Are you talking about flaking with the aerospaced freebie one? I havent experienced the metal flaking at all with my freebie, which has been used, more or less, daily since i received it over a year ago.
When u were mentioning high end grinders i was gonna add about remembering about a shredder one, and just realized its the santa cruz looks sounds like its been reworked from the one i remember though. Do you (or anyone else out there have a space case and the santa cruz that can offer a comparison because after looking at it on PV im highly interested. Looks just as good as the space case but would it be worth buying to replace my space case? If anyone does have the Shredder, the second pic on PV of a small blue one showing all pieces, looks like the shredder i remember, is the black one thats not taken apart a new model. Because those long wide holes on the blue one look horrible, and it says you wontnget any small BB sized clumps anymore but from the picture of the blue one I dont see how thats possible