Rotary Cutter Lane Shark bought by Trail Blazer under Titan ??

[JWR]

Last year I bought a "Lane Shark" FEL mounted 44" brush cutter, hydraulically driven, runs at many angles, nice for clearing fence rows, overhanging limbs, etc. Great tool. Readily driven by a utility farm tractor and NOT requiring the high flow hydraulics of a skid steer. OK, fine.

NOW, I stumble into my friendly tractor dealer and find a very new brochure on Trailblazer Attachments. The TB-ONE model Trail Blazer FEL mounted cutter is obviously the same thing as my Lane Shark from last year with new paint and a few mechanical changes (mainly the blade carrier and blade mounting.) The new brochure is totally devoid of any phone numbers, manufacturing locations, etc. except for the website (which has none either.)

After considerable web chasing I find that Trail Blazer is "exclusively distributed" by Titan and that both are in Decatur Tenn, unlike the origin of Lane Shark which was in McDavid Florida.

BOTH websites are up and appear to still be active , Lane Shark and Trail Blazer Attachments. Oddly, they have very similar website design and Dealer locater features which show a totally different set of dealers for each of the two products.

Any of you industrial sleuths out there have an idea what happened? Did Titan buy out Lane Shark and form a new company called Trail Blazer Attachments ? That's my #1 theory. [The company has not had time to reply to my inquiry but I'm curious what people on the street know of all this and especially any comments from other Lane Shark owners.]

 

[EverythingAttachments]

Last year I bought a "Lane Shark" FEL mounted 44" brush cutter, hydraulically driven, runs at many angles, nice for clearing fence rows, overhanging limbs, etc. Great tool. Readily driven by a utility farm tractor and NOT requiring the high flow hydraulics of a skid steer. OK, fine.

NOW, I stumble into my friendly tractor dealer and find a very new brochure on Trailblazer Attachments. The TB-ONE model Trail Blazer FEL mounted cutter is obviously the same thing as my Lane Shark from last year with new paint and a few mechanical changes (mainly the blade carrier and blade mounting.) The new brochure is totally devoid of any phone numbers, manufacturing locations, etc. except for the website (which has none either.)

After considerable web chasing I find that Trail Blazer is "exclusively distributed" by Titan and that both are in Decatur Tenn, unlike the origin of Lane Shark which was in McDavid Florida.

BOTH websites are up and appear to still be active , Lane Shark and Trail Blazer Attachments. Oddly, they have very similar website design and Dealer locater features which show a totally different set of dealers for each of the two products.

Any of you industrial sleuths out there have an idea what happened? Did Titan buy out Lane Shark and form a new company called Trail Blazer Attachments ? That's my #1 theory. [The company has not had time to reply to my inquiry but I'm curious what people on the street know of all this and especially any comments from other Lane Shark owners.]

I heard from a birdie that Trailblazer copied Lane Shark. Said birdie wasn't too happy.
Travis

 

[jmc]

Knocked off the product and then maybe knocked off the website too? Reminds me of a line from Kristofferson-

I ain't saying I beat the devil
But I drank his beer for nothing
Then I stole his song

 

[JWR]

An email replay from Trail Blazer says "We are not affiliated with Lane Shark." I guess maybe that is some kind of understatement !
One wonders where the patents and/or copyrights and of course the lawyers regarding "intellectual property rights" are on all this. Of course "outside looking in" we consumers know nothing but guesses and speculation. First blush says a very small innovative company was had, being swallowed -- well not swallowed, maybe ransacked -- by a bigger fish. Could be a very sad drama but who knows the rest of the story.

My immediate interest is that the Lane Shark had a heavy piece of small C-channel steel for the blade carrier. The bolts to hold the blades on it are not ribbed and depend on lock nuts to keep the blade bolts in place, yet not be tight on the blades. The Trailblazer literature shows a blade carrier that has the sides bent at 45 degrees rather than 90 degrees and uses "square blade bolts" which apparently ARE tightened down rather than depending on lock nuts staying in place.

Where I was headed was to upgrade from the relatively unreliable blade bolt circumstances on Lane Shark to the newer type blade carrier and square blade bolts that would hopefully stay in place and not be high maintenance. [As it is you have to check the blade bolts frequently to make sure the lock nuts have not backed off. In heavy use, the lock nuts will back off and I have lost a blade that way which is both irritating and potentially dangerous.]

 

[s219]

A lot of Titan's stuff is a knockoff.

 

[JWR]

That is a serious accusation -- and given what I see here with Lane Shark you are probably right. Do you know another example right off ?

 

[s219]

Their wood chippers are Wallenstein clones. But Titan is not the only one selling them -- I suspect a company in China cloned the Wallensteins and now multiple distributors are offering them. Even the stickers and model numbers are same/similar.

 

[jmc]

That is a serious accusation -- and given what I see here with Lane Shark you are probably right. Do you know another example right off ?

Which one of these two did all the work?

 

[ddbackhoe]

Last year I bought a "Lane Shark" FEL mounted 44" brush cutter, hydraulically driven, runs at many angles, nice for clearing fence rows, overhanging limbs, etc. Great tool. Readily driven by a utility farm tractor and NOT requiring the high flow hydraulics of a skid steer. OK, fine.

NOW, I stumble into my friendly tractor dealer and find a very new brochure on Trailblazer Attachments. The TB-ONE model Trail Blazer FEL mounted cutter is obviously the same thing as my Lane Shark from last year with new paint and a few mechanical changes (mainly the blade carrier and blade mounting.) The new brochure is totally devoid of any phone numbers, manufacturing locations, etc. except for the website (which has none either.)

After considerable web chasing I find that Trail Blazer is "exclusively distributed" by Titan and that both are in Decatur Tenn, unlike the origin of Lane Shark which was in McDavid Florida.

BOTH websites are up and appear to still be active , Lane Shark and Trail Blazer Attachments. Oddly, they have very similar website design and Dealer locater features which show a totally different set of dealers for each of the two products.

Any of you industrial sleuths out there have an idea what happened? Did Titan buy out Lane Shark and form a new company called Trail Blazer Attachments ? That's my #1 theory. [The company has not had time to reply to my inquiry but I'm curious what people on the street know of all this and especially any comments from other Lane Shark owners.]

I would vote for Lane Shark not being patented and Titan bought one of each (maybe just borrowed), copied the details and outsourced the build.

 

[shooterdon]

From experience I can tell you that many times a patent can be worked around if it is not written well. In fact, we did that with a competitors product and wound up with a better designed and less expensive product as a result. In our case, we were the little fish in the pond and up against the industry leader. Many times, a larger fish eats the smaller fish. They may buy them out....but only if they have intellectual property and/or a market the bigger fish wants. If the smaller fish has neither....well...

It is called "business". Before you "holier than thou's" start bashing....

It has and will continue to happen....cars, electronics, tractors, hydraulics, etc etc.

I have bought one Titan product and it was the best value out there. I also have bought from Ken...good product as well.

On a high ticket item, if I can save 10-20%, and get acceptable quality, I will go with the knock off. I bought an LS because it was thousands less than orange, green or red. If I was planning to put 400-500 hours a year on it, I may have gone with orange. I am looking at an MTL grapple for the same reasons...significant savings over the "brand names".