Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Meindl boot failure

The curious want to know. When was the last time you washed your feet?

Boot-mites!

I went on a 7 mile stalk in the PA mountains during deer season on a rainy day. This is what my boots looked like when I was done.



I attributed it to age given the fact that the boots were 10 years old. I had noticed some separation the year before and shot some shoe glue in the seems but it did not hold. I have since upgraded and bought 2 pairs of Danner's and I hope I never have the problem again. It was that soft spongy layer between the boot insole and the tread that makes boots comfortable that the glue failed on in my case.

I never replaced mine with Meindl because they didn’t carry that style of boot anymore and after 12 years the boot prices had doubled, they gave me $110 credit and I ended up buying a pair of Irish Setters,

Rocky boots are junk. I sure wouldn't buy the same brand of boots again and expect different results. I have a pair of Cabela's outfitter boots I bought in 1992 that I still wear whenever it's really cold.

Degradation of the materials used in the sole of the boot. May have read somewhere that it’s exposure to ozone?

I had the exact same thing happen to a pair of Timberland boots. It even happened on a PA mountain.

I've got an old pair of Herman Survivors for cold days, an old pair of Danner boots for fall days and a pair of Rocky boots for going to the range. The Rocky's are garbage but the are paid for and are broken in,

Wife had a pair of Merrell's do that to her while we were hiking Katahdin half a dozen years back.

I had a pair of Keens also fail on me.

Both companies gave us credit toward new pairs.

I could not repair the Merrell's because the foam glue layer kept disintegrating. I was however able to repair the Keens with 3M 5200 adhesive... a roll of electrical tape to hold everything in place while the adhesive set for a week.

Just as an FYI 3M 5200 adhesive is probably the greatest adhesive ever made. Used a small dab to reattach the rear view mirror mounting bracket to the windshield glass on my truck just last week.

I've also used 5200 on sheet metal to make a sheet metal plywood sandwich to repair holes in mower decks.

My dump truck bed it's starting to have some wear holes. I will sandwich another layer of 14 gauge sheet metal on top of the existing base metal and draw down with wide flange pop rivets. It will probably buy me another five years until I have to rebuild the bed completely.

I could go on but this is about shoes and not the incredible and he's qualities of 5200.

Ive got a couple pairs of Danners that are 20 + years old. Had them refurbished by Danner and wear em all the time still. Had some Meindls come n go during that time.

If you can't find the 5200, E6000 works great too.

I cannot personally speak about 511 boots, but I've been extremely impressed with much of their clothing... I would try a pair of their boots if I had the need.

511 also seems to be a very Pro LEO EMS conservative type company.

I am wearing a 511 poly coat at the moment (that I caught on sale for about 60-70% off). I would say the quality and weight rival Patagonia every step of the way. And at $35 it sure was worth a test drive for me.

Meindle will have nothing to do with the Cabelas contract Meindle USA boots. Cabelas will not warranty them.

This is one reason I try to buy only boots with Goodyear-welt sole construction.

I've had two pairs of Meindls do that one Cabela's meindl the other one I ordered from some place in Canada they were not Cabela's branded, it's an age thing has nothing to do with how much you wear them I really don't think it has much to do with where you store them mine were stored in a dry heat pump control environment worn very little and the souls basically fell apart Cabela's stood by the first pair and offered me a replacement pair. Mendel wouldn't stand by me a bit and the pair that were Mendel not Cabela's they look brand-new when that happened they were about 5 years old

Dont. They suck.

Made in china

My Mendel Perfects did the same. I only wore them a handful of times over a couple of years. Fairly short hikes too.

Yep. I got more seasons than that out of these Rocky hunting shoes, but the issue is time IMO. The compounds shoe makers are using simply crumble after so many years. So if they sat on the shelf a long time ...

Aside from the compound failing before the rest of the shoes wearing out, these were some comfortable hunting shoes. I've had the same happen to other brands of shoes simply sitting in the closet.

I wouldn't count on a pair of the same boots if they were still made today lasting that long. It isn't 1992 anymore.