I know this isn't the response most of you were waiting for. I'm not sure how long it will be before we get a definitive answer, so please be patient. Also I'm not familiar with forum etiquette. Is it best to necro this thread when I receive the next response, or start a new thread? Thank you to those that are still kickin'! This is what I got from HQ:
1. Hardness
When I was in China recently, I was told that the inland regions are very dry and that shafts and tips tend to get harder there. We haven't tested under those conditions, so some of what players are experiencing may not be something we can reproduce here in Hiroshima, where it's hot and humid.
To be honest, there has been some variation in hardness before, not now. Our quality improvements have narrowed it quite a bit. When we tested around 20 brands in-house, every one of them showed some variation too. Even so, we'll keep working to reduce it further.
2. Glazing
Honestly, we haven't compared this against other brands yet, and it's a really difficult issue. To prevent mushrooming, we push the quality of our leather as far as we can, and that process does involve chemical treatment. We haven't verified how that affects glazing though, so I can't give you a clear explanation yet, or say how we compare with other brands.
We're making glazing our top priority for quality improvement, and we're going to get to the bottom of what's causing it.