My Festool Literally (and not figuratively) disintegrated.

[Rockne]

My Kapex Hold Down Clamp (Item 494391) disintegrated out of nowhere and left a black, sticky mess all over the saw and a couple of workpieces. Apparently, Festool isn't using quality rubber.  I have an old Motorola KRAZR and a few other cheap items from China that had rubber that has done the same thing, but a) they're about 15 years older than the clamp and b) I would have thought Festool would use higher quality rubber.

ETA:  I took and provided links to photos, but this site isn't allowing it for some reason.

 

[ChuckM]

Resize the photos to well under 1 MB, and try again.

 

[Cheese]

As Chuck noted, photos need to be at the 1 MB information level or smaller. I generally resize the photos to 2000 x 1500 with a resolution of 75.

Also note, that a .png or .web image contains more information than a similar sized .jpg/.jpeg image, so go by total image information and not just by image size.

 

[kevinculle]

I have a vintage (2009) Kapex and the hold down clamp is like new...perhaps a material substitution by Festool at some point is behind your issue.

 

[sancho57]

ive had mine for many years, kept in a shop in Az where the summer temps get to over 116 in the summer and never had a problem with mine.

got to be more to the story

 

[squall_line]

The motor housing can warm up and leak oil from the grease when stored attached to the UG stand.

This oil can find its way to plenty of random places on the Kapex.

Oil deteriorates certain rubbers.

This may cause what you see.

There's something with my body's chemistry that absolutely destroys the rubber that is commonly used on mice, gaming controllers, and other electronic equipment.  I keep clean hands and don't use lotion during the day, so it's my body's natural oils causing it.

Oily woods may have a similar effect on the rubber for the hold down, depending.

 

[RonMiller]

I had the same thing happen to one my two clamps. It got sticky and deteriorated to a small degree after touching oil or acetone or something similar. It's been a while and I can't recall more than that now. It's continued to work acceptably, but I had to stabilize the rubber.