Recent Clearwater Experiences?

[droveto]

Edit - 3/26/2022 - Glenn and Clearwater have stepped up and are going above and beyond. I feel a little guilty as now they're giving more than I had just asked for in the first place and I hate that sometimes going full blow Karen works... But I've only gotten to that point twice in my life (I'm 46) so I don't feel like I'm taking advantage of that retail loophole...

Anyway, if it's possible to delete this entire thread, that would probably be ideal. It seems my case is a one off and it happened at a time where they were disrupted due to losing one of their technicians so it was an unlucky situation.

-------------------------
Below issue has been resolved:

I'm curious what recent clearwater experiences anyone has had.
I recently had a negative experience needing to follow up with them repeatedly. They lost the light I sent them, then they "finally found it," and flat out lied about the condition of the light and told me the inside was corroded when it was not.
I'm upset with myself for not taking photos, but everything I had understood about their customer service was top notch so I didn't even think of it. Have they gone downhill since acquired by Simpson?
And not that the corrosion even matters. The light was out of warranty, so I was willing and prepared to buy a new one. However, that they lost it and then it it sat there for a month and then offered up a visual diagnosis as the only diagnosis that happened to completely contradict what I looked at it when I shipped it out makes me very weary.
Also, when they learned that I had an older CANbus with an issue that causes the lights to shut off they didn't even offer to send me the updated one. Just "try not to accidentally hit your cancel button twice. The new CANbus doesn't have that problem."

I'm really totally shocked... I've gotten better support on $100 products from Amazon shipped from China. No exaggeration.

 

[pglaves]

I'm curious what recent clearwater experiences anyone has had.
I recently had a negative experience needing to follow up with them repeatedly. They lost the light I sent them, then they "finally found it," and flat out lied about the condition of the light and told me the inside was corroded when it was not.
I'm upset with myself for not taking photos, but everything I had understood about their customer service was top notch so I didn't even think of it. Have they gone downhill since acquired by Simpson?
And not that the corrosion even matters. The light was out of warranty, so I was willing and prepared to buy a new one. However, that they lost it and then it it sat there for a month and then offered up a visual diagnosis as the only diagnosis that happened to completely contradict what I looked at it when I shipped it out makes me very weary.
Also, when they learned that I had an older CANbus with an issue that causes the lights to shut off they didn't even offer to send me the updated one. Just "try not to accidentally hit your cancel button twice. The new CANbus doesn't have that problem."

I'm really totally shocked... I've gotten better support on $100 products from Amazon shipped from China. No exaggeration.

Is it possible that the light they "found" was not the light you sent and they lost? This might explain the corrosion issue.

 

[Omega Man]

I’m curious on why you sent the light to them. You mentioned it was out of warranty and were prepared to buy a new one.
OM

 

[bdfbeemer]

I recently had a problem and sent the light in for repair. It was several years old. They told me there was corrosion inside due to a leak around one of the bolts. They repaired it or sent me a new one. I have had great luck with their customer service.

 

[glenfiddich]

I had one of the first year Krista lights develop a leak midway through a 6k mile ride. Given its age it was well out of warranty and apparently the leak had been present well before I saw water behind the lens. I sent both lights in for I/R (they insist on checking out the pair). One was rebuilt; the other was too far gone so they replaced it for an extremely reasonable price. I've always been happy with their service.

Pete

 

[lee]

Have they gone downhill since acquired by Simpson?
.

I have not heard anything about a new owner.

Edit: I found this.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rel...cts-acquires-clearwater-lights-300990425.html

Sounds like Glenn is still involved with the company.

 

[droveto]

I’m curious on why you sent the light to them. You mentioned it was out of warranty and were prepared to buy a new one.
OM

They asked me to. I was hoping to get a new board installed as I would imagine that's all that was wrong and thinking that would be cheaper than an entire new light since the seals were all good and everything looked functionally fine. I didn't think 16k miles on a garaged CA bike was typical for life span.

 

[droveto]

I have not heard anything about a new owner.

Edit: I found this.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rel...cts-acquires-clearwater-lights-300990425.html

Sounds like Glenn is still involved with the company.

He is, but it just seems like my experience is going vastly different from others in the past so I'm wondering if bean counters from above have requested to stop being so generous on items out of warranty.

He did reach out to me yesterday after not hearing from him for a couple of weeks so I'd like to keep details private until things are resolved. As it is I would remove the system from my bike and sell it. The CANbus is an old version that shuts off the lights with a double click of the TSC and they aren't designed to work like that. The updated CANbus fixes this. The Darla light failed after 16k miles as a garaged CA bike. I was living with the annoying CANbus being sure to pull up close to cars at intersections to verify if my lights are on, but when the Darla failed and things transpired as they did I was just surprised that my experience seemed so different than others. I have Erica's and Billy Tail light too and I don't want to have to think about them when riding. Maybe I'll just remove the CANbus and run them straight to power. I don't know... It's just been an annoying process where my part was lost, I had to follow up a couple of times, I was ghosted on an email a couple of weeks ago and when the drivers in Vegas were all trying to hit me yesterday when I was out riding and I saw that my lights were out I had my tipping point and lost my patience with the lights.

 

[Omega Man]

They asked me to. I was hoping to get a new board installed as I would imagine that's all that was wrong and thinking that would be cheaper than an entire new light since the seals were all good and everything looked functionally fine. I didn't think 16k miles on a garaged CA bike was typical for life span.

I’m involved with a lot of LED lighting, mainly on an institutional (buildings) level. LED lighting is celebrated as the cure for darkness because people are told “they last forever”!
While it’s true the LED’s have long life, the circuitry is generally nowhere near as robust. The “drivers” ( think ballasts) which control the up/down, off/on seem to be the biggest problem.
I recently saw a bike with a set of LED lights low on the crash bars? Along with the headlight, the triangle pattern was excellent and just what I have been thinking of.
When I get to duplicating this, there will be no no extra control past a waterproof switch on the handlebars with power direct to the battery- through the SAE Battery Tender power lead.
LED’s great……accessory connections and controllers, not so much. This simplifies diagnostic work as well.
OM

 

[PoorUB]

Bought out by "BRS is a New York based private equity investment firm...", doesn't sound good to me! They will need to keep the investors satisfied!

Clearwater are great lights, they should be for the price! There are other quality options or much less.

 

[Omega Man]

Not sure how how any of the M&A stuff works. From the Clearwater site-



OM

 

[droveto]

I’m involved with a lot of LED lighting, mainly on an institutional (buildings) level. LED lighting is celebrated as the cure for darkness because people are told “they last forever”!
While it’s true the LED’s have long life, the circuitry is generally nowhere near as robust. The “drivers” ( think ballasts) which control the up/down, off/on seem to be the biggest problem.
I recently saw a bike with a set of LED lights low on the crash bars? Along with the headlight, the triangle pattern was excellent and just what I have been thinking of.
When I get to duplicating this, there will be no no extra control past a waterproof switch on the handlebars with power direct to the battery- through the SAE Battery Tender power lead.
LED’s great……accessory connections and controllers, not so much. This simplifies diagnostic work as well.
OM

This makes a lot of sense. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.

 

[millsaps2]

Clearwater Lights & Simpson

https://www.simpsonraceproducts.com/pages/clearwater-motorcycle-lights

Simpson has purchased Clearwater Lights

 

[droveto]

They said they'd ship me a light and a CANbus. They sent a light, but with not enough cable to replace the one I sent them. And the light they sent has a plastic connector, and then you have to attach an adapter so that you can eventually splice the three cables and connect them? What is the point of all the plastic connectors or did they ship me the wrong light? They forget to ship the CANbus. This is such a confusing (and time wasting) experience.
I've had suspicion that they lost my light when they told me it was corroded and not serviceable which contradicts what I saw when I took it apart. My suspicions are getting greater and it would explain why I felt like I've been being lied to every step of this process. I'm not normally a paranoid guy and I might have an issue with customer service every 5-10 years at the most and am just kind of scratching my head at this comedy.

At one point their customer service told me that "Amazon has created unrealistic customer service expectations." To which I must say that if you are struggling to keep up with the customer service levels of companies in China on Amazon it's probably time to file for bankruptcy. Not once have they said "Sorry" for losing my light, then finding my light (supposedly), not responding for weeks, for realizing I did actually have a defective CANbus after telling me it was user error years ago. All I got was being told that I had unrealistic customer service expectations because I waited two weeks until after they received my light when all I asked was for confirmation that they received it and that because I went Karen on them that they were going to send me free stuff. Which is not at all what I'm even after. A simple acknowledgement that their continued mistakes are costing me time and causing frustration matters much more to me than passive aggressively sending me free stuff to patronize me.

Ugh. Not impressed at all. I was honestly ready to sweep it all under the rug when they were sending me the items get it to work as it was supposed to when I bought it, but they really seem completely lost right now.