What is a "Defective" or "Unreasonably Dangerous" product?
A product is unreasonably dangerous or defective if it fails to perform in a manner reasonably to be expected in light of its nature and intended function.
Products can be defective and unreasonably dangerous in any of three ways.
Manufacturing Defects
A particular unit of a product may be defective because of an imperfection resulting from some miscarriage during the manufacturing process. Examples include an automobile with defective brakes or an imperfection in a surgical rod.
Design Defects
A product may be defective because its design renders is unreasonably dangerous. In that case, all units of the same design are defective.
Defective Warnings and Instructions
A product also may be unreasonably dangerous because of a failure to adequately warn of a danger or a failure to adequately instruct on the proper use of the product. When a danger is obvious and generally appreciated, there is no duty to warn of that danger. A defendant has no duty to warn of risks of which it neither knew nor should have known at the time the product was manufactured.
