I used to work for a customer service company that took the complaints
of consumers through their 800 numbers. Each complaint was classified,
grouped and analyzed by the parent company. Any deviation from normal
stats were flagged. The defective products could be tracked by
production runs to the manufacturers country, factory, date, time,
shift. All products would have records of the materials used as well
as the labor. I agree with Trader4. With the multi-national
manufacturers like Panasonic, nobody can just substitue inferior
material and get away with it for long. It is the parent company that
specifies a plastic cog or a metal one. Ryobi uses plastic parts in
their drills. DeWalt uses metal parts.