I chose Ultramarine Enterprises, and I was rather annoyed at the inattention to detail and the low level of craftsmanship in what I received. I was mistaken in thinking that they would do a better job than I could have done the first time. I wrote them the following letter to express my feelings. They didn't so much as acknowledge having received my letter. Buyer beware.
April 3, 1995
Ultramarine Enterprises
Gentlemen:
After several long weeks of waiting, my aquarium light fixture that I ordered from you arrived last Friday. I decided to wait a few days to let my ``excitement'' settle before I contacted you about some gripes I have. It's a good thing, because I want to communicate them in the most straightforward and rational manner.
The fixture I ordered was to contain one 250 watt 6500K metal halide lamp, and two blue Osram fluorescents, with the two blue lights on independent switches. My most serious complaint is that my fixture has the two fluorescent lamps on the same switch. I understand that this is the way you normally do it, but I had a very explicit conversation with the gentlemen who took my order that left me completely sure that he understood what I wanted. I remember his saying, ``So you're going to have four cords coming out of the back of the hood,'' and he explained what each cord would be. I took a peek under the reflector in the hood, and it was apparent that it took slightly more work to build what you shipped me than it would have taken to build what you told me you would ship me. The only explanation I can think of for this mistake is carelessness and a lack of attention to detail. It's the same thing that causes the cooks at the pizza restaurant to put onions on my pizza when I tell them not to. The difference is that you are not high school students making minimum wage with no interest in the reputation of the business, and custom metal halide light fixtures are much more serious investments than pizzas. I expected my $400 to buy the care and respect for the customer that it takes to get things right in the first place, or at least to check your shipments against the original orders before they go out. I also expect that as honest businessmen, you will want to put things right and correct the mistake, including paying the shipping costs both ways. However, I do not look forward to being without lighting over my aquarium for another unspecified number of weeks, nor to packing up such a delicate item. Your poured foam packing was excellent, but I can't duplicate that. Given the simplicity of the task ahead, I'm quite confident that I can do the work myself. So if you would be so kind as to send me another power cord, preferably one that matches the one you shipped, with the nice inline switch, then I will be able to fix the error in a short time.
As an amateur woodworker, I expected---and accepted---that I would be less than thrilled with the quality of the woodworking in the hood. But I did expect you to expend the effort to provide at least the illusion of a high quality product. The woodworking seems plenty rigid and solid, but other than that it is third rate all around. All wood surfaces are terribly rough, giving the impression that you never sanded the piece before putting the varnish on. I suspect that most of that roughness is due to the fact that the first coat of varnish will raise the grain of wood. If the wood had been sanded before varnishing, an additional two to five minutes spent knocking down the raised grain with fine steel wool, synthetic preferably, would have left a surface that is satin smooth to the touch. This roughness will be easy for me to correct, but other problems are uncorrectable. Some of these are more amusing than anything else, such as the mysterious empty hole drilled through the wrong axis of the thin strip of wood that holds the acrylic shield in place, the rather wavy cut that separated that strip from the rest of the back side of the hood, and the acrylic sheet that isn't quite wide enough to reach from one slot into the slot across the hood from it. I make mistakes like these too, but I would not sell them to my customers. Other problems aren't so easily shrugged off and ignored. I can tell by looking only at the top of the hood that you used a rather rough cutting circular saw to cut the sides. I shouldn't be able to tell that. I can tell because the circular saw marks were left on the edges of the boards. A few licks with a sander, jointer, or hand plane would have eliminated this eyesore. The rotary planer marks are clearly visible on the sides of the hood. A hood the size of mine would require less than five minutes of work with a random orbit sander to remove the planer marks completely. I could go on---about the router burn marks, the uneven use of wood filler, and other things---but I have said enough. I was not expecting a piece ready for the pages of Fine Woodworking. I know that woodworking is not your main business, and even at $400, you're not charging enough to pay for the utmost in craftsmanship. But I believe you are trying to sell a high-end aquarium light, and to produce a high-end anything, you must meet certain minimum standards in all of your components, and you just didn't do that. The sloppy and half-baked woodworking spoils an otherwise fine product.
Don't dwell too long on my criticism of the woodworking. It's the wiring mistake that I'm most upset about, and if it weren't for that I wouldn't have bothered writing at all. I suppose it's just that the poor woodworking on top of the rather insulting wiring mistake is adding insult to injury. I don't want to give the impression that I'm thoroughly depressed about buying the hood from you. My bottom line requirement was to have a big bright light with a beautiful spectrum, and I believe I got that. But perhaps I would have been better off buying a bag of parts and assembling them myself.
Sincerely,
Chris Paris