Wednesday, September 28, 2016

TL;DR - Solid aluminum construction; strong magnet base, awesome light!

You know that feeling when you get something that greatly surpasses your initial expectations? That was my feeling when I opened AYL TC86 Tactical LED Flashlight. The strong aluminum body feels very solid and all moving parts move very smoothly. 

The beam is incredible bright and I love that you can focus it all the way until the beam turns into the shape of the led itself, it is pretty cool. The flashing red light is great for a hazard light and the solid white center light is great at filling a space with light. 

 4-AAA batteries is all this guy needs and in my opinion that better than some Lithium Ion that is crazy expensive and hard to find. There are two aluminum caps covering the batteries and I think they feel very secure. 

 The best part of this flashlight, in my opinion, is the awesome magnet on it's base. It is very powerful and can easily hold the light perpendicular to any metal surface. It will make a great light for my car and in cases of emergency... or just laying around the house or even camping. I think this is a solid product! 

 ***I received this product at a discounted price in exchange for an honest review, and yes, I think this is great!

Thursday, September 15, 2016

TL;DR - This is a 5-Star ceramic knife, make sure you have a steel set first.

Should you buy a Suzaru Professional Chef's Ceramic Knife? Yes and no. Realizing what makes a ceramic know awesome does not mean you should run to buy this knife however it can be an important component to your kitchen tools if you have the basics first.

Ceramics limitations are important to realize, they can chip on hard surfaces (including bones in meat) and are more likely to shatter if dropped or twisted wrong and they are significantly more difficult to sharpen.

With that warning in your head, let me tell you why this is a 5-Star product. Starting with the minor things, the box, it has a great presentation value, if you wanted to give this as a gift it looks spectacular and the magnetic clasp really adds a premium feeling. The contents inside the box are housed in their individual foam cutouts, and this is a strangely nice foam cutout, again, with the premium feeling

The knife comes with a blade cover that says Suzaru on it and a microfiber cloth for polishing up the blade after you have cleaned it.

Onto the knife itself.

This is a beautiful looking knife, the blade has a highly reflective, gunmetal colored polish. The logo and brand name are clearly etched/stamped into the side of the blade. The handle also has a stamp on it as well as the butt of the knife which is a stainless steel cap embossed with the eagle logo, it really has a very premium look to it. The handle is a solid plastic piece with some sharp angles to give it a modern look, kind of like a stealth fighter and I found the ergonomics to be very good. It felt great in my hand while cutting and my wrist did not suffer any fatigue.

So I compared this to 3 other knifes I had in my kitchen (which I sharpened for my test) and the first thing you notice about the Suzaru is the that it is very light compared to the steel knifes, I found this a nice feeling while I was slicing through my test yam. The blade is incredible sharp and cut through everything I threw at it with ease. It also cleaned very nicely and I was able to get it to the near perfect polish after my first use of it.

I can recommend this knife fully (as long as it isn't your only knife - you need those bone cutting knifes), it feels high quality, it looks even higher quality and it slices like nobodys business.

#Suzaru_Ceramic_Knife

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

TL;DR - Looks good, could use some quality improvements.

The Jumaxis Bicycle pack has some good things going for it, but some issues make it just show up in the 'just okay' category.

Always start on the positive, it's what my momma taught me, so from a looks stand point, I think this is pretty attractive looking satchel. I got the black one and it looks pretty good, the material seems to be higher quality and the sides have a reflective quality so that is good for dusk or night riding.

The area where your phone sits is incredibly secure, I'm certain your phone would never come out of that unless you took it out. The clear plastic over the phone seems nice enough and the touch sensitivity was fair/good. The straps that hold it to your bike seem to do their job from a quality stand point, I'm not sure they would really hold up over time, but their initial velcro connection seemed strong. I liked the size of the side pockets, they fit my battery pack, wallet, keys, and some accessory tools which was nice.

The issues I ran into are this: The phone sits in its area so snuggly that there is no way to get a charger cable, headphone, or any accessory cable to it. It is completely blocked off (check out my picture of the area). It would probably be possible to make a hole for it, but I think that was a poor oversight to not include that. Someone had commented that the zippers were firm and would loosen over time, I believe they were mistaken firm for cheap and crappy. After only a couple of times of using it the zipper that holds the phone to satchel on one side (It is not completely removable, which kind of sucks too) it was getting VERY difficult to zip up at all, I'm pretty sure it will be failing completely soon.

Also the bottom strap for the satchel does not allow for a small top bar bike. There is a front strap and that fit securely around the front side of my bike but the one at the bottom of the bag basically did nothing because it was at the bottom of the bag instead of on the underside so it could have attached to bar better. My bag never became lose but it did kind of lean strongly to the side of the satchel that had the most weight. Now on my wife's bike her top bar and bottom are close together (standard women's bike shape) and the satchel fit better there.

The extra light accessories are pretty cheap, but they work fine. You need you own batteries (also fine).

I have a hard time recommending this, but it might be okay for some of you, but I didn't feel like it was thought out quite enough and the quality of the zippers needs to be improved.

***I received this product at a discounted price or free in exchange for a honest review.

TL:DR - Good looking; wish the magnets were stronger.

There a lot of things to like about the SCYA Cable clips, but 1 flaw that makes them 'just okay' in this reviewers heart.

Starting with the good. I think this is a fabulous concept! I love magnets and think we don't utilize them enough in our day to day operations. Like, why doesn't my phone have magnets built into it that allow me to easily go from my car dock to my wireless charger? Or a cable magnetically stick like the macbook pros? Anyway. The whole setup is sleek and looks good. The clips have a few different shape, so my flat cord sits it in one made for flat cables (which also works for round ones) and the different size cables seemed to be very tight fitting. I really don't think one of those clips could come off without some significant effort. The 3M adhesion seems to very secure on my night stand where I setup to hold my few cables that run away from me nightly.

So the bad? Well, the problem is that the magnets (in my opinion) are not quite strong enough. The purpose of this apparatus is to hold my cables when I am not using it, it does that, but if I just bump it (which I do, it is right next to my bed side) the cables bounce right off and are completely lost again. The bump, pretty slight, is enough to dislodge the cables from it's magnetic home. I don't think it would be hard increase the strength of magnets to counteract simple bumps.

If you have an area that isn't prone to human flailing then this product might work just fine for you. I think the magnetic power could be better.

***I received this product at a discounted rate or free in exchange for an honest review.

Sunday, August 21, 2016

TL;DR Premium feel, no leaks, laser etched logos!

ShikShook premium cocktail shaker set has a very premium feel to it. While the box it comes in is a little underwhelming once you get it out and store it in it's little premium velvet bag it looks very nice and feels just as nice. It has a heftier feel then some of the cocktail shakers I have used before and the seal on all the metal connections is very strong. I shook it fairly vicious while testing it out making a Pina Colada creamer and it stuck together flawlessly with zero leaks.

The Shaker itself is make up of the 3 standard pieces, the lid, the top strainer piece and actually cup portion. The name of the brand 'ShikShook' is nicely etched onto the strainer piece and their logo is on the lid piece. It has a quality look to it. It comes with a single ounce and half ounce Duble Jigger. I found it very helpful for measuring out ingredients quickly and in single mixes. I also like that it has laser etched their logo into it so it is easy to tell it is part of the set. It also comes with a couple Liquor Pourers & even an ebook: 100 Cocktail Drinks Recipes.

 Overall, I believe this is an awesome product, super quality and would purchase again if my mocktail business takes off. :p

 ***I did receive this product for free or a discounted price in return for an honest unbiased review.

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

Three Star Lions Salt and Pepper Grinder Review

The Three Star Lions Salt and Pepper Grinder set is great. They have an excellent look which is very modern. The glass seems quite thick and I believe could probably be dropped and the stainless steel toppers have seem to be able to stand up to some beating. I love the caps on top, they really tiddy up the look.

The finest setting of the pepper and salt is a very nice light flake and if you turn it up to the largest setting is a very coarse. For these price, these guys light up a table at dinner time, I highly recommend.

**I did receive this product for free or discounted price in exchange for a real review.

Monday, June 27, 2016

Swim Goggles #Glise

I am in no rites a professional (or even amateur) swimmer but these are the best pair of fitting goggles I have had and they seem very high quality. The adjustable nose pieces make it so you can find the right distance for the space between your eyes. It came with a small on it which I had to move to the medium piece for comfort. The nose piece comes right (not in a way that would ever fall out, but something that is not very difficult to do) and you just slide in one of the other ones. The straps are very easy to adjust the sizing and have a little mechanism that keeps them in place. To re-adjust it is very easy. The reflective nature of the front is very cool, it looks like a nice set of sunglasses where you cannot see into it when someone is wearing them.

The cushion around the eye is very soft but holds a good seal against water. When I went to test it I jumped off of a 12 foot platform and the goggles had no problem sticking to my face. They have anti-fog properties and didn't fog up one time while I was swimming and playing around.

 Good or bad (I'll let you decide) the goggles are very very tinted. They make everything a lot bluer. I was testing in an indoor pool but it made it a little difficult to walk around with them on. If you go outside it is not a problem at all, but inside it was a little dark in my opinion. The accessories are nice, and I am sure if you were an avid swimmer, it would save you from having to buy these as extras. With that said, I have a medium to large nose and the nose plugs definitely did not fit, the ear plugs seemed to be a little large (even though they were made from a nice silicone). The swim cap was perfect though, and seemed very nice (thick rubber) and fit quite nicely.


Overall. I think this is a solid buy for around $15, I think as a swimmer, I would use these while doing laps in or outdoors. As a explore-able set, I would probably try to find something that didn't have such a deep tint to them. Check them out!


#glise

Thursday, May 5, 2016

iFora Bike Phone Mount

Reviewing more free products! http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01DO8NSK8the iFora Bike mount. If you are looking for a bike mount for your phone, this one meets the bill. It fits from big to small (GS6 to iPhone Plus) and securely attaches through bumps and jumps. @$13 I have little complaint (just that there were no instructions). 4-stars! ‪#‎ifora‬