The Ultima part stands for "Ultimate crap." These are the worst dog crates I have ever owned, and I own a bunch. The issue with these crates is the hinge design for the end doors. On a good day, they bind and the door doesn't swing freely. They are also almost always bent when they arrive. Should the crate not be bent beyond use, you can count on the hinges being borked. On a bad day...in other words, eventually, and sooner than later, the hinges will break off. My dogs are easy on their crates. My boy has been in his for almost a year, and the hinges have been weird from the beginning. As noted above, they were bent when the crate arrived. One was not even fully closed. I had to pinch it with pliers. This week, the bottom hinge on the end door he uses snapped off. Midwest is not known for their wonderful customer service, and when I complained previously to them about how they package their crates and they are always bent to hell when I get them, they actually told me that they "NEVER" have had any complaints about bent crates or their packaging before. That's obviously a crock. So I was already dreading fighting them for a warranty replacement for this crate. In the meantime, I ordered a Frisco crate from another online retailer. Unfortunately, the wire gauge is really thin on it, so I was reluctant to use it for my boy. He's the biggest of my dogs, and while he is not a crate destroyer, he is a "violent nester" and gets crazy when he is nesting in his blankets. I was worried it might not stay standing. So, I traded that one out for another Midwest Ultima that I had stored away for one of my other dogs. Brand new. Never used. I set it up last night. Door hinge binding. What a surprise. Tonight, hinge snaps off. That is TWO of these crates that have just fallen apart due to this horrid hinge design. I love everything else about these crates. The wire gauge is heavy duty. The size is great. I love having three doors. If only the doors actually worked and the hinges didn't break off. I have a third one of the Midwest Ultima 48" crates that has managed to hold together. I had to tweak the hinge loops on it to make them work, including a bottom hinge on one of the end door. However, this crate has lasted because I use the side door, which has a different design than the end doors. I fully expect that, should I need to use the end doors ever, they will also break off. I bought a 36" Midwest Life Stages crate for one of my dogs, and it does not have the horror-hinge design. It has two doors, one on side and one on end, and they both work great. Wire gauge is nice and thick, too. As much as it makes me want to gag to think about buying another Midwest product in this lifetime, I may go with a Life Stages crate. If Midwest fixes this horrid hinge design, this would be a fantastic crate. Good luck getting one from Amazon that isn't mangled when it arrives. Be prepared to return it. They will expect you to try to ship it back. You will want to try to preserve the box, if you can. Good luck getting it back in the box. I had better luck with the smaller crate arriving in one piece. It, too, was bent somewhat at one corner, but still useable. My recommendation would be to return it without opening it if the box is the least bit banged up. I have learned this the hard way. Even then, you have a great chance of the crate having broken welds (42" crate came that way), bent panels (4 out of 5 came that way, not all from Amazon), or with bent or open (as in not closed loop) door hinges (4 out of 5). Watch out for that. I am not looking forward to trying to get Midwest to replace both of these crates. The construction is such that you can't just replace the end panels. So, given their reputation for lousy customer service, I will be very surprised if I am able to get a replacement for one of these crate, much less two. Wish me luck. The pictures I included show the broken hinge and pieces, and one picture shows an unbroken hinge, so you can see the difference. Apologies for the poor lighting. Update: I contacted Midwest customer service, and they have been GREAT. When I made my purchase, the model was #748UP, which was the triple door version. Midwest has since discontinued the triple door version. It is now a two-door version with a fixed hinge. Midwest requested proof of purchase and pictures of the issue, which I supplied. Their response has been fast and professional and they have shipped out two brand new replacement crates (new style), under the warranty. I have not received them yet, and hopefully they won't be banged up during shipping. That's the open question at this point. But, very, very pleased with the response from their customer service. I really expected a battle to get them replaced. I was very pleasantly surprised.
