On Dec 24, 1:08 pm, Gunner Asch wrote:
On Tue, 23 Dec 2008 21:05:23 +0000 (UTC), Cydrome Leader

Historically
China could match or beat the best of Europe when they wanted to.

any examples of this?

Most industrial Chinese lathes over 13" swing

Gunner


From my admittedly limited knowledge of machining, Gunner is correct -
the big Kwacheons (sp) at school are superb, so smooth in operation,
quiet, everything works well..
They recently got some new Colchesters - same crappy finish, badly
fitting sheet metal, same mechanical design as the 50 year old ones
they replaced. Only difference was some fancy electronics, they still
had the same annoying "features" they always had.

The $20 4 inch Chinese angle grinder is superb, you will get a year or
two out of it, and if it gets knocked off from the back of your truck,
no big deal. At that price, you have 3 or 4 of em loaded with
different disks - saves time and effort. Ditto with most of the rest
of their power tools, a lot of contractors here are using the Chinese
mitre saws for the same reasons.

And for the rest - these are people who build most of the electronics
in your lounge room. Including the semiconductors in them. And they
don't give a rats arse about supplying data sheets, or selling spares,
unless you want to buy a min. of 100,000 units - they don't need to,
so they don't .They have put men in space, built supersonic jet
fighters, ICBM's and nuclear submarines. And, being pragmatists, and
businessmen, (sorta like republicans, I guess) they will sell you any
level of quality you want.

And if your company in the US wants to screw them down on price to get
a bigger retail profit, well, they will happily oblige by making a
cheaper, crappier product.

(What really annoys me is where a local brand, say, of clothing or
footwear and has a reputation for quality built up over generations
suddenly moves their manufacturing offshore - still the same price,
mind you, but noticeably lower quality. best local example is
"Blundstone" workboots, used to be good for 3 winters till they
started leaking. Now, made in China, I refuse to buy them. May as
well pay a third the price for things that last one year and are
openly Chinese.)

Thought all this would have been blatantly obvious by now.......(yeh,
I know I am ranting, no need to point it out..)

Andrew VK3BFA.