New V3 Kettles from Spike? Anyone Have one yet?

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Whaaaaaaaat?
I had mine done custom and they were as fast as could be to respond, sent me a paypal invoice, and a week later i had a top quality product. To clear up what i wanted he even sent technical drawings to verify what i wanted.
I do not understand the gripe. They're offering to take care of the problem.

Hey Spike, if i wanted a kettle i purchased from you modified and covered shipping both ways is that a possibility?
 
Whaaaaaaaat?
I had mine done custom and they were as fast as could be to respond, sent me a paypal invoice, and a week later i had a top quality product. To clear up what i wanted he even sent technical drawings to verify what i wanted.
I do not understand the gripe. They're offering to take care of the problem.

Hey Spike, if i wanted a kettle i purchased from you modified and covered shipping both ways is that a possibility?

I actually contacted them about having a sight glass added to one kettle they told me they will add anything I want if I cover the shipping. About 1 week turnaround. Sight glass in particular was 90 plus shipping.
 
I can't believe people are sticking up for this. Spike/Tim, the lack of communication from your company is horrible. I can post the email from November saying that my kettles were shipping that week. Then NOTHING. If I had known things were going to run this route, I would have had my keggles modified.

On a side note, I will sell anyone on here anything they want and not deliver. Wait, I will deliver. Who wants a ketchup packet?;)

Do you have an order number, name, email or something we can look up your order with?

I'm assuming you purchased a pre-sale kettle. The pre-sale was advertised as a 1 month wait but you'd be first to receive the new kettles when we had them welded and ready to ship. Most of the kettles shipped on time. The sight glasses were delayed maybe an extra week. All pre-sale orders were printed and set aside. Our old system (now on a new system) did not live update tracking; it just sent out an email with a tracking number.

If you can get us an order number I'd be happy to look up where we messed up with communication so it doesn't happen again.

-Tim
 
lol

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"i guess it would be nice if you called all the ticket holders if the game was going to be rained out."

GFY :ban:

Tim/Spike, I will not be ordering from you again. What communication can you correct? I have an email from Ben saying my kettles would ship the last week of November. They didn't ship. I don't care if you have a new system, I was obviously on the old system. Read an inventory sheet and order sheet and keep you PAYED customers up to date. Again, I will happily drive my a$$ up to Wisconsin and return my kettles and equipment for a refund. :mug:
 
Do you have an order number, name, email or something we can look up your order with?

I'm assuming you purchased a pre-sale kettle. The pre-sale was advertised as a 1 month wait but you'd be first to receive the new kettles when we had them welded and ready to ship. Most of the kettles shipped on time. The sight glasses were delayed maybe an extra week. All pre-sale orders were printed and set aside. Our old system (now on a new system) did not live update tracking; it just sent out an email with a tracking number.

If you can get us an order number I'd be happy to look up where we messed up with communication so it doesn't happen again.

-Tim

Alas, mine did not. When I sent an email asking about shipping (two weeks after I was told they would ship) I was told they would ship later that week. They did not. To be smug about your faults is great. "I take peoples money and don't deliver. F the customer. I got mine."
 
Whaaaaaaaat?
I had mine done custom and they were as fast as could be to respond, sent me a paypal invoice, and a week later i had a top quality product. To clear up what i wanted he even sent technical drawings to verify what i wanted.
I do not understand the gripe. They're offering to take care of the problem.

Hey Spike, if i wanted a kettle i purchased from you modified and covered shipping both ways is that a possibility?

About the technical drawings... my kettles did not show up as the tech drawings had everything shown. The locations of everything are workable, just not what I asked for and signed off on. This is such a joke. I just want my money back.
 
About the technical drawings... my kettles did not show up as the tech drawings had everything shown. The locations of everything are workable, just not what I asked for and signed off on.

now this, this is a legitimate beef, especially if it is a custom order. did you let them know there was an issue? my kettle actually had the pickup tube coupler welded at the wrong elevation, such that it would not work with spike's standard pickup tube. spike owned their mistake, apologized for the error and sent me a custom pickup tube with my kettle, no charge.

and i've found that most of life's issues can be traced back to seinfeld in one way or another.:mug:
 
About the technical drawings... my kettles did not show up as the tech drawings had everything shown. The locations of everything are workable, just not what I asked for and signed off on. This is such a joke. I just want my money back.

This is the first time hearing about this. If you email us or give me an order number I can try and help. You haven't contacted us once. We've had to track down an issue on HBT and reached out to you and try to solve the issue. I don't know what more we can do.
 
Sounds like you guys are definitely having quality control issues. Is nobody performing inspections before shipping? These are obvious details... how are they missed: unreadable site glass shields, wrong size FB, wrong pickup tube, scratched kettles, upside down thermometers, custom work that doesn't match drawings?? Good on you for making it right, but it seems you have QA to work out.
 
Sounds like you guys are definitely having quality control issues. Is nobody performing inspections before shipping? These are obvious details... how are they missed: unreadable site glass shields, wrong size FB, wrong pickup tube, scratched kettles, upside down thermometers, custom work that doesn't match drawings?? Good on you for making it right, but it seems you have QA to work out.

All the false bottoms and pickup tubes will be etched with the size going forward. The center pickup tube for the 15 and 20gal size is about .75". Hard for our packers to tell. That won't be an issue going forward.

The sight glass tubes had a QC check done at the factory. The ones we checked were good. Now we are getting a few complaints about faint etching. That's being tracked down as we speak.

The scratched kettle might be from shipping or it could have been scratched right before shipping. Hard to tell. Things do slip past but we always stand behind our products and try to make things right.

The thermometer can simply be spun 180* into the correct position. Not really a quality issue.

The drawing issue happened once when our new fabricator placed the valve 1" too high. I think we offered to redo(?) or just make a longer pickup tube. Doesn't affect brewing in anyway. The other alleged drawing not matching has yet to be brought to our attention so I can't speak to that.

A couple issues out of the gate with the new v3 but nothing major. The SG etching should be taken care of in the next few weeks.
 
full disclosure, i am the dude who had the issue with the 1" difference in coupling height. at the time i ordered, spike had not yet finalized what height the couplings needed to be for the pickup tube. i ordered it at a nominal 1.5" elevation but with the understanding that the dimension could shift as necessary, to whatever it needed to be to work with the tubes. fast-forward a couple weeks and spike contacted me to let me know the coupling was installed an inch higher than specified. they didn't ship it without contacting me first. they asked if i planned to use one of their pickup tubes and i said yes. i had planned on ordering it later but in hindsight, i guess i should have ordered it at the same time as the kettle. i suppose i could have been a hard-ass and demand they redo the entire kettle but i never got the chance: spike offered up a free, custom dip tube to work with my coupling. it is in the hlt so 1.5", 2". 2.5" elevation, it doesn't really matter. the tube shipped with the kettle.

i'm starting to think i may just have bad luck. :)
 
I will post pics tomorrow. My couplers are wayyyyy off center. They drain from the side. It's great trying to rebuild things to work around a "custom" product. I didn't need more work, I just wanted to brew some GD beer. Again, unused equipment for a refund?
 
I will post pics tomorrow. My couplers are wayyyyy off center. They drain from the side. It's great trying to rebuild things to work around a "custom" product. I didn't need more work, I just wanted to brew some GD beer. Again, unused equipment for a refund?

Again if you can send (post, PM, Facebook, email, smoke signal) your order number so we can look into this issue it would be much appreciated on our end. We can't correct or improve anything if we don't know what the heck we're looking for. We looked for Jim and James orders from OH over the last two months but can't find anything that seems to match.
 
Alright. Issues noted and offer to work them out has been made. Let's drop the back and forth on this in this thread.

I'd like to remind people that we have a forum specifically set up for reviewing. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forumdisplay.php?f=173

Remember that the review forum is only for posting your personal experiences, not for general comments about a company you don't have experience with. We like to try and keep the topics on track and not get off on other tangents.
 
Alright. Issues noted and offer to work them out has been made. Let's drop the back and forth on this in this thread.

We apologize for the back but we've asked about 4 times for an order number and proof of the issue. Neither have been provided. We're trying to correct a wrong we've been accused of with no help from the customer.

I will post pics tomorrow. My couplers are wayyyyy off center. They drain from the side. It's great trying to rebuild things to work around a "custom" product. I didn't need more work, I just wanted to brew some GD beer. Again, unused equipment for a refund?

If the kettle is "wayyyyy" off would you please post a picture or email us? We'd like to compare to the drawing on the paid invoice and see where the issue arose from. If there isn't an issue we'd appreciate you remove your posts saying there is then :)
 
Sounds like you guys are definitely having quality control issues. Is nobody performing inspections before shipping? These are obvious details... how are they missed: unreadable site glass shields, wrong size FB, wrong pickup tube, scratched kettles, upside down thermometers, custom work that doesn't match drawings?? Good on you for making it right, but it seems you have QA to work out.

It sounds like a few people had some issues, but the company stepped up to the plate and offered replacement and or modifications free of charge. Also BrunDog, don't base anything off of this Capn_James guy. So far Spike is trying to make everything right with him, but he hasn't use the ole' noggin to give them an order number, or even his name. Lets not forget his "promised pictures" here.

I'm just saying, I don't bash a company for whose products I don't have. Yes, I have Spike equipment. Yes, I reviewed it. Yes, I feel their products and services are exactly what I look for in a vendor, short of going to see it and touch it.

The new V3's look great, and issues asside, I'm not hearing anything so far that would scare me away from buying one.


Lastly, I would say Capn_James sounds like he might be trolling. He has pretty much done nothing but badmouth this thread since he got on here: 17 Posts all on this thread alone and is his only activity in 2 years. Soooo yeah... Word to the wise man... You don't make any friends here by acting the way you are right now. We all try to respect each other when we have issues or differing opinions.

Also feel free to paint me as a Spike Fan-boy. I definitely am. But I'm not affiliated or paid by them in any way. I just like to see a small company start up, make a good product, and be successful. Plus they are from Wisconsin.... GO PACK GO!
 
Cool but don't put words or inferences in my post. I didn't bash the company - I too have been a fan of Spike though not a customer yet. I see them on my short list when I get some legit kettles.

No doubt the Capn is not forthright and his credibility is in question. But he was not the only one with issues. ANd note I didn't say anything of the product, just the QA (shipping, final inspection, whatever you wish to call it). This is likely a syndrome of trying to launch a new product quickly without having all the ducks lined up.
 
Didn't mean to call you out like that. Just making sure that no one was putting out information regarding a product they didnt have their hands on.
 
Ive handled mine every day since receiving it. Couldn't be happier with the product and the customer service is TOP NOTCH.
I also think this Cap'n guy is trolling or just plain unreasonable.
 
I never had to wait more then a day if that for a response from Spike Brewing. I got my 2-15 gal kettles and they arrived in 3 days after ordering. I had a lid that got damaged during shipping and they shipped a new one out the next day!

They are very nice kettles and will be buying more down the road.
 
I ordered a 30 gal. custom V3 kettle on 1/11 and this morning FedEx delivered it. It's a beauty! Once this Global Warming trend thaws to a reasonable temp I look forward to using it as my boil kettle.

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I've had mine for one brew sesh and I am very happy so far. I have the 15 gallon kettle with the new false bottem. It filters well and leaves much less dead space then my last tun. Pics attached of old spike kettle on right and new on the left.

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Ahhh! That looks soooo good. I really want to get a new MT from Spike... Gotta see what kind of refund we get this year. I am in the doghouse for spending a bunch of money on an extra vehicle... Who knows... Maybe I'll win the Spike contest and get one for free.

I've also been talking to my LHBS to try and motivate them to consider contacting Spike to start carring them. They only carry Polarware, and Blichman currently. I'm sure that if they carried a few Spike products, people would clearly see the quality differences.
 
Ahhh! That looks soooo good. I really want to get a new MT from Spike... Gotta see what kind of refund we get this year. I am in the doghouse for spending a bunch of money on an extra vehicle... Who knows... Maybe I'll win the Spike contest and get one for free.

I've also been talking to my LHBS to try and motivate them to consider contacting Spike to start carring them. They only carry Polarware, and Blichman currently. I'm sure that if they carried a few Spike products, people would clearly see the quality differences.

My LHBS has been trying to work up a relationship with Spike for more than a year. Apparently, they only currently work direct to consumer. He's try to order a palette of electric kettles to sell in his new store. He also wants to do a brew on premises setup where he'd be featuring Spike equipment. No luck thus far.
 
I just blew my VW refund money on some of these SWEET kettles. I oggled them at the Advanced Homebrewers Conference in Milwaukee a week and a half ago and my Tall Boy Kettles have never looked the same. Time to upsize and upgrade. I'll post pictures when they come but it should also be noted that Ben has donated multiple kettles to support our local homebrew club (Beer Barons of Milwaukee).
 
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