While the Easton Stealth RS shoulder pads may be one of the hot new products on the market, people are beginning to question their durability for high end performance.
Coming in at $119.99, the Stealth RS shoulder pads are priced below some of the top of the line pads from Bauer and Reebok. Being a top of the line product, however, requires a bit more from the shoulder pads. In fact, they should be able to stand up to use and abuse for at least a year before the foams begin to break down and become more fragile.
The problems that have been reported to us, on the other hand, have occurred within a short enough time of purchase that they were taken back to the store for a refund or exchange. Oddly enough, the problem has actually been the same on each return. The main area of concern seems to be the shoulder cap itself. In both cases which one of our Twitter followers sent us, the shoulder cap shattered. It’s not just the plastic which breaks either, it is the foam underneath breaking along with the plastic.
Besides an unusable product, this could lead to much bigger issues for Easton. With errant pieces of plastic hanging around after shattering, the next hit a player takes could result in one of those pieces of plastic piercing their skin.
While the shattering issues at this one particular store have been quite similar, the incidents might not be related in any way. The breakage could simply be a coincidence and have a small chance of being a recurring problem. If they are related, however, and can be pin pointed to a single manufacturing issue, Easton may have to go the route of a recall on it’s Stealth RS shoulder pads.
Help us track down these problems if you can. Leave us a message in the comments if you or someone you know has had a similar issue with their Stealth RS shoulder pads. If there is a bigger issue here, we want to help make sure its tracked and taken care of.
I got the elbow pads and the same thing happen to those. The part that is the same material as the shoulder cap broke. I’m trying to get an exchange. Hopefully I get one…and hopefully it doesn’t break again…….
seems about on par with the rest of the stealth line. are the caps made of the same material the sticks are made of?
my shoulder pads brokeon the shoulder part im 13 in travel hockey… those things shouldnt break at my age… we had a checking practice and it broke and i didnt know i got huge bruises on my shoulder blade and shoulder and i also got bruises on my shoulder even on the side that didnt break… so one shoulder pad broke the other one has a dent and the chest has a dent…. DONT GET THEM they look cool but i mean the material is awful!!! they use this material in their helmets to!!!!!
I bought these & within 3 games the shoulder cap broke in half, got them replaced for free & they broke 2 games after that, the same way. Easton needs to recall these.
from Facebook when you first posted about the new product
“Chris Rowan I saw this last week. Very light. Deff an upgrade over the s line. I do see the shoulder caps having problems at use of high levels. No rigid enough
December 13, 2011 at 11:50am ยท Like”
told you so! the “plastic” on these is a laminated styrofoam, its the same on the elbow and shin, all these pieces will break in a contact hockey game.
I run a proshop in west australia and have hade 2x elbows come back after about a week. hard plastic pieces broke apart after both customer took what they called a small hit. I havn’t had any of the chests or shins come back. I have noticed that the RS gloves are pretty cheaply made and the stitching is horrible. I do know from talking to suppliers that the RS sticks were breaking and delaminating very quickly. which is why the RS2’s came out. no recall came out. Easton should do a recall of all RS Gear because customers no longer want to buy it because of the bad word of mouth
My Son’s Easton RS Shoulder Pads plastic cap has broken and cracked. Half of the shoulder cap on left shoulder came loose and fell out on ice during a game. Spoke with warranty dept at Easton Bell Sports in Canada and I am still under 90 day warranty period. Have to send in with invoice for replacement. They have played stupid when I ask about other warranty issues with the RS Shoulder Pads.
OMG!
My 8 year old has the RS Shoulder Pads and cracked his right should cap. 8 Years old. WTF
My 12 year old had one shoulder cap crack in half and lost the bottom half of the other cap already this season playing PeeWee A. The store we purchased them through told me Easton is aware of the problem and has updated the material the caps are made of in the new RS shoulder pads. They are exchanging the shoulder pads for us for the new model.
Same problem as other posts. One shoulder cap broke off like picture above and the other one is cracked and ready to break.
same problem occurred my easton rs shoulder pads. shoulder cap is broked. just come down in ice. please contect to me.
my email is cconamo@naver.com
I have yet to discover any problems with the shoulder pads, most likely because the shoulder caps are not the foam and plastic combination. I believe thats is only used on the junior pads. The elbow and shin pads, however are a different story. My right elbow pad broke in two places yet the left one is completely fine. I didn’t get the RS shin pads but they are part of the stealth line. I took a slapshot to the shin and ended up with i gigantic bruise as well as a hole punctured straight through my skin to the muscle on top of the bruise. This happened without so much as a dent to the shin pad. It absorbed none of the energy from the impact so i might as well have not been wearing it when I blocked the shot. I also have a crack in my s19 helmet from a wrist shot. Not very strong if you ask me. I don’t think ill be buying anything from Easton other than sticks again.
RS skates, Piece of junk , broken toe cap, didn’t even get a shot, it just came undone and then cracked. I WAS a die hard EASTON fan, always bought their high end products for both myself and my 2 boys. Warranty dept doesn’t want to change it. I no longer will support Easton or any of its subpar products. They just lost a customer that would spend 1400$-2000$/year. I guess they dont care about keeping good clients. CCM here i come….
I just bought adult sm “RS” shoulder pads for my son this year. He is a Bantam. Yesterday my so. Got off the ice and noticed the shoulder cap was broke in half. I called Easton and they said I have to go through the whole picture taking sending the product in at my expense deal. When I asked if this has happened before he told me no not that he has heard of. He also said those were old pads. They might of been an older model but they were new. Not very happy with Easton anymore. My last set of skates were junk, so were some other products I bought from them. I think I’m done with Easton.