Dog Handling Equipment Failures

[dwynwen]

I imagine most reading this forum are using quality gear so failures are hopefully rare.

I've been using a Sporn original harness on my 35kg dog while we work on her lack of self control when seeing other dogs in the street - think energizer bunny on steroids.

Yesterday during an encounter with an off-lead dog - thankfully a friendly one - one of the clips on the harness failed. Luckily the other one held and I was able to switch to the martingale collar while the other owner continued to attempt to catch his (cute, fast and totally not-under-effective-control dog).

K9Pro used to have a page about leash selection which explained the weakness in die cast chrome plated snaps. It's still findable by searching but the pictures are no longer available.

This snap failed in exactly the way he described.

http://www.k9protraining.com.au/selecting-the-right-leash-for-your-dog/

I have friends who use these harnesses extensively on much larger dogs than mine although perhaps more for steady pulling behaviour rather than the sharp stresses of bouncing that my girl does (she is getting better but when a worthy playmate turns up right under your nose, what's a girl to do?)

My regular leads are K9Pro leather and syntec The leather leads are well over 10 years old and never a problem. I use Rogz martingale collars with the chain insert, also without any issue.

What kind of failures have you had in equipment if any? (None, ever, would make me feed more confident in just replacing the part)

Edited December 17, 2015 by dwynwen

[BarbedWire]

The worst that has happened to me is the dog has slipped her collar at a critical moment but that is my fault. :)

efs

Edited December 17, 2015 by sarsaparilla

[JulesP]

20+ years and I've never had anything break. Had a couple of leads chewed through by puppies :laugh:

But my dogs don't tend to do things that would cause issues.

The leads/collars I've probably used the most in that time frame is Black Dog.

I'm a horsey person too though and you learn to avoid allowing that sort of pressure as a handler.

[Tassie]

Mostly Black Dog gear here, although my current leads are the gripper ones I got from Clean Run ... very happy with them. Only use harnesses for bike and tracking .. Black Dog Y tracking harnesses and I've also used the Comfortflex ones from Clean Run.

[BarbedWire]

sorted thanks

Edited December 18, 2015 by sarsaparilla

[Mrs Rusty Bucket]

I had a $20 horse lead broken by my dog in the exact same way as the opening post. The snap clip came apart at the swivel.

It was a pity because the rope had a really nice feel to it. I can't find any for sale in google - so I'm guessing I'm not the only one who broke the clip.

She's eaten through three webbing leads - hence the horse lead - takes her about 30 seconds or three bites to chop through a webbing lead - scissor mouth dog. She busted the join of a cheap as chips lead. I fixed it with whipping cord in the traditional sailing way of joining two ropes together and that has held.

And I had a kramar dog harness like one of these - part of the clip bit of one of the buckles broke off. Not chewed or shut in the door - just broke while trying to clip it together. My next car harness - doesn't have any plastic buckles where they matter structurally.

http://www.animalhealthstore.com.au/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/c/a/car_and_walking_harness_5.jpeg

And she's pulled apart the buckle of a cheap as chips reflective collar that I use for agility. We just had to say hello to that dog there. I used a rogs collar after that.

I do use two leads with the head halter. The one I put on the head halter is super light so it doesn't drag on the attachment and put pressure on her nose and I attach the regular horse lead to a normal collar as usual - just in case.

[sheena]

I've had equipment chewed though but never had any equipment actually fail of it's own accord.

[ness]

Never and mainly use black dog gear with mine to.

[J...]

None here - I use black dog collars and mostly yacht braid leads.

I make a point of finding places where my dogs can be off lead and away from other dogs, they really only wear leads and collars for agility trialling - so can't say we put too much pressure on anything either!

[alpha bet]

Have a local woman make mine, she makes horse harness so uses good quality harness leather and brass fittings.... much better quality than most you can find.

Your gear is only as good as the fittings and joinery... most of the ordinary gear as very poor clips.

[huski]

I had equipment fail when we first had our husky Micha. I still have the K9 Pro leash I bought to replace it, it is over 10 years old. It failed exactly like the pic you posted in your OP.

Sorry the pics aren't showing for you, we had trouble with the server losing them when we changed over and I am slowly updating all the articles with missing images. Here is another one that does have pics - http://blog.k9pro.com.au/how-safe-is-your-dogs-collar/

Nowadays I obviously have a LOT of equipment, especially with three dogs. When you handle dogs like this you can't afford to have equipment that could break;

Edited December 18, 2015 by huski

[silentchild]

I've had my girl chew through a Syntek leash but other than that nothing else, touch wood!

[Two Best Dogs!]

Disregarding the things pirhana-mouth has bitten through in one quick nip...(my long leads are horse lines now too, they'll take quite a few nips, enough time to get her attention!)

One long lead that snapped when she reached the end, creating a less supervised play than I wanted

[dwynwen]

Sporn central has confirmed that the construction of the clip per my photos is normal (ie not an obviously faulty join)

And they will replace it for me if I want.

(customer service is good - although I would prefer 'lifetime guarantee' to mean "unbreakable" rather than "will replace if/when it breaks", unrealistic I know)

[Cosmolo]

I have had a few collars on clients dogs break as well as a couple of leather leads and 2 German made Sprenger correction chains.

[OSoSwift]

If your dogs chew leads put lavender oil on them. Smells good, tastes bloody awful!

My dogs don't pull so snapping things due to lunging/pulling is not much of an issue. The BRD can get a bit excited and will sometimes hit the end of a lead - not really hard but it's there, so we are working on that. Having said that she does have an amazing leave and recall.

[LisaCC]

I've had equipment fail at the clasps in the past with my family labrador. Mum just used to buy stuff from the local pet shop. He wore a head collar for a short time and yes we would double up the leash with that. But more for training purposes, I transitioned him onto a flat collar pretty quickly.

The breakages with general petshop equipment we had is one of the reasons I buy more expensive quality equipment now.

[aussielover]

My main issue is that plastic buckles are not safe enough if my dog were to suddenly lunge (she doesn't usually but you never know) but the metal ones tend to get rusted very quickly as she swims a lot.

[dwynwen]

Footnote to the issue with my harness - the manufacturer has sent me a replacement halter. I was expecting just the 'restraint' part but they sent the whole thing. Good customer service, happy with their response.