KMC Perfect Size Sleeve Issues
Gear forum
Posted on Nov. 16, 2015, 1:55 a.m. by JakeHarlow
I have been using KMC Perfect Size sleeves as my inner sleeve of choice for over a year and have been well-satisfied with the product, as they are tight enough to protect the card without bending it, and also snug enough to prevent its card from sliding out the bottom of it while double sleeving. However...
I've been having a real problem lately with KMC Perfect Sizes. The last several packs I've opened (around seven or so) have had what appears to be major quality control issues. This is evident in that the sleeves in these packs are too big. This is by about 1 mm. The sleeves are very loose, and have lost the signature snug feel that the older Perfect Sizes I used before had.
The result of this extra size on these latest batches of Perfect Size sleeves is that they're nearly impossible to double sleeve with. You can sleeve up a card in them, but when you try to slide that into any sleeve (I've tried this with KMC Hyper-Mats, Ultra Pro Mattes, and Dragon Shield Mattes), the lack of snugness causes the card to slide right out the bottom of the imperfectly-sized Perfect Size. This is quite enraging. After seven or so packs of Perfect Sizes, I've had to throw hundreds away because they're too big to serve any purpose.
I decided that maybe this was a minor snafu in the production process of a certain batch of Perfect Sizes, so I started to buy other packs from different vendors on Amazon. I still ran into these issues. Is this over-sizing of KMC Perfect Sizes becoming a brand-wide problem? Or is this just peculiar to me and my area?
I thought that perhaps the sleeves were subjected to high temperature during the transit to market (i.e. sitting in the back of a very hot truck, etc.) and thus suffered from thermally-induced expansion that happens to other types of plastic products. Still, this couldn't be happening to every Perfect Size package I've ordered, could it?
Has anyone else had this issue? It's very annoying because I'm at this point where I can't sleeve up any new decks because I'm out of usable inner sleeves (the alternative brands for inner sleeves all present fairly bad options, in my opinion). What have your guys' latest KMC Perfect Sizes been like? Any problems like I've been having?
JakeHarlow says... #3
@ maiden77:
I've unfortunately had some issues with Pro-Fits. They have the opposite problem, in my view, and that's that they're too tight. They're just not quite wide enough and cause my cards to bend slightly about the X-axis. I'm glad to hear, though, that you've had good experiences with them. Maybe I had a bad batch.
My problem is that KMC Perfect Sizes used to be ideal and didn't have quality control issues. These latest issues are what greatly concern me, and I just wish I could acquire some Perfect Sizes that confirmed to KMC's normal standards of quality.
November 16, 2015 2:04 a.m.
I bought some perfect fits recently from japan, and have experienced the same issue while double sleeving with dragon shields. Really frustrating, but I did eventaully manage to get them to work with a lot of patience. I'm glad I'm not the only one, I thought this was the norm.
November 16, 2015 2:14 a.m.
I have had the same problem, but oddly enough it was not every sleeve in the pack. Only around 20 or so of them wouldn't fit. It was rather odd.
I purchased them a couple months ago. Has anyone purchased any within the week? Perhaps they have fixed this issue.
November 16, 2015 2:33 a.m.
JakeHarlow says... #6
I bought a pack yesterday and all of them had this issue -- they were too big.
The brand didn't have this problem before. I wonder what is going on.
November 16, 2015 3:41 a.m.
i believe i tried the perfect fits and had a similar problem of having to throw away 20-30 per pack. I immediately chinned them off, and to be honest, as i find the cards with the looser double sleeves, i replace them as i go along. Pro fit are tight, but in a decent deck box they stay straight for me, might be because i use them with Ultra Pro sleeves too? I find their sleeves have the best shelf life, and i love the foily ones they have started to release, like the Commanders Arsenal ones, the Modern deck ones, and the Commander 2014 ones. Bit of an ultra pro fan boy it would seem haha.
November 16, 2015 6:29 a.m.
JakeHarlow says... #8
It's definitely good that you've found a brand that satisfies your needs, and I'll need to look into Ultra Pro again, it seems.
I'm just very confused about the Perfect Sizes, as they used to be the absolutely ideal inner sleeve. It's a total mystery as to what's happened with them in the past couple months. How is it that customers haven't widely given voice to their concerns about quality control, if indeed this is becoming a widespread problem? Why hasn't it been addressed? Very frustrating indeed.
November 16, 2015 7:04 a.m.
GeminiSpartanX says... #9
I've found that sometimes the outer sleeve makes a difference when using the KMC perfect fits. The last deck I double sleeved I would have instances like you mentioned with the card exiting the perfect fit sleeve, but I'd try it again with a different outer sleeve and it would work just fine (I was using dragon shields). That was a few months ago, so I don't know if there is just a bad batch of recent perfect fits or not. I do know that there were occasional bad batches of older dragon shields though that looked chewed up on the sides, so I imagine that the same sort of thing would be possible for KMCs.
November 16, 2015 8:03 a.m.
JakeHarlow says... #10
Could be. If that's the case, I have been having rotten luck with my Perfect Sizes lately. :(
November 16, 2015 8:37 a.m.
MagicalHacker says... #11
I remember reading about some clear sleeves that go on the outside of normal sleeves, but I can't find that currently D:
November 16, 2015 10:18 a.m.
I bought like 3 packs a montha nd a half ago and they are fine in fact I have never had issues with kmc sleeves in general. But I might need some more soon anyway so Ill buy a pack when I get a chance and let you know if this is still active
November 16, 2015 12:18 p.m.
@maiden77, JakeHarlow The ultra pro isn't a one time batch thingy. They've always been extra tight with the cards I play with.
November 16, 2015 1:14 p.m.
JakeHarlow says... #14
@ EmblemMan: I'd appreciate that, thanks. I'll be interested to hear of you encounter the same problem, hopefully you won't. :)
November 16, 2015 3:50 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #15
Ask your LGS owner to see if other players have experienced the problem, and if not, report the problem to them to see if they can ask KMC about the issue. Because it is a really glaring issue that will drastically hinder their market and if they don't get told about it it won't get fixed and they'll forever lose their top place in card sleeve protection status.
November 17, 2015 12:53 a.m.
JakeHarlow says... #16
Very true, Femme_Fatale. I will bring this to the attention of my LGS owner and see if he can point out the issue to his supplier. Though I have to note that I haven't had this issue with his stock alone. I've bought several packs from Japan via Amazon within the past month and still encountered the issue...I'm thinking that at least an entire production run may be affected with the problem.
Still, something must be done to bring this widespread problem to the attention of KMC. In my opinion, there isn't a very palatable replacement for inner sleeves on the market at present. It's rough because I can't reliably double sleeve my decks right now! I have at least four packs of defective Perfect Sizes in my messenger bag right now, and this is making me very sad.
maiden77 says... #2
i use Ultra Pro Pro-Fits and they seem brilliant with Ultra Pro sleeves. Snug, clear and don't slide out the bottom when double sleeving. I have around 1500 cards double sleeved in this way including my foil EDH cube that is 1050 cards and 250 foil basics most of which are full art. Try Pro-Fits man :-)
November 16, 2015 1:59 a.m.