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Metal Tipped Heels - Quarter irons/steels


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Hi

 

I get through a lot of these. Still popular with the rest of you?

 

Also have a lot of customers that want them straight on brand new shoes which I've always found a bit odd. Any others have that with customers? Any idea why someone would take off a brand new heel that there's nothing wrong with?

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I use a lot of these but have been frustrated with the poor standard of quality in recent years.

Having grumbled to reps time & time again nobody seems to supply decent combinets anymore.

They all seem to be PVC which in my opinion finish very poorly & look shabby.

However...

Recently an old lady came into my shop stating her husband had recently died aged 85 & used to do repairs from their garage & was I interested in going to clear it out ?

Sad that the poor chap had died I was still intrigued to have a look

What an aladins cave. I've now acquired a stack of Fussells combinets , straight tops etc .

It's great to have them in stock .

How many other old sheds/garages are filled with things of the past we crave for ???

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I've tried on numerous occasions to source rubber heels with 1/4 steels from Europe or even worldwide and no-one has ever heard of them. As far as I can work out its only us in the uk that use these.

 

Unless you want to buy thousands of pairs from china and then there is the risk of them being rubbish, maybe jointly the SRF members could group together and get a load made, but as previously discussed actually sorting out detail (payment, delivery etc.) makes something like this near on impossible.

 

Believe me, if I found a manufacturer of these I'd be importing them cos there is money to be there!

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Er, I think we can, but it needs to be economical :wink: If the demand was there I believe manufacturers might make them, but at a price. As most of you guy's are very price concious, it may make them unviable or uneconomic to make.

 

 

perhaps it is then in the interest of a supplier to enquire as to the cost of reproducing them, giving us guys an estimated cost for us to buy them, and then see what sort of response they get back, in regards to if we think its too expensive or not. i'd say the ball is firmly in the court of the suppliers at this moment, can they be bothered trying to source a manufacture?

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Er, I think we can, but it needs to be economical :wink: If the demand was there I believe manufacturers might make them, but at a price. As most of you guy's are very price concious, it may make them unviable or uneconomic to make.

So who would make them in this country,as Paul PVC would like to know of a manufacturer

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The only supplier I know that make rubber components in the UK are Harborough Rubber. If Robinh is looking in he may be able to enlighten you all on the pro's and con's of making this specialist component as it will need tooling I'm sure and I'm sure, as a supplier, that this has been looked at many times before.

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When Fussell's Rubber stopped making the Combinettes I contacted them on behalf of The Forum to enquire as to why they had stopped production.

 

Their reply (If I remember correctly) was along the lines of that they had moved or were moving premises and that it wasn't cost effective to move or replace the big and old machinery that was used to produce Combinettes.

 

To be honest we rarely get asked for them these days and do about one pair every six weeks.

 

You could always make your own, it's fairly straightforward if the iron quarters are still available. If you make them yourself they usually end up neater than the original Fussell's which I sometimes found to be sub-standard.

 

Rick.

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  • 1 month later...
I saw the rep from soles2go last week, and they are trying to produce something as well!

 

See what they come up with.... :-k

 

 

I told him to get these made and he does seem to have some good contacts in South America and has lots of experience in sourcing materials and suppliers (mainly from the shoe retail trade but now in repair)

 

Like you said, lets see what he can come up with.

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