is there actually a difference? I'd genuinely appreciate education on this, having only a theoretical understanding of it. Given sufficient resolution in the "peaks" of a grind, wouldn't it be nominally as flat of a surface as one that was 100% perfectly dressed?

D.D.Machine · Sep 22, 2020

My Hat is off for Orange vise ,, well I am not a user of there products I have never seen anything about there company that is not top shelf and there customer service sounds great ,, we ALL ship out bad parts at times and its how we fix are mistakes that stands out ,,,

I mostly use kurt vises and have had some of them show up really screwed up and lets just say Kurt does not have the best customer service I have seen. I had one lock up the screw after a few hours and kurt wanted me to pay out of my pocket to mail them back the vise and "AFTER" they looked at it they would mail me back the vise after they fixed it ,,, lucky for me I had ordered it from a local place that "IS" a stand up company and there sales man delivered a new vice to me the next day ..

Kurt has been trying to stay cheap on cost and there vises are really going down in quality with them trying to compete with the cheap china junk ,, I think a lot of guys would be happy to pay more and get a better vise and that is were Orange come into the market ,,

Houdini · Sep 23, 2020

mutiny said:
I appreciate what you're suggesting here, but... Beyond the aesthetics of the grind, is there actually a difference? I'd genuinely appreciate education on this, having only a theoretical understanding of it. Given sufficient resolution in the "peaks" of a grind, wouldn't it be nominally as flat of a surface as one that was 100% perfectly dressed?

In function the lines were below the surface, so to a HIGH degree only cosmetic, to a EXTREMLY minor degree if you added up the surface area contact you may still be above 90%, I blued and stoned the vises to be sure I had a high degree of contact, and once I confirmed this I kept them.
I didn't have time to ship back and forth, so I just fixed all the issues myself.

As a side note, I just received a quote from Schunk, for a similar vice with far less accessories and versatility than a Orange vise they quaoted $3900,
that's double the cost of a Orange vise, So its a no brainer for me, ill still be ordering Orange vises, and I like to keep thing the same, so the entire new shop will be Orange.
That's 9-12 vises Ouch HAHA

Mtndew · Sep 23, 2020

D.D.Machine said:
My Hat is off for Orange vise ,, well I am not a user of there products I have never seen anything about there company that is not top shelf and there customer service sounds great

Same,we're a Chick shop for the most part with a couple of older Kurts on one of our vmc's.

Have heard nothing bad about their products until now.

chainfeed · Sep 30, 2020

I purchased a 17.5 dual station vise from them about 5 years ago and did have an issue with the ball lock system. I machined my sub plate and installed the ball lock inserts, installed the vise and found that the vise was out of tram. The machine was a brand new Brother S700X1, so the machined features in the sub plate were dead nuts. After some inspection it turned out the c'bore for the ball lock couplers in the bottom of the vise were not in line with one another. I reached out to orange and they told me thats why they sell the individual sub plates, so the user can tram the sub plate in......

I decided to just live with it since I do everything in soft jaws anyways and it was only out a couple thousandths. Still annoying though.

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