1st Time Buyer. Impressions, Lens Questions, Revant, etc.

[SteveH]

1st time poster so I am sorry for the newbie questions.

1st, some background..... Years ago, I had a couple of decent quality sun glasses like Serengeti, and Revo. Like many, I lost or broke them and felt like crap shelling out that kind of $$'s. So for the last 25 years, I bought cheapo Walmart type brands. The quality of these $20 glasses have been getting worse and worse.

While killing some time in a shopping outlet mall, I walked into three different shops and started trying on sun glasses. IMHO, most styles of the Oakley glasses were absolutely to the next level over Revo, Ray-Ban, and Serengeti. But Maui Jim (never heard of them before then) had a nice product line. Anyways, I fell in love with the fit and finish of the Oakley Radarlock Path. They frames fit like a glove, looked awesome, and "smelled like money"! That last sentence is a good thing.

So my plan was to buy a pair of Radarlock Path's that day. I was at one of those Tanger outlet malls in the Washington DC area so I was looking for a deal. I walked into 3 sun glass stores and their discounts were non-existent unless you bought 2 pair and got a messily 20% off on the 2nd pair (or 10% off each making you buy 2 pair). They did have more discounts so long as you bought the items no one else wanted and they were butt ugly with limited options. I diverge....

Because of my realistic fear or breaking or scuffing them, I didn't want to drop $2xx+ dollars. The Radarlocks have various frame parts as well as different rotatable lenses with different colors and applications. I was sold on this concept! So I searched the web trying to find a deal. I end up buying a new pair of vented Radarlock path NON-polarized for $140 delivered on Ebay. It had the tags, case, extra nose piece, etc.

Which brings me to my questions.

1.) I want a couple of polarized lens options and got sticker shocked by Oakley's lenses. With the help of this forum, I noticed that Revant makes some knock-offs. With a little more digging, I see there are brands like BVANQ. Are there any others? Any to stay away from? If it is $20 a lenses versus $50 for polarized, I don't care. Give me the better ones. After that, I can accept small compromises.

2.) My series is the 009181-41 (vented Path). I hope it is a standard (non-XL) Radarlock frame. But can I buy vented or Non vented lenses? Buy Path versus Edge lens?

Thanks for any and all help!

Steve

 

[OakleyFrankFMJ]

Welcome to the forum.

You may find very little support to aftermarket lenses here. But some members do use them. Although there should be optical tests done on them by a third party to ensure they are comparable to oem.

 

[SteveH]

Welcome to the forum.

You may find very little support to aftermarket lenses here. But some members do use them. Although there should be optical tests done on them by a third party to ensure they are comparable to oem.

Thanks for the response Frank.

Do you know if the 009181-41 (Radarlock Vented Path Prism) can use NON-vented as well as Edge style lenses? When I was at the retailer, he was struggling rotating the lenses from a Prism to polarized. His test was to set the glasses with the bottom lens edge down and touching the table and attempting to get them straight. He looked at the bottom of both of the left and right earpiece and said they both ears should be close to touching the table. It took him 4 attempts to get it dialed in. trial 1-3 had one ear in the air. I wasn't impressed with his trials and he explained that one series was thinker than the other.

Any help with this question would be appreciated.

 

[kronin323]

A radarlock frame should accept any authentic radarlock lenses. Vented or not makes no difference. The different lens shapes edge/path/pitch are just differences of the bottom edge shapes/coverage; they should all fit in the same frame.

I've experienced the problem before where it seems like the frame is twisted a bit after putting in new lenses; the issue was it just wasn't seated properly. Usually a slight twist would pop things into place. Once I got more experienced with swapping the lenses, didn't have it happen anymore.

You'll do what you want but I also recommend sticking with OEM lenses. Yes, they're more expensive, but there's a reason for that, and it's worth it. And if you buy cheap ones first then decide to get OEM, you'll be spending more total than if you just got OEM in the first place, yet would have spent time dealing with crappy lenses. Some forum searching can find a number of arguments for and against aftermarkets, but here's a link to start:

http://www.oakleyforum.com/threads/lenses.36431/page-2#post-407016

And welcome to the forum.

 

[SteveH]

A radarlock frame should accept any authentic radarlock lenses. Vented or not makes no difference. The different lens shapes edge/path/pitch are just differences of the bottom edge shapes/coverage; they should all fit in the same frame.

That was what I was hoping for. Thanks for the confirmation.

I've experienced the problem before where it seems like the frame is twisted a bit after putting in new lenses; the issue was it just wasn't seated properly. Usually a slight twist would pop things into place. Once I got more experienced with swapping the lenses, didn't have it happen anymore.

The retail employee struggled getting them to set in perfectly with multiple attempts. I was hoping experience was the reason. Possibly out of embarrassment, he mumbled some lens models were more persnickety.

You'll do what you want but I also recommend sticking with OEM lenses. Yes, they're more expensive, but there's a reason for that, and it's worth it. And if you buy cheap ones first then decide to get OEM, you'll be spending more total than if you just got OEM in the first place, yet would have spent time dealing with crappy lenses. Some forum searching can find a number of arguments for and against aftermarkets, but here's a link to start:

Thanks for the link and the counter arguments.

I will bet that the Oakley lenses will objectively measure better. After some quick googling about Revant, they are now about a $10M company (see http://www.oregonlive.com/playbooks-profits/index.ssf/2015/05/lens_shades_50_shades_of_gray.html ). If they were at $400K in sales like their 1st year in business, maybe not. But at $10M, H_ell yes! If they were as good or better measurement wise, their sales would do much better. If their measurements proved this, they would be shouting it out to the world yet you only hear crickets.

With that said ^^, there are objective measurements that may exceed ones ability to discern any subjective difference. Meaning, just because it measures better doesn't mean it looks superior to a persons eyes. More specifically, some eyes may be more sensitive than others. I'm 50 years old and by definition presbyopia (focusing ability) is a reality at my age (see http://www.aoa.org/patients-and-pub...-age/adult-vision-41-to-60-years-of-age?sso=y ). Putting it another way, my eyes simply are not as good as they were 20 years ago. I'm staring though $4 Costco cheaters (which are MUCH better than the $1 cheaters) and I have never gotten a headache in my life based off of optics. But rather I get a headache when my pumpkin sized head feels a tight frame after a few hours. So if you are following, there is a subset of Oakley buyers who appreciate the fit and feel of the Radar frames as well as the beautiful looking lenses. It's because they look and feel better to the fatheads like me! It's not all a loss, fatheads have bigger brains (normally more surface area)! All in fun.

So my goal is to get darn close to Oakley lenses. If I cannot subjectively tell the difference, I'm going to be tickled. If I can still see a very small difference and it is close enough, I'll take the trade-off. Now if I could guarantee that my lenses would never break, scuff, or get lost, then I'd splurge and spend the extra $400 total for all of the lens combination. But I know myself and I expect to misplace them, scratch them etc. When I do, I will be upset so I'm taking a trade-off on some brand that others say works out well.

Back to Revant for a moment.... I've learned the following: Price, Quality, Service. Pick 2 of the 3. I can tell you where Revant is cutting at least one corner and that is customer service. You cannot walk into a retailer and try them. You have to wait 3-7 days to receiver them. If you don't like them you have to send them back and micromanage your visa to make sure it was taken care of. Good luck trying to call them on the phone. I've tried and they hide their number extremely well. Most disturbing is they don't answer their fricken Ebay correspondence! So when the article pointed out that they have 21 employees, they need 22 employees: one person to answer their questions! I've asked 3 times since Wednesday and as of this AM, zero responses. I'm willing to buy the Oakley lenses exclusively because I have no patience for THAT level of poor customer service. Their business model is web based and then they better learn to answer a simple question. If I didn't like them, how can I assume they will be willing to take them back? Sorry.... I cannot be alone. It was why I was looking at other knock-offs that others have tried. As of now, I'm not trusting Revant. Rant off!

I appreciate your feedback.

 

[OakleyFrankFMJ]

Maybe @Revant Optics can respond to you here?

 

[Revant Optics]

Hey @SteveH, we're very sorry for the inconvenience and want to get you taken care of ASAP. Please send me a DM with your eBay username and I'll be sure we get a response your way. You can also feel free to give us a call at(503) 954-2817.

Our Customer Experience team strives to respond to all messages within one business day. Emails are always answered in the order that they come in to us, but that being said, there are some things that can complicate that. When multiple emails are sent in the same email chain without a response, this resets the email time to the most current date/time.

This can cause your email to get pushed back if you send multiple messages, and is something we are working on improving. In the future, I'd recommend sending one email to us and if you don't hear back within two business days, please let us know by sending us a DM on OakleyForum or on any social media platforms you are a part of.

We're very active on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, as well as some other popular social media channels. We do not take it for granted that an incredible community is taking precious time out of their day to interact with us, and try to get back to all posts directed to the brand.

On the note of phone support, we definitely appreciate the feedback here. This has been something we've worked on improving as we know sometimes it's just easier to talk to someone over the phone. This year we were able to add our phone number to our Facebook page in an attempt to give people a chance to call us from there. This is also giving us an opportunity to understand what it might take to launch full phone support, without compromising service in other areas. We know this number isn't on our website and may not be the easiest to find if you weren't aware of this. However, full phone support is something we are working on launching in 2016, and we're excited to get this in place for everyone.

@OakleyFrankFMJ thanks for tagging us in this post so we could check it out! -Kevin

 

[Litos]

I can tell you where Revant is cutting at least one corner and that is customer service.

I disagree...

Revant has had outstanding communication with me personally for over a year...

if you send an email to Revant customer service, they are without a doubt, some of the fastest responders I've seen...

and right on cue (see below), Revant has come into this thread and given you advice on how to mitigate a certain situation...

their lenses are nice also - tons of people use them on this forum, but only a handful will openly defend them and acknowledge they are wearing Revant lenses.....

I'm a huge supporter, as well as a handful of other posters who are actively involved on the forum....

I started buying Revant because of the simple fact that the colors they had available, I would have NEVER been able to get them for my RadarLocks.....

 

[SteveH]

I disagree...

Revant has had outstanding communication with me personally for over a year...

if you send an email to Revant customer service, they are without a doubt, some of the fastest responders I've seen...

and right on cue (see below), Revant has come into this thread and given you advice on how to mitigate a certain situation...

their lenses are nice also - tons of people use them on this forum, but only a handful will openly defend them and acknowledge they are wearing Revant lenses.....

I'm a huge supporter, as well as a handful of other posters who are actively involved on the forum....

I started buying Revant because of the simple fact that the colors they had available, I would have NEVER been able to get them for my RadarLocks.....

I went from underwhelmed to delighted with their customer service in a few short moments. Revant wrote me an email an hour ago:

"Hey Steve,

My name is Evan and i'm the Director of Customer Experience here at Revant. I sent you a message via eBay, but I also wanted to send you one here in case you respond quicker to emails in your own inbox.

I'm really sorry that so far your experience with us has been less than satisfactory. We strive to provide the highest quality experiences, and so far we haven't been able to do this. I'm here to help turn that around, answer any questions you may have, and get you set up with some great new lenses!

Feel free to give me a call at 503-954-2817 and ask for "Evan" when you do. I'm open and available all day, and would love to help you out as soon as possible.

I'm looking forward to your reply, and helping you get out of those Costco shades! "
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Evan let me know that Kevin (@Revant Optics ) passed on the information. We talked for a while. They are working on getting some more help over the weekend which was most of the delay. Admittedly, us "type A's" want turn around. I suspect I just described most of his buyers (male, above average income, type A). Anyways, I'm now very happy as I have their phone number in case I needed it.

I'm going to get getting some lenses and see how they stack up. He was adamant about how important he wants to win over Oakley Forum members. He assured me that I would be delighted with the quality.

Sincerely,
Steve

 

[OakleyFrankFMJ]

I went from underwhelmed to delighted with their customer service in a few short moments. Revant wrote me an email an hour ago:

"Hey Steve,

My name is Evan and i'm the Director of Customer Experience here at Revant. I sent you a message via eBay, but I also wanted to send you one here in case you respond quicker to emails in your own inbox.

I'm really sorry that so far your experience with us has been less than satisfactory. We strive to provide the highest quality experiences, and so far we haven't been able to do this. I'm here to help turn that around, answer any questions you may have, and get you set up with some great new lenses!

Feel free to give me a call at 503-954-2817 and ask for "Evan" when you do. I'm open and available all day, and would love to help you out as soon as possible.

I'm looking forward to your reply, and helping you get out of those Costco shades! "
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Evan let me know that Kevin (@Revant Optics ) passed on the information. We talked for a while. They are working on getting some more help over the weekend which was most of the delay. Admittedly, us "type A's" want turn around. I suspect I just described most of his buyers (male, above average income, type A). Anyways, I'm now very happy as I have their phone number in case I needed it.

I'm going to get getting some lenses and see how they stack up. He was adamant about how important he wants to win over Oakley Forum members. He assured me that I would be delighted with the quality.

Sincerely,
Steve

Aren't you happy you came here and we pointed you in the right direction?