Exped UL7 Failure and the REI Warranty – Kudos

This seems to be very common with Exped pads. I can see why Exped reduced the warranty. I do own one, but luckily I bought it at REI when REI offered a lifetime satisfaction guarantee. I still won't take it out on anything longer than two nights though.

I bought my Thermarest 13 years ago. I haven't had to send it back because it hasn't failed. Now that is something worthy of praise.

I hope I'm not tempting fate here, but…

I took my Exped Synmat UL7 MW on the JMT + sidetrips (a total of 20 nights), AND I used it as part of my pack frame during that time (which put lots of extra stress/wear on it!), AND I didn't baby it at all: no problems. Maybe it's a quality control issue (i.e., some didn't get full bonding on the channels in the factory; others did)?

My problem item was an Icebreaker shirt that developed tiny holes within 4 days of purchase (and I'm STILL getting the run-around from their warranty people and the retailer who sold it to me). So, based on my own experience, I wouldn't trust an Icebreaker product on a hike longer than 2 days, but I'll definitely bring my UL7! :^)

FYI, every single problem I've had with my exped pads (2 massive dog punctures, +1 faulty baffle) has been taken care of without difficulty from exped.

After my dog exploded my first exped, I sent it back to them to see how much it would cost to repair. They sent me a brand new one, despite my telling them that my dog jumped on it (totally user error).

Exped has had the absolute best customer service/warranty of a "big" company that I've ever used.

My first SynMat did the same thing as this. I emailed a photo to Exped Canada and they mailed me a new one.

This summer I put ~130 nights on that new one while hiking the PCT and this issue didn't arise, so perhaps they've made some improvements to the design.