Deanski

In an effort to try to clear up any questions or statements that were made prior by K40's Marketing Director, he has sent another message to clarify some issues that were brought up.

Please be advised, I'm not in any way involved with K40. I'm just a "happy customer".

Let me first state that it is typically not our company’s policy to correspond with forum sites, because it’s an easy place for people to anonymously attack someone and bait them into a war of words. I believe Mike Valentine shares a similar opinion.

That being said, I would like to address the issue regarding K40’s legal action against Roy Reyer’s website. As correctly stated by someone earlier in this thread, K40 sought relief under the Lanham Act, whereby Reyer’s website promoted himself as an impartial testing authority. In truth, he is an online retailer of radar and laser products and his forum site, www.radardetector.net, is primarily a vehicle to promote his online store.

We believed his test of our product was conducted in an effort to confuse potential K40 customers who were attempting to research our new Calibre system so he could sell them one of our competitor’s products. At the time, he was using K40 keywords to optimize his website in order to draw people from Google and other search engines that were merely looking for information on K40 products.

In addition, we also found his test to be contrary to the results posted by Speed Measurement Laboratories (SML), a respected testing firm endorsed by most everyone in the industry, including Mr. Reyer. A copy of this report is available at www.K40.com.

K40 sought legal action to have the test removed from his site and all mentions of our product from his forum. As part of the settlement, Mr. Reyer agreed to honor our wishes in this matter. To those that have asked why we are suppressing talk about K40, nothing could be further from the truth. There are literally hundreds of forum sites on the Internet, including this one, were discussion of K40 products is taking place (both positive and negative). The only websites affected were ones associated with Mr. Reyer’s. Our company at no time felt we would ever be given a fair shake on Reyer’s forum, by himself or those working on his behalf, or desired to let him use our name to draw people to his retail site. That’s the bottom line.

And I promise you, if K40 as a company sponsored a forum site and claimed to be an objective authority on all products in our industry, and subsequently conducted field tests of our competitor’s products, they’d come after us too. And with good reason!

It’s unfortunate that so much inaccurate information gets spread through the Internet. The truth is there are lots of good products out there now. When our company essentially created the installed remote radar detector and laser jammer categories, we were really the only one out there marketing those types of products. It wasn’t until years later that anyone else tried to aggressively develop and promote similar items. And frankly, when bigger name companies like Escort and Beltronics take notice, and subsequently pursue similar products, it’s good for everyone. It brings awareness to the category and furthers development and research of better products by all involved, including K40.

In the future, should any of you have specific questions regarding our company or products, you are always welcome to contact me at (800) 323-6768.

Regards,
Kevin Fryer
K40 Electronics

Regards,
Deanski

Deanski

Please read the thread " P-car 944 threatened by K40 Electronics" on more detail.

P-car 944 details

I have no axe to grind, except for shills and people who do not become members only to attack vendors without merit.

Regards,
Deanski

DerivativesGuy

Hmm let me see... by this logic a ford commercial could never show a side by side comparasion with a GM product. This is absolute BS.

Now if they ran a test a lied about the results in some way that would be a very different story.

Something is rotten in K40 land if you ask me.

boolala

That's not the point at all. Of course GM can compare their cars to Ford etc. And V1 can compare their detectors to K40. We know who these companies are and that they are trying to sell a product so we accept their comparisons with a grain of salt. But when a website claims to be "indepedant" and goes ahead and sells certain brands they are no longer a neutral third party but are representing themselves to be something they are not (and that is deceptive). No one believes that GM, Ford, K40, V1 are "neutral." We do expect a company claimimg to provide indepedant reviews of products to not be tainted by financial intersts in what they review. This would be like Underwiriters Laboratories reviewing electrical appliances and then going ahead and selling certain brands on the side.

If you read K40s response you will understand why they forbade discussion of K40 on that website. They had apparantly been using HTML coding (meta tags) to draw traffic away from K40 and unto their site to promote their financial interests.

Eharrison

Let's say everytime you punched in GM and you ended up at a Ford site that shows that their car is better and cheaper. And GM never gets the chance to show you what they have or show their products first. When all along you wanted to look at GMs. Do you think thats fair competition? Now do you understand the reasoning behind banning the keywords and K40 name from the website?

FWIW I emailed K40 TWICE about upgrading the K40 I have in my 996 and still have not received a reply. I would still like to find out if I can.

Eharrison

Deanski, little help? Seems that you have an in with them....

K40 Electronics

I told myself I wasn’t going to register on this site, but I want to further clarify some of the confusion. The merits of legal action have nothing to do with whether a company is allowed to discuss that their products are better than someone else’s, or that they outperform theirs, or that they provide better service. That stuff is common in any industry, and as already noted by someone else, when it comes directly from a manufacturer or retailer, and not a third party, you can take it with a grain of salt. I believe Valentine and Escort talk about one another all the time, showing how their detector is better than the others.

But they never portray themselves as independent consumer advocates, or make claims about the other that aren’t based on something a third party source provided, or a feature that the other is already known to lack (ex. “Escort products lack the useful arrows …”). They also don’t stage their own tests, make potentially false claims about the other from the results, optimize their site with the others key words so the test results show up higher than the others own site, or disguise their intentions to people who may not understand who they are.

When this first happened, honestly, everyone here just shrugged it off. We thought it was pretty obvious what was going on and figured others would too, and it would eventually become a non-issue. But when we started getting a LOT of calls from consumers and retailers who were either looking to buy our products, or who had just made a purchase of our new Calibre system, found the reviews while doing research and were now very upset (because they honestly thought that the site the reviews were posted on were from an impartial third party), we had no choice but to take action. And when we discussed our options with our attorneys, a well known and prestigious law firm in Chicago who represents a large number of clients on Internet matters, they said it was one of the most clear cut cases they had ever worked on in this matter. And in the end, we obtained the result we were looking for and consider the issue resolved.

We hold nothing personal against this person. I understand he just sold his business and is doing well. Good for him. In fact, on a personal note, I actually think his business model is excellent. I even remarked to a colleague here years ago, before anyone really knew who he was, that his site and forum concept were brilliant. His placement in search engines is not by luck. The guy obviously knows what he’s doing.

I hate seeing how people read more into this than what is really there. We have nothing to hide. Nor do we go to every forum site and shut down the naysayers. I chuckle to think how expensive and ultimately futile that would be. This company has been a successful business entity for almost 30 years now. We have a great reputation amongst our customers and retailers. We market primarily to a small, niche part of the industry. And lets not forget that without K40 it’s likely most remote radar detectors or laser jammers today wouldn’t exist, or at the very least be as popular and accessible. We essentially invented and then validated the categories.

One final thing, for those of you that mentioned you weren’t getting your e-mails answered; it’s likely they are getting lost in our SPAM filter. Because we get so much SPAM through our servers, the IT people set us up with a very selective filter, one I’m not really happy with. Unfortunately, yours probably got lost in route. Generally speaking, most e-mails get responded to within 24 hours. Your best bet is to just call me at (800) 323-6768 and I’ll see what we can do for you, or refer you in the right direction.

Regards,
Kevin Fryer
K40 Electronics

mal28

Simple solution: have K40 install their calibre system on my new 997s, have it tested by P car 944 with a k40 representative present,; if it works, I pay for it, K40 get GREAT press and P-car 944 stops his anti-k40 posts, if it does not work, I pay nothing!

K40 Electronics

LOL. I'm quite certain that no amount of evidence will ever stop this individual from bashing us. When you're pushing an agenda, evidence is irrelevant.

Our company would also never voluntarily allow some obviously biased, and non industry trusted source test our products. When we've needed to, we always utilize SML. They have access to all the latest equipment and do their best to test products under normal operating conditions, only certifying them if they meet "as advertised" conditions. Carl Fors is also a certified radar and laser instructor and has contacts on both sides of the business. We jokingly like to call him a double agent. He's a good a guy, though, and I've personally learned a lot from speaking with him over the years.

We actually should have something coming up in regards to this issue, so anything I do now will probably be obsolete within the next couple months. I'll talk more about this matter then.

W211

Any recent comparisons between K40 and V1? Went to the K40 site but saw a bunch of fairly old reviews, from 2001 and 2003.

mal28

"We actually should have something coming up in regards to this issue, so anything I do now will probably be obsolete within the next couple months. I'll talk more about this matter then"

you can't tease us like this! new detecter? new features?

W211

Did some quick research on "V1 K40" and found the following, for what is worth.

http://forums.mbworld.org/forums/sho....php?p=2231274
http://www.m5board.com/vbulletin/sho....php?p=1035950

K40 Electronics

I'd love to talk more about the future, but I'm not able to at the moment. As far as the V1 comparisons, you won't find many of those, mostly because the products are too different, especially from an application stand point. The other reason is because nobody really tests this stuff anymore, and the ones that do typically have associations with certain manufacturers which greatly biases their results and influences how they actually conduct the tests.

I've always thought these debates were amusing and made for great drama, but from a practical standpoint, they probably do more to confuse people than actually help. As someone once said to me, the only conclusive thing about these tests is that they're inconclusive.

The real question to ask I believe, is can this product help you avoid speeding tickets? If yes, then the rest of the stuff is more about personal preference. Where they rank on a test bench doesn't necessarily mean you're going to be happy with it. And the truth is, the gap between the detectors on a test bench is as small as its ever been. There used to be a much bigger difference between the haves and have nots. I know, because I talk to people all the time that want to turn in their V1's, or Escorts, or Bels as if there's some silver bullet out there.

If the only thing you're looking for from a detector is one that will rank #1 on a test bench, or detect 7 miles away in the middle of a deserted desert, you can't go wrong with the V1. They're a reputable company, have strong marketing and customer support, and by all accounts a loyal fan base.

But, if you're looking for something different, while still wanting to have the ability to identify the location of threats and avoid tickets, the Calibre might be something that interests you, especially if maintaining the aesthetics of your car are important.

Again, we're not trying to design products to win tests. If we lost our focus on what we do well, I'm quite sure this company wouldn't be in business anymore. There were people here a long time ago, before I even worked here, that identified a need and demand for a built-in product design like K40. And we've stayed true to that niche ever since. That doesn't mean our product is for everyone, or that we're trying to be all things for all people.

I'm not sure that really answered your question, but I suppose my thoughts on the subject is that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I've talked to enough people over the years who have tried all types of detectors and swear by ours, and I've talked to others who prefer Valentines, or Escorts, or Bels, or even Whistlers. Everyone seems to do something that makes theirs unique or special to people, and frankly, there's enough room in this market for more than one favorite. As consumers it should be nice to have options.

Eharrison

Ok, so can you answer the question here? Here's my email to K40:

Hello,
I purchased a used car (99 Porsche 911)with the K-40 radar detector built in. Unfortunately the detector triggers a lot of false negatives and I ended up using a Passport Solo instead. Is there a way to refurbish or upgrade the K-40? I've heard a lot of good things about the K-40 but at this time it's useless due to the constant (once maybe every two minutes) notifications. I would appreciate the information.

Regards,
EHarrison

DerivativesGuy

Now thats a classy response from a classy company. Kudos