I called WM yesterday and talked to Doug in customer service....
He explained that, although rare, sometimes the welding machine's tip get's dirty and can cause poor welds, or possibly they had a new guy running the welder, or possibly the steel roll it came from was bad. (he said roll is about a mile long
)
I explained my situation, and told him how I ordered the box in the beginning of summer but just now opened it up. He told me to take the broken blades and cut off about a foot of the blade on each side of the weld, and tape those two sections together and set them aside. He is mailing me a box to ship them back with to return. The reason he wants both sides of the weld is because there is a serial number on there, which will tell them what roll the steel came from, who the operator was that made the blade, and when it was made. He said if I had opened the box immediately after getting it and called then, they would have gone back and inspected every single weld that came off that machine in that roll.
Since I waited, it's no rush to get the blades back, so if I want I can just set the blades aside and send them in when I send more blades in for resharpening, which I will do.
He was very nice and extremely accommodating, he started telling me some stories about some of the milling he has done and some of the issues he has had. He didn't try rushing me off the phone at all.
I like that the warranty never expires and they will ship me new blades to replace the broken ones, which of course is expected.
I was finished talking with him and asked if he could transfer me to the parts department....he then said "sure hang on a second..." (short pause, never put me on hold" and said "Hello, this is Doug in parts"
I like how such a large company is still very personable.
