Well, after only moderate use my Onyx 1828 3/8″ Nano Impact Wrench has a problem. On the nose is a small retaining ring, that holds sockets in place. It came out of its groove and bent. At first I couldn’t figure out why it was so hard to put sockets on or take them off the wrench. The last one I had to hammer off and then saw what the problem was:
The retaining ring that holds the sockets on the nose had bent! It was so bad that I didn’t even try to see if I could get a socket on as you can see in the above photos.
First, I checked Amazon to see if I could return it but could not – no worries – I bought it back on January 25, 2018 — about eight and a half months ago. So, I Googled Astra Pneumatics, found their warranty page and they said to call (800-221-9705) with the model number of the unit (The 3/8″ Onyx I have is model # 1828) and the part that I needed from their breakdown sheet located on the main product page – so I got that too:
I circled it in red above for reference – it’s part number 1822-04 and called the 800 number. The phone was promptly answered and the lady I spoke to was very professional. They knew there was a problem with a previous generation of the wrench sold earlier by Amazon that they had since fixed. She said she’d be very happy to send me a new ring for free. “Cool – I don’t have to send it in” so I gave her my info.
Here we are two weeks later and still no ring. I called again and this time wrote down the name of the customer service agent and she gave me a reference number, which the last agent did not. I told her I was bummed because I needed the wrench and the sockets just fell off when I was trying to do odd position work – which was true. The sockets were just falling off on work with any downward angle.
So, I talked to her on September 11th and we’ll see how things go. I’m hoping the ring comes this time or I will call back and escalate matters. I really like the wrench – it’s light, powerful and can get in tight spaces but that all doesn’t matter if it can’t retain its sockets.
So, I wanted to pass this along in case you are having a similar issue and you want to know who to contact and what to request. I’ll update this post once I have the ring and the unit back in operation … or, worst case, I have to call a third time and escalate but I think things will get resolved this time as the customer service agent made sure (literally) that I wrote down both her name and the reference number.
We’ll see.
This started on 9/11/2018.
Update 9/20: They sent the wrong size retaining ring!!! The replacement unit must be for the 1/2″ model. It’s 8:07pm and they closed at 3:30 Pacific so I left a general voicemail as Marcy’s voicemail box in customer service is not accepting messages. I’m now getting irked.
9/21 – Called and talked to Marcy who confirmed they sent the wrong size ring. I told her this was causing problems for and I’d really appreciate it if they would send the ring some way other than first class mail. She mumbled something to the effect that she couldn’t do anything about it or it was out of her control.
9/26 – Still dead in the water and am ticked off.
As an update, some time in October 2018 this got resolved. I called and asked to talk to a supervisor. It turns out the rings were back ordered but she had a stash to help out people who had waited a long time. She sent me two and I was back in business. If you are going to buy one, first find out if they have changed the socket retaining ring/clip design. I think someone at that firm told me they had but confirm this. If it weren’t for this problem, I’d be very happy. The wrench itself works fine otherwise.
2/21/20 Update: I use this wrench occasionally when I am in a tough spot. I don’t use it more because I don’t trust the hog ring to last. I really can’t recommend this tool given the challenges I’ve had and knowing that hog ring is a problem.
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