HONEST PRODUCT REVIEW! TENKIDOM HOOD STRUTS.

Hello, welcome to Charlie's Garage. I got something really exciting to talk about today because this is a new for me and my channel. I just had a company send me a product for the first time and asked me to do a review of their product for the channel and I'm super excited about it because number one, other than sending me the product for free, they are not paying me for this review, which means I can be completely honest about it and you're not gonna get any BS from me about the product. So the name of the company is Tinkerdome. So if you look right here, that's the name of the company right there. I'll put a link to their site, mostly sold on Amazon so that you can see what they have available. But their main product focus is struts, mainly for hoods, tailgates, trunks, and they're made out of a graphite carbon, carbon graphite, whatever you wanna call it. So a couple of things I look at when I receive a product is number one, how quick do I get it? So literally I told these guys that I'd be willing to make this video and try these out and see what they're like and I received this thing on my front porch like two days later, so very fast delivery for them to send this to me. The other thing I like to talk about is how well something is packaged because if you have a company that just kind of willy-nilly throws stuff into packages and it comes and it's bent, damaged and stuff, that's no fun for anybody so then you have to go to the hassle of sending it back or asking for a refund. But I will tell you that these came very tightly packaged in a bunch of bubble wrap in a box that was pretty secure so these came packaged very well. So for the first two categories as far as shipping and packaging, I would give these guys a five out of five. They did a really good job on both of those. And then the third thing you look at when you get a new product is the overall appearance, right? So they're graphite tubes and at first when I saw this on there, I was like, not everybody's gonna want your logo on their car if they buy these trucks or shocks and then I realized that this logo right here is just a sticker that will peel off pretty easily. I say that while I'm struggling to peel it off. Here it goes. Okay, don't laugh at me, okay? Okay, you can laugh at me. So I'm not gonna peel it all the way off. You see I got the corner up and I peeled it off of the other set that I got and it came, okay, so coming right off, doesn't leave any residue or stickiness behind so if you don't want the logo, you can easily peel off their sticker and put it on there. So as far as appearance goes, I would say that it looks like a pretty good product. The ends seem to be pretty durable. The rod is definitely made out of some strong steel. The only thing I would improve on is I think the graphite appearance of this. It looks okay but it also does look kind of cheap and you can, I think a little bit more effort could be put into making this part look a little bit better, look a little bit less like a sticker that's just rolled on there and make it look more like an actual graphite steel material. So I don't know, it's the little thing. So I would say appearance wise, I give these guys a four out of five, right? Little bit of room for improvement but overall pretty decent, right? So the next thing that really I look at when I'm looking at a product is how easy is it to put in? Am I gonna have to drill holes in my car? Is it gonna require me to buy new tools? What is the ease of installation? And these are really designed to replace struts that might already exist on your car. So they got the clip in right here where you take the old strut off and this clips right onto the end of it. And the other side they left mine with a threaded end so that you can put the ones that came with it on there or just thread this into the one that already exists on your tailgate or in your hood. So I got two sets of these from them. I got this set that I'm gonna try out on the tailgate of my 2022 GMC Canyon. And we got an orange pair that is gonna go on a friend of mine's 2018 Camaro. And so he sent me some before and after pictures that I'm gonna post here later on. So for right now, we're gonna go and try and put these on the truck, see what they look like and get an idea of what they look like installed. And then I'll also at the end of that, put the pictures up for you guys to see what they look like on the Camaro hood. I've also talked to the company about getting some of these made for the 68 Mustang. But when you look at classic cars like the Mustang, they have those springs and stuff in the trunks and the hoods that really make these obsolete for those. So the goal was that I put these on, see what they look like on the trunk, get an idea of kind of how they bend and function, and then do the measurements I need for them to custom design the one for the Mustang. That is another good thing I will say about this company is that they are easy to communicate with. If you need a custom design, a custom length for a custom vehicle, they will make these custom for you. It just takes a little bit more time to get them if it's not something they already produce in bulk. So let's go out to the truck, try them on, see what happens. All right, so first problem, I asked them for tailgate struts and they sent me hood struts. So this is what the hood strut looks like when it's installed. And this over here is what my original hood strut looks like. I didn't need hood struts. There was nothing wrong with the hood struts I had on here. So I'm just gonna go ahead and do both of them so they match. But the other thing that I don't really like is that their color options are pretty slim and the gray and the silver, they look okay, but I wouldn't have bought these on my own. The getting it on and off is pretty easy. So when you're trying to clip off on the rod end, on the backside of this rod end, there's gonna be a clip that looks like this that you just take off with a screwdriver and then you just kind of pop this off. Once you pop that end off, this end pops right off. And then I just threaded this end on here, popped it on there, and then that side popped right on there. So I would say ease of installation is pretty easy. So I'm gonna go ahead and put the other side on and see how it functions. All right, so hood struts are installed. As you can see, they obviously have no problem supporting the weight of the hood. Let's see, close the hood and see how easy the hood raises. So yeah, they work as intended. They seem plenty strong. So operationally, pretty cool. So I would say getting what I asked for, a one out of five, ease of installation, a five out of five, and appearance on the truck, maybe a three out of five just because I couldn't find the right color match. So there you have it. So overall, it took me about 10 minutes to pop those old struts out, put the new struts on. I would say this overall experience would be maybe an eight out of 10 if I had to rank them out of that way. With the biggest problems being that I asked for trunk support struts, tailgate for the truck versus the hood struts, you know, getting the hood struts. But they did send us the right struts for the Camaro. So if you're in the market for struts, then I would say that this is a recommend for me. They seem to work well. They look good if you can match the color that you want well. I would encourage you to go to Amazon, check out their variety of colors that they have. They will probably have something close to matching yours. I will say that I like the results on the Camaro a little bit better than I like the results on my pickup truck. So here are the results from the Camaro, the before and after pictures. He's pretty happy with them. He said that the only thing he noticed is that they're not quite as stiff as the struts he had on there before, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. If they're still easy to open, but they're easier to close, then that's okay. But if they're harder to lift up because they're not strong, then that could be an issue, which he didn't have a problem with. So I, again, look in the comments for the link. I'm also gonna try to figure out how to overcome my old man technological challenges and put a link right here and go to their Amazon page, check them out, let them know I sent you. Maybe in the future, I can get other people to send me products that I can do reviews on, and I'll really like doing this one. So thank you, Tinkerton, for the parts and for letting me do this review. Hope you like it. Thanks, bye.