Why is everything you buy such rubbish!!

[adyParticipant @ady]

The Hawker p.1121

Canned in the 1957 defence review.

 

Designed in 1953. A British F-15 eagle

 

The p.1127, which survived the review, ended up as the harrier jump jet.

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

Posted by Stub Mandrel on 07/11/2010 21:56:54:

I bet nearly all the computers we are using are largely Chinese – and they work with a level of reliability and complexity you would NEVER have found in any consumer electronics a few decades ago. 

 

That would only be true if you are Chinese, and think that Taiwan should still be part of China…

 

I think you’ll find that the Taiwanese Quanta Computer Incorporated is the largest laptop manufacturer in the world (by quite a long way), and that most of the others are made there too. The Americans have some considerable restrictions on the technology that they are prepared to let the Chinese manufacture in terms of computing, one way or another, and computing is the one major area where the Chinese don’t have anything like the world domination in manufacture that they clearly desire.

We use Chinese sub-contract manufacture – it’s way cheaper than getting things like injection moulding, for instance, done in the UK. Okay, the reject rate is higher, but the cost differential more than covers that. We’re seriously considering using one of the Chinese PCB manufacturers as well – the UK firm we’ve used before is expensive, and offering a slightly worse turn-around time. But if we do, we will be looking very carefully at the manufacturing quality – something that we haven’t really had to do with the UK firm…

[TerrydParticipant @terryd72465]

Posted by ady on 07/11/2010 22:00:14:

 

Consecutive British governments have overseen 30 years of asset stripping and not lifted a finger.

 

No Ady,

 

You’re wrong (this is not really political, excuse me if it seem so)

They’ve been doing it since at least the early 1960s, and doing it actively, egged on by Banks, accountants and free market capitalists who wanted to sell the family silver to make a short term profit because we were going to be an oil rich nation with our North Sea wealth which was supposed to be invested in infrastructure.  Yet another fairy story by our governments.  The rich got richer once again (but the poor wot got the blame).

 

Why is it that the French, Spanish, Germans, Americans and Japanese own and run most of our services and successful manufacturing now.   It was a deliberate policy from the 80s and 90s and we know who was in power then.

 

Terry

[Chris TriceParticipant @christrice43267]

 

Most people would be scared if they realised what percentage of goods in your average B&Q were manufactured in China. About 90%. While a cheap product in the name of competition is a consideration, the primary motivator is the low wholesale price allowing more profit even with a lower retail price. Unfortunately, the typical buyer at a DIY store doesn’t know what they’re buying. They choose primarily by price usually. Some finished products are cheaper than what you can buy the materials they are made from for.

Edited By Chris Trice on 07/11/2010 23:32:46

[TerrydParticipant @terryd72465]

Hornby and Bachmann now produce some of the most beautiful OO model locomotives and rolling stock ever made.  It is moulded and assembled in mainland China and is of incredible detail.  Yet another planet away from the British products from Margate in the past.  They use the most up to date cadcam systems and machines in modern factories and are able to produce short runs which makes a much wider range of reliable models available than ever at reasonable prices.

 

What can you say?  They are inexpensive but certainly not cheap.

 

Terry

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

Posted by Terryd on 07/11/2010 23:28:41:

They’ve been doing it since at least the early 1960s, and doing it actively, egged on by Banks, accountants and free market capitalists who wanted to sell the family silver to make a short term profit because we were going to be an oil rich nation with our North Sea wealth which was supposed to be invested in infrastructure.  Yet another fairy story by our governments.  The rich got richer once again (but the poor wot got the blame).

 

There were other issues that were more dubious than that, as well. For instance, look at the British Aircraft Industry. No, not BAe systems, but the small plane industry we used to have. There was a manufacturer called Auster, who got taken over and amalgamated into British Executive and General Aviation Ltd (BEAGLE). They were part of Pressed Steel and they got taken over by the British Motor Corporation, who in turn didn’t really want BEAGLE, and it was effectively nationalised by the Government of the day. This was in 1966. The first and only time they went back and asked for more support, the government promptly put them into receivership. No buyer found – effectively, end of story. Why did the then Minister of Technology do this? Don’t know for sure, but it is suspected that he was rather more interested in putting all his eggs into one basket and developing that massive commercial success that sold hundreds of planes otherwise known as, er, Concorde… Same thing happened with the British Space Industry – remember that?

 

We’ve always had an excellent record at developing products – dammit, we invented most of what passes for mechanical industry, but when it comes to putting it into mass produced practice, or even keeping it going at all, we have always been thwarted by governments who think they know best, but actually know NOTHING. I know which ones have been mostly to blame, but it’s not just a one-sided game, even though it looks like it sometimes.

[Sam StonesParticipant @samstones42903]

Didn’t we teach –  

`How to take the food right out of our mouths’?

 

As a Lancashire lad, I saw it happening with the textile industry in the 50’s!!!

 

The education of overseas students is considered to be an important dollar earner here in Oz .

 

I don’t expect to be around when this country goes down the gurgler in a few years time, but my children and grandchildren may.

 

Sam

Edited By Sam Stones on 08/11/2010 07:27:49

[KWILParticipant @kwil]

I have to say that I will only buy Dormer drills but they are made in Brazil.

[Eric CoxParticipant @ericcox50497]

<<In The UK goods must be of a ‘Merchantable Quality’ and ‘Fit for
Purpose’ under present legislation.>>

So what happens when you subscribe to a magazine and find that it contains drawings with incorrect or missing dimensions. Do you return it and ask for a refund of your subscription as the magazine contravenes the “Sale of Goods Act”

[blowlampParticipant @blowlamp]

In that instance Eric, you would probably find a clause to the effect that no guarantee could be made to the accuracy of the magazine’s content. However, if all the text and pictures were badly blurred and/or pages missing etc, then you might have a case.

 

Martin.

[BogstandardParticipant @bogstandard]

This country did a major change around in the 70’s & 80’s.

 

We swapped over from being a producer to a money grabbing ‘yuppie’ culture. The same sort of thing happened in the US as well, we just followed along like lambs to the slaughter.

 

So most our manufacturing went the way of the Dodo, and we started to ‘buy in’ everything that the money culture wanted.

 

The far east came to the rescue and gave us all what we wanted.

 

Cad and CNC took over, and soon everything could be designed and made out of cheaper materials, with obsolescence built in. Instead of something lasting a lifetime, things are now made to be thrown away after just a few short years. Hence us older ones term it as junk, and youngsters call it great, until a new model comes out., then the ‘gotta have’ takes over.

 

If you look deeper into Chinese production methods and products, you will find that they are up with the best of them, include in that the quality.India is going the same way.

 

What we see mainly are items made down to a price for the box shifters, who call themselves retailers. Who buy cheap and sell at large profits by the container load. Most have no idea of the quality or even about the product. If something goes wrong, it is cheaper for them just to give you a new item rather than repair it.

 

Give it another ten years, when China has really got it’s act together.

Once that happens, the US, Japan, Korea and ourselves will all be ‘has beens’ in the manufacturing and quality stakes, and maybe even the power stakes as well.

 

BTW, I am not a great supporter of what has and is happening, just someone who takes an interest, and if you look around you, you too can see what is happening as well.

 

 

Bogs

[adyParticipant @ady]

Frank Whittle would have been richer than God himself if the British Government hadn’t nicked the patent off him and handed it to the yanks for nowt.

“There ya go boys, free jet engines!”

 

Even Bill Gates would be lower middle class compared to Whittle.

 

If I discovered how to make energy from seawater I’d keep it a secret, Britain aint a good place to be too smart.

[oilcanParticipant @oilcan]

We’re seriously considering using one of the Chinese PCB manufacturers as well – the UK firm we’ve used before is expensive.

 

personaly, I blame the greedy workers. Fancy demanding 1st world wages to live in a 1st world country. lets all try and put the buggers out of work ay?  then we can all moan about the increase in taxation to pay for the welfare bill.

i remember reading a few years ago about traffic cones. one of the leading manufactures in europe is (still is?) british. when they tried to break into the german market, ( E.U. rules on competative tendering and all that crap) the government (german) kept on moving the goal posts to try and stop them meeting their specifications so as to protect there own manufactures. i don’t blame the germans for trying to protect thier own industry, i just wish we could be more like that.

if , as i was told as a young man , “the world doesn’t owe us a living” is true , then perhaps we should owe each other a living instead ? and start reading the “made in…” labels of what we buy.

we harp on about human rights, personal freedom, dignity at work etc. then run head long into trying to make the worlds largest dictatorship the richest country on the planet.

I would call for the revival of the “I’m backing britain” campaign  of the sixties, but what would be the point? We seem to make bugger all these days. 

[TerrydParticipant @terryd72465]

Hi Ady,

 

Out of interest, Frank Whittle worked on the development of the engine in Ladywood works, Lutterworth near where I live and there is a full size model of the Gloster G40 (also known as the G28/39) on the traffic Island which is on the approach road to the town about a mile from me. 

 

However another version of the jet engine was patented by Hans Von Ohain in Germany at around the same time as Whittle’s and was flown in the Heinkel HE178.  This flight took place nearly two years before the flight of the G40.  Ohain’s improved second engine also flew before the G40 but this time only about 6 weeks earlier.

 

I suspect that the Americans would have grabbed this one as a spoil of war anyway and Ohain would have been seen as the ‘father of the jet engine’ rather than Whittle.

 

 

 

 

 

Terry

[NJHParticipant @njh]

Hi Terry

 

A bit off topic but is that the Gloster “Gormless” do you know? I recall reading about it many years ago in a book  by their test pilot , Bill Waterton but , of course, I can’t locate it now !

 

Regards

 

Norman

Edited By NJH on 08/11/2010 13:45:28

[Ian S CParticipant @iansc]

The German Junkers engine was proberbly a more advanced design  being an axial flow type instead of the Centrfigal compressor of the British engines by RR, DH etc. Just a note the BBC TV news is on at the moment, and they are saying about a little trouble QANTAS is having with some of there RR engines, oh dear. Ian S C

Edited By Ian S C on 08/11/2010 14:05:02

[EddieParticipant @eddie]

Hi

There is always a choice, Take it or leave it.

Don’t expect Quanlity at a cheap price. If we stop buying cheap and complain to ourselfs it will always be in stock, as soon as something does not sell, the suppliers witll have some dead stock on hand and they will eventualy dissapear from the shelves. My Dad always said, If you buy a screwdriver at the Toy store, it will be a Toy. Buy the best Quality you can afford and expect the quality what you pay for.

It is your choice, buy Junk and get Junk Quality…

Eddie

[Richard ParsonsParticipant @richardparsons61721]

Eddie all you can get these days is JUNK!  No one sells good stuff any more the ‘Account-ants’ see to that.

[Chris TriceParticipant @christrice43267]

It doesn’t make much difference where the factory is. The factory that employs the cheapest labour force will always out price the rest. That’s why everyone goes to China. They work for peanuts by comparison.

[ChrisHParticipant @chrish]

The Account-Ants, and some very senior managers, have very much a fair share of the blame to take as well as greedy short sighted unions and workers.

 

In the 1970’s I stood by the building of a (then) very large container ship.  Had 2 main diesel engines each of some 26000 shp each, plus 5 generators of 2500 shp each – we were a total refrigerated cargo ship.  The obvious solution would have been to put a nice efficient exhaust gas boiler in the chimney to take all the heat from the exhaust gasses we chucked up into the sky to generate steam to run a turbo-alternator, but no, the account-ants ruled.  Payback on this had to be 3 years or no-go.  The building team got the payback down to 5 years, but it was not good enough, so no steam driven T-A.  Given the life of that ship, like most ships, would have been at least over 25 years, was that short sighted or what?  The building team would spend 2 weeks deciding on whether pump A was better in performance, delivery, price etc etc than pump B.  Then in the final meeting the account-ants would come in and say you are having the rubbish pump C because it is cheaper!  And so it has gone on ever since.

 

We are surrounded by water, we need and once had a strong merchant navy supported by a strong shipbuilding industry supported by all the relevant manufacturing and engineering industries to be able to survive by ourselves.  All is now gone.

 

In the 1990’s I worked for a horticultural company and what an eye-opener.  Nothing of quality was ever bought if an alternative was available that was cheap – Crap was King! 

 

I now live in France for part of each year.  We haven’t got a car company left to shout about in the UK, but France has.  Most of the motors on the road here are French.  Reason, the French, despite being big in the EU, first and foremost look after the French, France and all things French before considering the EU or the rest of the world.  Why can’t our politicians do the same in the UK?

 

But as for working on any modern car, forget it.  I have an old Renault 4 as a fun car and it’s great, I can work on all of it.  My Renault Scenic by comparison, needs a garage to change the headlight bulb. (well, OK I have done it, but you have to take a load of covers off and then it helps if you have one inch diameter arms fitted with universal joints, and it takes about an hour to change one bulb.)  The stupid thing is, in France you have to carry a bulb kit around with you in case one light goes out, despite the fact that changing a headlight bulb by the roadside is a total non-starter for 99.99% of the motoring population.

 

I agree with most of what has been said above.  You get what you pay for, buy crap and crap is what you will get, and twice off as you will buy twice.  I lament the fact we now have a throw-away society and cannot /will not repair anything, and that stuff is such rubbish that it lasts no time at all.  Our resources are not infinite, eventually we will have used everything up and then we will HAVE to start repairing stuff.  And that time is not that far off, maybe not in my lifetime but not long after when the oil runs out.  Just think of stuff that needs oil either as a material or as an energy in it’s manufacture.  Frightening, or what?

 

Ho humm, so endth the rant for today, feeling better now! 

Chris 

[TerrydParticipant @terryd72465]

Lots of rose tinted specs around here methinks.

 

I have a modern car, just 8 years old.  It is Korean and has a lovely silky smooth V6 2.4 L engine, power steering, auto box, cruise control, climate control, ambient temp sensors, Leather seats, electric mirrors, windows and drivers seat adjustment, window mist sensors etc etc. it is also economical,  It has let me down only once but has no sign of even one spot of rust.  It starts first time every morning despite being left out in the cold etc.  It runs on the original battery and drives so beautifully, my dad could only dream of such a car.  But it was not expensive and will last for many years yet and I don’t need to lie under it every weekend.

 

My washing machine was bought 15 years ago and shows no sign of wear, My microwave oven was bought when I was divorced 20 years ago and I have no problems with it, not even the interior lamp, despite daily use.

 

My last television lasted 12 years without a blink until it gave up (unlike my parents 405 line valve TV where we had the technician out every few weeks and had to keep a stock of EL84 valves in) They lasted about 3 years on average and cost a fortune, I have the invoices.  I have just bought a 46″ plasma which I believe will see me out for less than the equivalent price of my dad’s Murphy in 1957.

 

My Chinese machines are not of industrial quality but are streets ahead of many of the offerings of western industries previously at a fraction of the cost for domestic hobby machines.  My computer has run day and night for years on end with no complaints, a computer which NASA would have been jealous of a generation ago. and it sits on my desk.

 

I have Rolex, Rotary and Accurist watches, the latter costing a couple of pounds but they all keep just about perfect time – what’s the problem?

 

Sorry guys I do think that times are better now.

 

I could go on and on There was an awful lot of not very good products made in the west in the past just remember that.  Mind you Germany doesn’t seem to do so bad, but they haven’t slavishly followed the free market capitalist route of the bean counters have they?

 

Regards ,

 

Terry

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

It’s true about the stuff you could buy 15-20 years ago – we had a washing machine that lasted ages and didn’t actually cost that much, but – to get even close to the same build quality now you have to pay a fortune. Same with the microwave – we had a Philips one that lasted for about 20 years, but the new one is showing signs of distress already, and it’s only a couple of years old. Yes, when industrial manufacture in this country started to die out, there was some rubbish built, but generally nowadays you get your rubbish from abroad – well, you do if you’re a cheapskate. SWMBO is gradually learning this, unfortunately the hard way.

 

You can’t really make a case about TVs – they’ve all been more reliable since valves stopped being used, but I think you’re mistaken about it being an EL84 in a telly – that was an audio output pentode with a 6.3v heater used in Hifi and record players. The ones that packed up regularly in TVs were the PCL84 frame output triode-pentodes, and these had serial heater chains that used to run directly from the mains via a large green dropper resistor. What was defined about those heaters was the current they drew, not the volts that appeared across them, but they were the ones that were generally used in TVs of around that vintage.

 

I can’t really comment about the Chinese machinery at home thing, because I don’t have any, apart from an X-Y vice, and that had to be treated as a set of castings. There’s a Chinese Warco Major mill/drill at work, and now it’s had a good going over, it’s not too bad, considering. But I did tip quite a bit of casting sand out of it, and the quill required a rework. We don’t need to use it for anything precise, so it’s hardly a problem.

 

I don’t think that times are better or worse – I just think they’re different, and sure, some of it’s better. It’s just that some of the other differences ain’t so good… So no rose-tinted specs here… 

Edited By Steve Garnett on 08/11/2010 23:52:47

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi, I do to a certain degree think that you get what you pay for. If you buy at dirt cheap prices then you get sub quality stuff. That isn’t the same as buying cheaper than someone else. I usually buy at a mid range kinda price and have generaly found that it performs and lasts to what I would expect of it. When I was devorced around 24 years ago and strarted to live a quiet life, I bought a Service washing machine, not cheap but not dear. It had in its life time a new rubber around the load door and a set of brushes for the motor, however it only lasted 23 years. I have two microwave ovens, the fist one is a Matsui which I’ve had for 24 years and is still going strong, which has been in vertual daily use (they tryed to get me to buy extra insurance cover at about half the cost of the oven for that) the other one is a Kenwood which was my mothers before she passed on which is about ten years old, but that has some of the paint peeling off inside and I had to do running repairs on it the other week. I don’t expect it to last much longer, I think this one might quit first. but this was a cheapie one. They are both turntable types.

      On the other extrem where things are expensive I believe that the extra cost is somewhat cosmetic or the item is over complicated for its use. As an example one of my sisters used to buy the more expensive wasing machines and found more often than not that they often went wrong, had features she never used and lasted only four years or so, she now buys cheap ones and just replace them when they go wrong. She says its cheaper that way, than having higher priced ones repaired even with extra insurance cover on them.

 

Regards Nick.

Edited By Nicholas Farr on 09/11/2010 09:38:14

[ChrisHParticipant @chrish]

My daughters washing machine is now 7 years old.  When it was 5 years old she had to get the repair man out.  His comment was she should be lucky that it was 5 years old not 3 as the ‘new’ ones can’t be repaired anymore.  Says it all really.

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

Unfortunately, Nicholas and Chris, this is exactly what the manufacturers want you to do – not repair anything, and just buy new stuff. That way, their production line keeps going, and their employees remain in work, and they cream more profit. The whole idea of buying a decent product at a realistic price, keeping it and repairing it where necessary to get a good life out of it, and then purchasing another one when it had finally had it does not pay for their expensive lifestyles at all. Mind you, bankers are worse!

 

There’s a whole development style (unfortunately aided somewhat by CAD/CAM) that revolves around making damn sure that component life is limited, and when they can’t realistically do this, then they just make sure that there are no spares available for the few things that will inevitably break, to force the scrapping issue with the rest of the product. And of course it’s all this that has given rise to all these new regulations about recycling materials – it really has got somewhat out of hand.

[Author]

Posts