Bad airline experience -- Broken segway

[Hauptagon]

Arg! I was happy with my recent "packing" method for airline travel (http://www.segwaychat.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9793&SearchTerms=,airline,) but it's proven a horrible mistake.

My return flight back to school was yesterday, and after having spent 16 hours in transit from NY to ND, I was sitting at the gate waiting to board for the final leg of the trip. At this point, I'd already spent 6 hours at that particular airport (Minneapolis) because my previous flight had been so delayed that I missed my 2:36 connection, and the next flight wasn't until 9:01! Anyway, sitting there waiting, the only thing I was doing was hoping the segway was going to make it onto the plane. While waiting, I could see the luggage being loaded onto the DC-9, and was keeping my eyes peeled for my segway base. Eventually, another luggage train drives up, and lo and behold, I could see the segway base in one of the carts. "Yes!" I thought, "it made it!". Than, I noticed that some idiot had loaded it so it was only halfway on the cart... one of the wheels were hanging over the edge! My heart sank. I now thought "Are they KIDDING me? It's gonna fall!". Than, the luggage train turned, and I watched in horror as the segway slid right off the cart and bounced across the ramp with the left fender dangling! I could not believe my eyes... between having been traveling for so long and only three hours of sleep, I began to shake... twitch, if you will. I was livid, tired, and aching. I went to an agent to tell them what had happened, and she said "don't worry, it will make it on the plane". It was time to board, so I took my seat and watched to make sure the segway would indeed be loaded... it was.

Upon arriving in ND and taking my deformed baby off the conveyor belt, I assessed the damage. I gave the fender a little tug, and it fell right off. The floor mat was torn to the metal from having the "dog ears" ripped off with the fender. After finding a Northwest agent, I was basically told they wouldn't compensate me for anything because it was an "exposed item", it wasn't in any kind of container. Nonetheless, he left a note for his manager and gave me her card to see what they can do. I will be talking with her when the week starts.

Luckily (very luckily), the seg seems to be fine other than the cosmetic damage... I took it for a long ride today and she ran flawlessly, even in powdery, drifting snow... a new cosmetically flawed fender is on order (I'll have to wait on the $95 mat). I removed what was left of the old fender and cleaned everything, and it looks surprisingly OK now.

In short, don't use that packing method.

-Justin

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams." -From Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

[Dragan]

That's really unfortunate Justin...Sorry to hear about it. I manage an International airport, and I can tell you that most of the horrible stories about baggage damage and loss is just that; stories. The industry is WAAY too competetive these days to risk losing even one passenger through poor customer service, and NW is pretty good about things generally. If you don't get any success with the local manager, elevate it to corporate relations. I'd be very surprised if they didn't make things right for you
Wayne

[ElectraGlide]

Handles get ripped off suitcases, wheels get broken off the bottom of roll-aboards, boxes get dropped off luggage carts, fragile items get crushed inside their containers......I even remember seeing baggage handlers kicking bags down the Jetbridge stairs.....so....why would anyone hand over a three thousand dollar Segway base without ANY protection or packing material to let them drop it down chutes and conveyor belts and get tossed from cart to cart. You were very lucky ( and unlucky in most respects ).

Steve

[Hauptagon]

quote:Originally posted by ElectraGlide

Handles get ripped off suitcases, wheels get broken off the bottom of roll-aboards, boxes get dropped off luggage carts, fragile items get crushed inside their containers......I even remember seeing baggage handlers kicking bags down the Jetbridge stairs.....so....why would anyone hand over a three thousand dollar Segway base without ANY protection or packing material to let them drop it down chutes and conveyor belts and get tossed from cart to cart. You were very lucky ( and unlucky in most respects ).

Steve


From good past experiences, I guess I just built up too much faith in the baggage handlers -- my thinking was that they'd see what they were handling, and at least try not to mistreat it. When I'd checked it fully assembled in the past, it was obvious that you had to be careful with it, and I also figured they might treat it as they'd treat a medical device. Oh well, lesson learned.

Dragan, thanks for the support... I'll hope for the best when talking with the manager tomorrow.

-Justin

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams." -From Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

[fredkap]

Justin,

Sorry to hear about your almost nervous breakdown. The handler may have put the base completely on ...and it rolled. Then they want to charge you for an exposed item, that's ridiculous.
It is back to school weekend in our house as well. We have one of our boys headed to Europe for a semester and he bought a bag that was over 62 inches for the trip. I reviewed United's policy and found the following:
http://www.united.com/page/article/0,6722,1034,00.html

They can charge extra essentially because they have had problems with certain items. That says to me that we need a better way to ship our Segs.

I'm sorry to hear of your problems but I'm glad that the worse part is the floor mat.

Fred

[X-man]

An interesting post and very apropos for me at this time. Having watched my machine bounce down the stairs from the plane door by three baggage handlers in Philadelphia (US AIR), I'm in the process of trying to create a handle in the rear for them to grasp. What I have done is to wrap and secure 3 foot nylon straps on each side of the platform along the side of the fenders.
I took a piece of old washing machine hose and cut a piece to act as a flexible handle and fed one loose end through the hose. The two loose ends are tied in a sheet bend knot. Will it work? Stay tuned, I leave for Vegas in the morning.
I will take a picture later but I doubt that it will show much - black on black is the problem. Maybe I'll slip a piece of paper behind it and see if that helps.

Edit for link to knot: http://www.tollesburysc.co.uk/Knots/Sheet_bend.htm
Bob

[florin]

Hi there,

Have anyone ever tried the segway shipping case? They aren't cheap, but from the picture I would say that the Segway can't damage when it's in one of those cases.

Kind regards,

Florin


Visit http://www.florin-webdesign.nl/segwayinfo if you want to stay up-to-date on the situation about the Segway HT in the Netherlands.
http://www.florin-webdesign.nl/segwayinfo/uploads/cavt41287ea7e3ec0

[wwhopper]

One of our DC SEG members just got his HT back from being repaired after USAIR dropped kicked it on the baggage line from the return flight from the Thanksgiving Parade in Asheville NC.

Now it appears that there is some internal transmission damage that was not picked up on the orginal repair review at Segway. So it has to go back to NH for repair yet again.

Be very careful to assess all of the damage - both internal and external before having it repaired. Like an auto - often a hit takes it's toll on the mechanical systems, and they begin not to work properly several hundred miles down the road after the repair has been completed! And you and the Insurance company have signed off.


Will W Hopper,IFDA
Taxation Without Representation here in:
Washington, DC, USA

[RAG1247]

I still like my case and I can't imagine giving my seg to an airline without any packaging. i posted info previously as follows:

One side folds down to act as a ramp so that you can you power assist to drive the ht into the case. On the floor there is a small trap door where tools, etc. could be stored. It has wheels on one end and a telescoping handle on the other. You will note that you must disassemble the control shaft and there is provision for mounting in at the back. Once the segway is in, there is ample room left for bags, tools, etc.

The inside is lined with a hard foam and various foam blocks are provided so that the unit cannot move inside.

The overall dimensions are 29.5 inches high by 28 inches wide by 22 inches deep. ($650)

The case was made by Clydesdale Custom Cases in Vancouver. My contact was Don Dinsmore (www.clydesdalecases.com). Before any mentions it, I have no connection with this company and I am not selling them.

Pictures can be seen at http://www.sonyguy.com/newcase/index.html




Richard
Ft. Lauderdale

If you can’t change the people around you, change the people around you [img=right]http://www.sonyguy.com/rageagle.jpg[/img=right]

[Stan671]

I did not want to take any chances with my valuable machine the one time I flew with it, so I made a very sturdy wooden box to hold the platform as checked baggage. I put the rest of the pieces in bubble wrapping in the rest of my luggage.

http://www.sdobrowski.net/images/box1.jpg

Stan Dobrowski

[Hauptagon]

That's a nice design, but did you have to pay oversize charges? For Northwest, I think it's $80 if over 62" combined l,w,h... so that's something I've been trying to avoid.

-Justin

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams." -From Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

[adobephile]

quote:Originally posted by Hauptagon

That's a nice design, but did you have to pay oversize charges? For Northwest, I think it's $80 if over 62" combined l,w,h... so that's something I've been trying to avoid.


But. . .but. . .but, how much is it going to cost in parts and time to get yours fixed? What are you going to do for your next flight? And what about your shattered peace of mind? You were also lucky that repairs didn't cost several times that of this case.

What's wrong with investing in the case and amortizing its cost over at least several flights? You could also pack your Seg in the case if you went on a Caribbean cruise.

"The job of art is to chase ugliness away."
Bono, U2.
From a personal appearance
at an Apple Computer music event.
October 26, 2004

Daniel Swanson
http://www.van-garde.com

[MowAlon]

I recently shipped my Segway with no problems. Unfortunately for anyone trying to recreate my method, it ended up in 3 or 4 different bags.

I tood United Airlines, which allows 50 lbs in a 62" container. Luckily, I found a 62.2" rubber bin at Target. I didn't get charged extra for size, but the base itself is just about 50 pounds, so after I added a bunch of newspaper, foam popcorn, the fenders, and more padding, it was overweight - not much, though. They only charged me $25 for the extra weight.

The control shaft was sent in it original box with all the Segway paperwork, and the wheels and batteries went in a suitcase.

For any normal person, this would be too many bags, but I was lucky enough to be traveling with a second person, and neither of us had a lot of luggage. It was basically carry-ons and Segway.

Bottom-line - my Segway is in great shape. I just wish I had a convenient way to get it into my Mitsubishi Galant. Not a small car, but not quite a good size for a Segway.

-Alon

--------------------
Crossing the country on a Segway...

Follow along at http://www.10mph.com

[pam]

I can't think of any way to avoid either the overweight or oversize charges, if you want to ship your unit as a single unit. I used the rubbermaid "action packer" and shipped the (bubblewrapped) base and fenders in it (as I recall) - have to remove the wheels and cut small holes in the sides of the box, and then shipped the rest in luggage. I believe my overcharge was $25.00. I had packed some clothes around it for padding.

At some point I got to the realization that it's a false economy for me to pay $5k for a machine and try to get around a $100 overcharge when I travel just to keep it safe. I also wonder (for me) if some of my reaction is based on the fact that I remember when you could travel with practically an unlimited amount of baggage, and you could buy round trip tickets and sell the return portion when you got to your destination, in order to get a cheaper one-way fare, so I am a bit resentful of the restrictions we have now. I mean, what's the difference between what we can carry outside the US and what we carry here? We have a 50 lb weight limit per piece for inside US travel and a 40 or 44kg (or 80+lb) weight limit for international travel. It's not a security thing, therefore it seems to me it must be to allow the plane to carry more fee-paid cargo.

Oh well, out of my hands and not something I should be losing sleep over. But I do wonder if stuff like that colors my reaction to having to pay extra for my Segway.

Pam

[Sal]

This is exactly the kind of horrid experience that has prevented me from taking my Seg on business trips.

I am glad that your Seg didn't suffer any more than cosmetic damage. I agree with Dragan in that if you escalate the matter, NW would do something compensatory for you. If not compensation for the damage, maybe you'll get ticket vouchers, so you can take your Seg on another trip -- FOR FREE!

-Sal

Think Different
www.apple.com

[Stan671]

Alon, that is exactly what I did when I traveled with my father to SegwayFest in Chicago in 2003. I custom designed and built that box of mine to be under the 62 inch size limit, so no oversize charges. There is nothing I could do to get it under 50 pounds, but I kept it under 70 pounds, so the extra charge was only $25. And I was only charged that one way because the person at the checkout did not even care.

I packed the rest of the parts of my Segway (and my clothes) into three suitcases. My father fit everything of his into one suitcase, so between the two of us, we had four checked bags - no extra charges.

So, for $100 worth of wood, hardware and polyurethane and the price of a plane ticket for my dad (<grin>, just kidding, Dad) I was able to transport my Segway very safely via the airlines.

http://www.sdobrowski.net/images/box6.jpg

http://www.sdobrowski.net/images/box5.jpg

Stan Dobrowski

[Hauptagon]

OK, I think everyone's sold me -- a crate it is.

-Justin

"We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams." -From Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

[X-man]

FWIW,
ATA delivered mne to me at the gate in Vegas. Not a new scratch. Did my handle help. Don't know but here's a picture of the makeshift handle. I have duct tape holding it up to prevent dragging through the airport.

http://bythelake.com/seg/seghandle.jpg

Bob

[Snowgod]

Stan, do you have a materials list for making your case? I would love to make one myself.

Live Free and Glide

www.whitemountainjoyrides.com

[Deviant]

FWIW,

I was told by Progressive Insurance that if my HT were damaged during non-business flight on a commercial airliner, that it would be covered.

For the first SegFest, I used two cardboard boxes, foam (and clothes) packing, and the rest (no fenders) in my carryon for no extra charges on Continental. I'm not saying this is safe - just what I once did successfully.

[Stan671]

Sorry, Snowgod, no materials list. I just built it from scratch and designed on the fly as I was building it. I can take a few measurements for you and indicate when kinds of wood/hardware I used and where.

Stan Dobrowski

[Heidi]

Stan,
how much does your box weigh and what dimensions has it?
Thanks for your great pictures.

[Stan671]

Heidi, I designed the wooden box to work within the checked baggage rules for Continental Airlines, but I think most others are about the same.

Checked bags up to 50 pounds are free, 50-70 pounds are $25 extra, 70-100 pounds are $50 extra and nothing over 100 pounds allowed. My box with the base platform in it weights about 68 pounds. I wanted it to be enough less than 70 so than an inaccurate scale at the checkin counter would not read over 70.

Rules allow check bags to have a maximum length+width+height of 62 inches. My box adds up to a couple inches less than 62.

For more info and pix, check out htis topic:
http://www.segwaychat.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=7794

Stan Dobrowski

[X-man]

I'm beginning to believe that the airlines are either, being quite selective on whether the appliance is used specifically for mobility use or whether it's an optional 'fun' object. For me it is both but I have never had any untoward damage to my machine in my travels, with the exception of the appalling way it was treated by US Airways.
My last flight into Vegas, the machine was waiting for me as I left the plane with only a small rub mark on a fender. Granted I was one of the last off the plane but nevertheless, I didn't wait at all. Kudos to ATA.

Bob