Gator Bonded Abrasive Wheels No Expiration Dates Class Action

Ali Industries, LLC makes at least twenty kinds of bonded abrasive wheels under its Gator brand. Bonded abrasive wheels are used to cut metal or concrete, and to do so, they must spin at high speeds. The complaint for this class action alleges that Ali has violated the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act (MMPA) and other laws because the wheels bear no expiration dates or warnings, despite the fact that if they are used after they have passed their shelf life, they may crack, split, explode, or otherwise fail.

A class and a subclass have been defined for this action:

• The Nationwide Class, based on claims of unjust enrichment, negligence, or breach of implied warranty, is all customers who bought any of the products in the US within the applicable statute of limitations.
• The Missouri Subclass, based on claims under the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act as well as for unjust enrichment, strict liability design defect, strict liability failure to warn, negligence, or breach of implied warranty, is all persons who bought any of the products in Missouri, for personal, family, or household purposes, within the applicable statute of limitations period.

The complaint alleges that the products at issue are defective and unreasonably dangerous. They are used to cut through tough materials like metal and concrete. The complaint alleges, “The wheels are attached to power tools (e.g., angle grinders, chop saws) that spin at speeds in excess of 5,450 RPM to 13,000 RMP[.]”

The complaint quotes the “Safety in the use of abrasive wheels handbook,” from the Health and Safety Executive Committee, as saying, “All organic bonded wheels for hand-held applications will bear a use-by date of three years from the date of manufacture.”

In addition, a European group, the European Producers of Abrasives (FEPA), provides the industry standard for the shelf life of such wheels as three years.

The complaint alleges, “As an admission of its knowledge that its abrasive wheels have a shelf life, on some of the Defective Products, it places a vague and ambiguous collection of numbers on the ring of the Defective Product (e.g., V/04 2019).” But the complaint claims that this is not enough since “[n]o reasonable consumer would understand this to be an expiry date.”

The complaint alleges that the company may be selling abrasive wheels that have already expired, and that stores also do so as well.

According to the complaint, the company “knew the shelf life of the Defective Product would expire without notice to a reasonable customer and thereby created an unreasonable risk of giving way, cracking, splitting, exploding, failing, and harming customers, yet it failed to warn” consumers of this danger.

Article Type: Lawsuit
Topic: Consumer
Tags: Breach of Implied Warranty, Negligence, Strict Product Liability—Defective Design, Strict Product Liability—Failure to Warn