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Check Your Hercules Stands


Jabba_the_gut

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3 hours ago, oldslapper said:

Had same problem, and there was a thread on here about it a while back. Hercules were brilliant and I got a new one for half price as a result of sending some pictures to them. The new ones don’t have that rubber on the mechanism anymore thankfully. 

So my nice new stand which hasn't got a 'rubbery feel' coating should be OK?

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3 hours ago, ezbass said:

Garage storage may have some bearing on the demise of the plastic. Less than optimal temperatures and, if cars are stored there, there may well be some pollutant damage.

I used an old A frame stand yesterday (not a Hercules) which I’d been storing in the loft, took it to a gig and, upon opening it, the rubber at the apex just split. The environment in my loft had obviously degraded it (plus, it was probably cheap). Fortunately, not as a huge disaster as having the height control section let go on the OP’s Hercules (I have one of these too, which I may now remove from the loft to a more stable environment).

My Arbiter triangle-type stand is about 30 years old and still going strong!

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3 minutes ago, Stub Mandrel said:

My Arbiter triangle-type stand is about 30 years old and still going strong!

I'm thinking the loft definitely killed mine. However, with some judicious application of gaffa tape, we have a working stand again. Aradite, gaffa and WD40, if you can't fix it with any of those, chuck it! :D 

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2 hours ago, Frank Blank said:

I think you can get similar faults with other stands but the thing about Hercules is that they seem to acknowledge the problem and be quick to rectify it. I actually think it makes the brand worth using.

Exactly. I've always thought you find out what a company is really like when things go wrong and they have an obligation to fulfil, a single report of a customer who's had problems and has been treated properly makes me much more likely to spend my money with them.

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As mentioned earlier by some people here, it's a known fact that the Hercules grip on these stands simply explode over the time even if simply and correctly stored. Mine were stored for a year or so in the attic (stable temperature and humidity, just in case) and the plastic had become sticky when I decided to use them again. It's a form if depolymerization of the bad quality plastic they used around 2011~2014.

Hercules offered me to exchange them without discussion. So if you have some sticky grips on yours, there is absolutely no guru cure, but write to Hercules with a photo of the grip and they'll send you a new one.

I fixed some of mine with a threaded screw with handle like this :

41xcS6ruhnL._AC_SY400_.jpg.ac7a329469b39de1f00ed3aa3a156b9c.jpg

... And now they are rock solid.

To me the Hercules stands are still the best ones. 😉

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The sickness of the height adjuster grip which will eventually lead to the plastic disintegrating, is AFAICS completely down to Hercules using the wrong, or a dodgy batch of plastic for some their stands and has nothing to do with how the stands have been stored, or used/abused. If the plastic is wrong the grips will eventually become sticky and then the mechanism will fail irrespective of how you look after the stands.

The good news is that Hercules and their distributors have acknowledged that there is a problem and have been putting it right.

The replacement stands I got 2 years ago for my sticky ones are still fine and have no problems at all.

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Hmm  ... I don't think it's helped by the spring being too powerful. With a 2:1 mechanical advantage the spring could have a third of the force and still be more than secure.

Suggestion - don't store fully closed, instead click it into the top hole. I think this will more than halve the force on the pivot.

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Had that happen to me with one of their triple guitar stands, whilst it was fully loaded!  Wasn't massively impressed by that (as it had never been pushed beyond standard bedroom use) but I had not long bought one of their "traditional" style racks so just squished everything up on that.  That rack works fine as it's just a padded frame, very little to go wrong with that.

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Strings and Things the UK distributors policy has changed from offering a replacement (apparently this was abused by people just sending a picture off the internet and requesting a replacement) to now offering 50% Off although if you dig in they may offer to replace just the lower half and you re-use the grab part as this part just pulls out of the assembly 

 

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Good news story in the end, we all make mistakes, if you put them right then you are a company I want to deal with. I read this through because I'd recommended Hercules stands to a band member just a couple of days ago. 

I wonder if Fiat will send me a new car if I complain about their soft touch car handles disintegrating on my 15 year old Multipla?

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