Snapped my Oakleys!

cee

Just changing the lenses before goin out this morning! They didn't even make it out of the door!

Snapped clean through just beside the bridge....

Hope Oakleys service is as good at's supposed to be...taking them back to the shop tomorrow..

Less than a month old!

paul_75

less than a month old then you should get a swap at the shop.

i had my oakley scalpel snap last month, had to send them back to an online shop i got them from and they had to send them to oakley to see if they were covered (were only 6 months old) got a brand new pair sent to me in less than 2 weeks

Anonymous

After a while you realise that expensive eyewear on the bike is just costly when you keep snapping and scratching them, then you buy the cheap stuff... that's just as good :P

njee20

Not snapped or scratched a pair of Oakleys in 11 years using them virtually ride! I'll keep using them myself, only got one pair of eyes after all :-)

lostboysaint

deadkenny wrote:

After a while you realise that expensive eyewear on the bike is just costly when you keep snapping and scratching them, then you buy the cheap stuff... that's just as good :P

Covered in a variety of places elsewhere but it just isn't I'm afraid.

Many moons ago I had in my collection a pair (can't remember the name of them) that kept snapping on the arm (normally at about 18 months), Every time they got sent back to Oakley in one of the customer service boxes and every time a new one came back. UNTIL they didn't do the arms any more, so they sent a whole new frame which they'd put my lenses in!

Not only is the optical quality miles better but so is the customer service.

ben_chesterfield

i keep humming and arrring about buying a pair.

for biking & on hols.

just my luck to scratch them first time out.

ben

p.s they do luck awesome tho.

bails87

The lenses are very good. I'm much happier driving in my Flak Jackets than my Raybans. After a couple of minutes I just forget that I'm wearing them, whereas with other sunglasses I've always been aware that they're there.

However......the "you only get one pair of eyes" argument is a bit wierd. If you buy those Bolle safety glasses for £6 they'll do as good a, if not better, job of physically protecting your eyes than a £150 pair of Oakleys. Any difference in UV damage will be pretty negligible too.

If it was Oakleys or nothing, then yeah, it would make sense. But you can protect your eyes perfectly well for th ecost of a couple of pints, but if you want to do it in style......well, as Wheezer said, "Oakley makes the shades that transform a tool"...

cee

i was always a bah humbugger as far as oakleys were concerned....

I have various paris of Bolles etc which do an adequate enough job....

However....the difference in the lenses of the oakleys is instantly noticable....

They are better.

Maybe not better at protecting from trees etc.....maybe not better at UV....but for clarity of vision...most definitely.

The girlies is off up to the shop this morning so hopefully i will know whats happening later on

t0pc4t

I had the finish come off my chrome radars and just had that sorted out of warranty.

I moaned at them in an email on Sunday night and by 8.30 Monday morning they had called and explained that all I needed to do was to pay for a year's warranty and they would replace the frame.

I did that and they also gave me the option to choose a different frame colour as I was worried the same issue with the finish would happen again.

It cost me £16 for the warranty and about £4 to send the frames off.

End to end it took about 3 weeks from the email to the glasses going back.

I asked whether keeping paying for a warranty was a good idea in case I had another issue, they told me not to and said if I had any problems in the future, I could buy a year's warranty and they would sort any issues under that.

The service was absolutely blindingly good.

While I was waiting I used a pair of old Bloc ones I had, they lasted 2 rides before I stopped wearing them, rubbish lens quality and although they fit, the rubbish plastic arms and nose piece meant they kept sliding down my nose, not what you want on a trail.

I can't rate Oakley's highly enough, I intend to be a lifelong customer.

Anonymous

I have one pair of Oakley straight jackets that are getting on a bit now, the lenses are a bit scratched from rocks bouncing off my face!
I have replaced them several imes, but I've lost all the replacements, dammit!

I don't know what their customer service is like, but I tried to contact them once with a peculiar query, and got no response at all.

alan_sherman

After a wasp hit me in the Radars and the lens cracked they replaced the lens free of charge (6 months old).

Any Oakley dealer should have the returns box to use to post them to the right place.

Excellent customer service.

I'd recommend avoiding the coated lenses for longevity (i.e. irridium etc). the coatings are very good but as they are a coating any scratch will show up. My 15 year old square wires are about dead due to the small scratches in the irridium coating spoiling the clarity of vision. They've done me well.

Anonymous

Personally, I'm not too fussed about seeing everything in amazing quality and detail whilst riding. Usually too busy riding.

Can I see clearly with a cheap pair? Yes. Maybe not fantastically amazing, but it's fine enough.

Number 1 priority is protection for me. Safety stuff that isn't going to snap easily or worse shatter is good enough (my last pair may have saved my eye given what damage I did and didn't receive thanks to wearing them, and the lenses are still perfectly intact).

Other than that the only other reason I wear any at all is to stop bugs getting in the eye. I wear contacts and had bugs get in there often without protective specs and the things get infected. Which is nice.

Anonymous

deadkenny, have you ACTUALLY tried Oakleys?
The old phrase springs to mind "you can't miss something you've never had".

Like some of the others here, I've had several pairs, and the clarity is just amazing. Things actually seem clearer with them on. The difference compared to cheaper sunglasses is such that I have not bought a cheap pair since trying Oakleys.
Even though I bought my first pair on a whim after a bonus from work.

t0pc4t

same here Yeehaa! (bought on a whim after a nice bonus)

Anonymous

yeehaamcgee wrote:

deadkenny, have you ACTUALLY tried Oakleys?
The old phrase springs to mind "you can't miss something you've never had".

Like some of the others here, I've had several pairs, and the clarity is just amazing. Things actually seem clearer with them on. The difference compared to cheaper sunglasses is such that I have not bought a cheap pair since trying Oakleys.
Even though I bought my first pair on a whim after a bonus from work.

Yes I have tried them, and yes the optical quality is good. I just don't find them a requirement when riding a bike and there are plenty of other options that are perfectly clear enough and possibly safer in a crash.

I'm not talking about any old cheap sunglasses you can get from a supermarket, I'm talking proper dedicated safety specs for activities inc MTB. I'm not even interested in just sunglasses. I wear them all the time, changing lens or specs for the situation, so clear ones, yellow for dull light, sunglasses for really sunny days.

Anonymous

Well, in that case, you're the one spending more money.
I currently have one pair of Oakleys, that I use for everything. Driving, kayaking, biking, just general wear.
So, in addition to those expensive pair of glasses, your logic is suggesting that I buy an ADDITIONAL pair of glasses for riding?

bails87

yeehaamcgee wrote:

So, in addition to those expensive pair of glasses, your logic is suggesting that I buy an ADDITIONAL pair of glasses for riding?

He's not suggesting that you do anything. He's saying he is happy with the slighty reduced optical clarity from cheaper glasses.

If he has one £30 pair of glasses with 3 sets of lenses for biking and one £50 pair of glasses for 'everything else', how is that more money than £100+ on a 'do it all' pair?

And as for adding an additional pair as an addition......do you work for the Department of repeated words department?

Anonymous

Fair enough, with one correction. My Oakleys were £60.

I don't work, repeatedly, for the reapeatedly overusing words repeatedly department. But I have repeatedly done contract work work them, repeatedly. They're one of my repeated customers*


(*Also a paid up card-carrying member of the "make sense? What the fugg does that mean?" club)

bails87

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Fair enough, with one correction. My Oakleys were £60.

I don't work, repeatedly, for the reapeatedly overusing words repeatedly department. But I have repeatedly done contract work work them, repeatedly. They're one of my repeated customers*


(*Also a paid up card-carrying member of the "make sense? What the fugg does that mean?" club)

My Oakleys were £135 I think. They're one of those things that make you go 'ouch' when you click the buy button. But everytime you put them on you think "these are pretty good actually".

I've just bought some Tifosi cycling glasses, with 3 sets of lenses though, because I couldn't face the thought of dropping my Oakleys under the wheels of a lorry while commuting. Also, they're too dark to use when I'm in amongst the trees.

Mental Mickey

bails87 wrote:

However......the "you only get one pair of eyes" argument is a bit wierd. If you buy those Bolle safety glasses for £6 they'll do as good a, if not better, job of physically protecting your eyes than a £150 pair of Oakleys. Any difference in UV damage will be pretty negligible too.

Posers can't pose in Bolle's though can they? They don't have the same rad to the gnarr power of awesomeness that Oakley's have but, you knew that.

bails87

Mental Mickey wrote:

bails87 wrote:

However......the "you only get one pair of eyes" argument is a bit wierd. If you buy those Bolle safety glasses for £6 they'll do as good a, if not better, job of physically protecting your eyes than a £150 pair of Oakleys. Any difference in UV damage will be pretty negligible too.

Posers can't pose in Bolle's though can they? They don't have the same rad to the gnarr power of awesomeness that Oakley's have but, you knew that.

bails87 wrote:

but if you want to do it in style......well, as Wheezer said, "Oakley makes the shades that transform a tool"...

Anonymous

I don't pose. I just ride. I'm ugly enough as it is .

So better to keep on the move than looking at stunning views with fantastic optics and attempting to look stunning to any beauties I may find on the way (and let's face it, there aren't many out there!).

As for cost. I only really wear the stuff for the bike. Out and about or driving I don't wear sunglasses, skiing I wear goggles (not Oakley either). Not that I'd be replacing the cheap stuff much if it's good quality sturdy stuff. Some are designed to just snap apart on impact without damage and you just fit back together.

Back to the point, I'd be quite concerned if my glasses snapped just by replacing the lens! Even if they give you a replacement, will that be just as fragile?

supersonic

There is cheap (£1.99 a pair from a dodgy geezer on Blackpool sea front), and budget - and some of the latter are very, very good.

I use Red Frog Oxigen - though unfortunately that model doesn't exist, but similar do:

http://www.redfrogstore.co.uk/virage-vp ... -749-p.asp

Use good quality polycarbonate lenses, and can take a beating as a shut the car boot on them, didn't even scratch them!

nc1584

I bought my first pair of O's about 15 years ago. After many years of abuse I finally decided to send them to Oakley to have the lenses replaced, this was in 2003 and they called to say they didn't make the model and lens anymore.

On the plus side, they offered me 50% of a new pair; which have been mint ever since, despite being used for riding, skiing, snowboarding and playboating...

Can't rate them enough as I've had 8 years of decent sunglasses for circa £10 a year.

Rich Hcp

I was very sceptical about Oakleys.

Now I won't buy anything else!

The customer Service is superb, it used to be in Letchworth, but is now in Holland.

But a dealer will help.

As said above, you may pay slightly more, but they last for years and if there is a problem, they sort it.

can't say fairer than that

Anonymous

How good are they when you come off and faceplant a rock or go end on to a branch?

That's the key question I ask of glasses for bike riding.

Looking good, great optics and great customer service that replaces them when they break(!) is no match for not losing your eyes in a smash.

I admit I don't know the answer there. I may have tried them on, but I haven't tested them in a smash . Others I have and I know which work.

Rich Hcp

From the website:

Most Oakley Eyewear meets or exceeds ANSI Z87.1 standards for optical clarity and impact resistance. Please check the product description on Oakley.com for exact specifications.

OSHA references ANSI Z87.1 as the benchmark standard for occupational eye and face protection. Section (b) (1) Protective eye and face devices purchased after July 5, 1994 shall comply with ANSI Z87.1-1989, “American National Standard Practice for Occupational and Educational Eye and Face Protection,” which is incorporated by reference as specified in Sec. 1910.6. www.osha.gov ANSI Z87.1 - Practice for Occupational and Educational Eye and Face Protection Standard Z87.1 (—) 1979 American National Standard Institute is a private, non-profit organization. It includes the specific standards for evaluating factors such as impact resistance, lens thickness, projectile penetration, and optical quality.

The proection is pretty good, I've been hit in the face by branches with no problems, not even scratched lenses

If you're going to facepalnt rocks, then you need a full face helmet!

allthegearnoidea

ive just had a similar issue of one of my pairs, snapped on top and below the lense on my hijinx, gutted as they were a favorite pair but as they cost very little have bodged them back by super gluing the lense inti the frames and use as riding specs!

company called visionary lenses - http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Visionary-Lens ... 4340.l2563 do some Great polarised replacement lenses for resonable money that really make the difference on old scratched lenses! haave a pair of fire iridiums in my gascans and a pair of mirror gold for my other hijinx, really good lenses,

have a few pair of cycling specs, but always end up in the oakleys!!

chrischris1315

If I were to buy a pair off the net because they're considerably cheaper could I take them back to a dealer to get the boxes to send them back to Oakley to get them fixed if they break?

Cheers

Chris

Rich Hcp

If they are genuine Oakleys, then, yes, they will sort it for you.

(The dealer near me would, anyway)

cee

chrischris1315 wrote:

If I were to buy a pair off the net because they're considerably cheaper could I take them back to a dealer to get the boxes to send them back to Oakley to get them fixed if they break?

Cheers

Chris

My girlie bought mine for me for my birthday.....she got them online....

The local dealer is just up the road from the house though, so thats where she went for the pre-paid warranty returns box....

No problem....just took the receipt..As long as the online place is an authorisied Oakley Dealer.....then all is good with the world.

Now sent off....hopefully won't have to wait too long to hear.