Comment by somat 20 hours ago
Military-grade just means it has a spec, now, I will admit having a spec is nice, very nice. but in general it says little about the actual quality of the item. And if the spec can't be found or there is no spec. Probably best to stay away, in those cases they are not even selling you the snake oil but the sound of it sloshing in the bottle.
Yeah if you see something labelling itself "MIL-SPEC", that's grade A snake oil bullshit.
That said military spec stuff is actually generally a good sign that something is of higher quality than random off the shelf garbage but only if you know there's a specific spec you want it to work with. And most of the time you aren't even necessarily looking for a MIL-STD (standard) but rather a MIL-PRF (performance rating/spec).
So like if something is "MIL-SPEC" run. But if you see say a spool of fiber that is "MIL-STD-1678 compliant" and more importantly "MIL-PRF-49291 compliant" and "MIL-PRF-85054 compliant", that's probably a really good sign that it'll do its job. The former PRF documenting perf requirements for the fiber itself and the latter PRF the cabling/sheath's corrosion and deterioration resistance.
It's the military so odds are it'll probably cost extra for that and it'll still kinda suck but it'll suck in exactly the way they promised.
Anything with “Marine” in its title, is usually 5X more expensive, but worth it.
Nothing sucks more than having the engine crap out, 150Km offshore, because your fuel injection system got corroded.
Hell, anything even close to salt water is apt to get ate. What's funny is you'll see people say they want to retire and get a beach house. No. You. Don't. Blowing sand is hard on stuff, getting in gears and moving parts. But the salt, the salt is like some alien monster that just dissolves things that flat landers would never expect. Get the smallest amount of saltwater flooding in a closet with equipment and things start to corrode away like it's an alien acid world.
Military grade afaict just implies the military ‘could’ use it, by that definition almost any company sells military grade products or services, except companies who explicitly would not sell to the military.
In the US, "military grade" is like "natural". There is no legally enforced meaning, so it means whatever the manufacturer says it means. Sometimes that's something real and of some value, but the majority of the time it's just a meaningless marketing buzzword.
I’m not talking about what the military could or would use, I’m talking about what it takes for something to be called military grade.
"military grade" isn't a protected phrase. As a consumer you might be able to sue them if the thing breaks and they can't prove that phrase meant anything? But doubtful.
Claiming to conform to a more specific product or process standard would be more specific fraud.
But in general though "military grade" is a red flag for shitty marketing.
Example: pop tarts are military grade! [1]
Though their commercial packaging is likely not.
https://www.dla.mil/Portals/104/Documents/TroopSupport/Subsi...
There is no legal requirement for it to refer to MIL-SPEC. More often than not it is just pure marketing without any actual spec tied to it