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What's In a Tool? a Case For Made In the USA (hackaday.com)
szczys writes: You have the choice of buying a wrench made in the USA and one made in China. Which one should you buy? The question is not a straightforward one. Tools are judged by their ability to do the job repeatedly and without fail. To achieve this, only the best of design and manufacturing will do. But this is a high bar when you factor in price competition which often leads to outsourcing production. Gerrit Coetzee looks at this issue, comparing two instances of the same model of Crescent brand adjustable wrench; one a legacy manufactured in the USA, another outsourced for manufacture in China.
They were one of the most significant holdouts over the past decade or so, but they won't learn from their mistake. They could have learned from vise-grip, who could have learned from dremel, who could have learned from Stanley. Sears (Craftsman) could have learned from any or all of them, as could Husky and Kobalt.
They'll all just go the same way, only to lose the race to the bottom to Harbor Freight.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
I actually read the article and immediately regretted it, the conclusion was that lower quality tools are of lower quality and then some blathering about marketing nonsense.
Vote with your dollar
Next.
I think all of us tech minded people already know the answer to this, even if your primary daily tool is CAD or G++.
And, if you are even a bit of a tinkerer or garage mechanic you also know that harbor freight crap is generally inferior to Snap On or MAC.
Come on slashdot, give me news I don't know about.
"Tools are judged by their ability to do the job repeatedly and without fail" Not necessarily. I might just need it once, or for very light use. It is often true that you get what you pay for, but this doesn't mean you should pay for more than what you need.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
... promotes designed obsolescence and waste, because the highest value is profit and not making sure you make best use of your resources. There is just way too much waste and shit being thrown away in our current world. The human animal is not rational.
John Oliver - A piece of food waste
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8xwLWb0lLY
I wish the same were possible in the techology industry.. Buy a Samsung Galaxy made in China or one made in USA. I'd pay more for the USA one, personally. As long as the phone was like for like in specs and usability.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Unlike others I found this article well written and with a unique perspective. Defining requirements and tolerances is very important but far too often we overlook these steps and rush right into a project - get the PMO involved, assign a PM, purchase some widget we "need" and run setup. Project complete. Of course it doesn't meet the requirements of the user or customer, but we can't worry about that. We have more projects to "complete".
Who cares where it is produced? Price/performance ratio is important.
knows the answer to the question.
The stuff from China is cheap powdered metal with a surface coating to disguise the crap.
Swapping out products for an almost identical-looking Chinese copy made to order by some outsourcing factory. They think they'll be able to super-size their profit margins and people will keep buying their stuff. What they don't realise is that any old fool can order generic tools from China for pennies and their hollowed-out "design"-only office-based tool manufacturing company won't serve a purpose any longer.
Nothing against US made stuff but you pay extra because of the cost of shipping it half way around the world, and generally the exchange rate makes importing those goods expensive because the of the high US dollar.
Comparing old tools -- tools hat haven't gone through extensive cost-cutting measures -- with new ones?
How about comparing modern US-made tools with modern Chinese-made tools? I'm not sure which I'd place my bet on. Also, does the new, shitty Chinese tool cost as much as the old, well-made one did, adjusted for inflation? Or, for added fun, adjusted for mean or median income?
There are lots of Chinese tools that are the best in the world.
I’ve worked as an engineer in industry. The one common thread between a quality product and a bad product has always been this, ”Is the person who designed the product involved in making the product?”
This is not an argument for "Made in the USA". This is an argument for the design and manufacture should be in the same place. Therefore, this also makes the case for "Don't just export the manufacturing phase. Also export the designing phase."
-- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
Tools are judged by their ability to do the job repeatedly and without fail.
That's not how anything is judged -- they are judged by expected TCO. And that TCO includes initial cost, minus expected performance but plus the expected value of failures multiplied by the cost of each failure. All of these vary by the job that the tool is being asked to do.
To give an example, if the wrench is going onto a deep-sea oil platform where replacement will be very costly and will cause very expensive delays, the last factor is very high and so reliability will be at a premium.
On the other hand, the local auto mechanic probably has a dozen wrenches and a parts truck that comes around every other day that can bring a new one in for nearly zero overhead. So she might be willing to accept a higher failure rate.
On yet another (third?) hand, someone working in aerospace or other sensitive area will likely need a wrench that can accurately deliver a set amount of torque. In this case, the accuracy of the tool will be the most important concern, since failure of the product (satellite, jet engine, space shuttle booster rocket clamp attachment) will be far more costly than failure of the tool.
So there you have it, three examples of how making general statements about how we judge things is complete bollocks. The "right tool for the right job" might be cliché but the lesson is less about picking the right tool and more about thinking about the properties that are priorities for the job.
As long as the manufacturer gets "it", whatever "it" happens to be for a product, then there are no issues. The issue comes where they outsource to some random company is told to implement X for a fixed contract and they don't give a shit what they're doing providing it meets whatever their contractual obligations are. It doesn't matter if we're talking about manufacturing widgets, OEM electronics, providing software support, printing books or whatever. If the company making the thing doesn't care then it shows in the product.
Among all the stupid chauvinistic stories I read, this one tops all. Crescent wrenches are made all over the world, and the USA was not the first to manufacture one. The one I have has a scale, and I use it. Don't know where it was made, but judging its price it was not made in the USA.
Also, I have several PCs. My Macbook certainly performs worse and has more problems than the ALDI nameless that is my main computer. My cheap east-german, polish, taiwanese or chinese tools are as rugged and relieble as the expensive stuff that comes from America. This has been a pattern ever since I carried my Apple II to the attic.
The point I am making is that most cheap products that I buy (in Europe) are as good or better than the more expensive brand products. YMMV, but don't come with all kinds of mystic explanations.
Paai
You can make fine things in China but ultimately it comes down to how much you're willing to spend.
QC isn't cheap. Neither are proper manufacturing techniques or high quality raw material.
I said QC first for a reason. While labor is cheaper in China, and other supply related costs are lower.. You need to invest in quality control because your Asian suppliers will try to cut corners on you at every turn. And they'll do it just to see if you've noticed. That's simply how they operate.
The comparison they do in the article has all the earmarks of just this. Cheaper production technique here, cheaper raw material there. Sure, the initial run they sent back to the US for proof was fine.. But six months down the line..
Ultimately outsourcing is about cost cutting, and when you cut costs you're going to cut quality. I'm sure you can make a wrench in China that's every bit as good as it's American made counterpart.. But after you've spent the extra money on QC to make sure it's up to standards it will probably end up costing the same. Or more.
Ok so I am British and I do have some "Made in USA" tools, a Metrinch socket set and spanners, but frankly I prefer quality German tools. You pay a bit more but you get reliable quality.
I spent a number of years working in the plumbing industry. There were a lot of imports (more Korean in those days than Chinese, but the same principles apply) , and a lot of domestic production, and lots of opportunity to compare.
And the import stuff was all over the place in quality. The good stuff was every bit as good as the US made stuff. The cheap stuff was crap. The difference was in what the importer (the US company, that is) ordered. The difference in manufacturing is that the Korean factories had a lower level of quality they were willing to produce than their US counterparts, so they had a lower price. The importers, as often as not, had no clue what the difference was between a $1 pipe fitting and a $10 pipe fitting, so they ordered the cheap one. But if you ordered the good stuff, it was top quality. And top price, because it took just as many man hours to make in Korea as it did in the US. The man hours were cheaper, sure, but then you had to pay to ship it here, so it evened out. The top quality was about the same price, no matter where it was made.
The failure wasn't a disconnect between the designers and the factory, the failure was between US management and the real world.
This is a red herring, China typically sends the cheapest crap to its foreign markets to maximize its profits whereas its best tools are kept for home import use. Labor is the same way when it's a foreign company building something in China.
The US is very similar whereas the Europeans are quite opposite that they send their best exports to their foreign markets just look at the car industry.
A lot of people make the argument that you canâ(TM)t go wrong buying a tool made in USA, Germany, Japan, Switzerland, etc. They swear that any Chinese tool will be garbage and itâ(TM)s not worth purchasing them. Now, any discerning mind will say, âoeWait a minute, why? China has a huge economy, experienced people, and the ability to use all the scary chemicals that make the best steel. Why would their tools be any better or worse than ours?â Itâ(TM)s a very valid argument.
Seriously, has this man been in a coma for the last 10 years? The reputation of Chinese products has a serious quality problem. Don't ask me - ask Chinese people, who buy foreign whenever they can. I'm just baffled at this open-mouthed naivety. WTF?
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I have been turning wrenches for over 30 years. ASE certified Master Auto Technician with a BA in Applied Automotive Technologies. I do not buy Kobalt @ Lowes. I do not buy Husky @ Home Depot. The lowest I go is Craftsman @ Sears. There are some name brands that I buy because like the article says, the original manufacturer had personal input and desired a certain outcome. An example is Channel-Lock. They make the best adjustable slip joint pliers. Some times I do go to Harbor-Freight. To buy Channel-Lock pliers.
My company makes some great components in China -- it's not who is making it, it is how it is designed, and making sure that the end-product is as designed.
You can't blame Chinese manufacturing for design details which allow incredibly open tolerances on what should be precision-fit components.
From a comment at TFA -
"Another thing that can give an idea of the scale of corruption in China. If you haven’t seen them, I highly recommend you look up the Chinese “ghost cities”, and be amazed. Entire cities – including upscale homes, apartments, malls, business complexes. Built only because government grants covering the cost of construction were available to developers. But they weren’t needed, there’s no one to actually occupy them (or perhaps no one who can afford to do so), and many are now crumbling due to disuse and neglect."
Because the highest value in socialism is politics and LOOKING like you're doing something... not making sure you make best use of your resources.
At least with capitalism there's feedback in the system so that when resources do get excessively wasted somebody can actually get in there, make more efficient use of them and... eat your lunch.
If you are adjusting packing glands on pumps or valves, it's fine. If, on the other hand you need torque, use the proper wrench. I have seen too much damage to bolts and nuts due to " adjustable wrenches ". The proper tool for the proper job. If you are too cheap or too lazy to use the proper tool, you get what you pay for.
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
Tools are judged by their ability to do the job repeatedly and without fail. To achieve this, only the best of design and manufacturing will do
Utter rubbish - it sounds like "reassuringly expensive" - an amusing phrase when applied to lager (beer), but trite in the real world. Tools are judged on their ability to get the job done. Most normal people are origin-blind. They don't, nor should, care where a tool, device, object was made or sold from. Just so long as it's fit for purpose and cost-effective.
As for buy .... <name of country> this is little more than subsidising inefficient or lazy production and fooling yourself that you're a "patriot". Great if you a re a politician - who's main job is to fool the gullible and ill-informed. But for most people it's irrelevant. There are factors that come into play: support, warranty and spares. However, buying from a local producer is no guarantee that you'll get any of those and the internet makes everywhere as accessible as they choose to be, Buying from a known and trusted brand should be sufficient but since so much of the population just looks at the price, even brand recognition counts for little - and supplies the same - in these days of disposability.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
The lowest I go is Craftsman @ Sears.
Well, Sears is circling the bowl, and Harbor Freight's polished wrenches are the same price as Sears' rough cheap ones, and have the same warranty. I like HF's socket sets more too, that colored coating may not last forever but it's fun while it does.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"you can’t go wrong buying a tool made in USA, Germany, Japan, Switzerland..."
Germany and japan for sure, heck even some korean but it's been decades that USA has produced anything that can be called "quality." Guitars ,cars, tools,toys...but nowadays quality is associated with other countries....
Besides if you pay crap, you get crap. Cheap and high quality, haha I don't think so. Chinese can produce quality, but quality costs, and most stores and companies want high margins, not durable wares. Greedy capitalism is screwing us all, not some evil-commie-chinese boogiemen.
If we import Chinese tools en masse because these can be cheaper, then these will be cheaper. Making tools is highly automated. A minimum investment in a better factory line, and you get better quality.
Many tools by European or us companies are made in China with the same quality as in Europe or US. There is no incentive of the "Made in China" no name tool makers to invest to make better tools, since buying European or western brands, but made in China with good quality is ok for the Chinese.
I remember such shit being said about China a decade ago "only the cheap electronics comes from there", but in reality this is not about competence, motivation or skill, but about market segments and trade.
Snap-On tools are top of the line, but they rape your wallet. I did buy a lot of Snap-On tools, but a trip to Sears once in a while for a large Craftsman wrench and screwdriver set was more cost effective for the tools that walked away (were borrowed by co-workers).
I have been turning wrenches for over 30 years. ASE certified Master Auto Technician with a BA in Applied Automotive Technologies. I do not buy Kobalt @ Lowes. I do not buy Husky @ Home Depot. The lowest I go is Craftsman @ Sears. There are some name brands that I buy because like the article says, the original manufacturer had personal input and desired a certain outcome. An example is Channel-Lock. They make the best adjustable slip joint pliers. Some times I do go to Harbor-Freight. To buy Channel-Lock pliers.
The problem is the good stuff is harder to find. I have a number of 30+ old Snap On, Mac, Craftsman, Sun et. al. tools that I plan to pass on to the third generation to use. I rue the day one of my Craftsman tools breaks and Sears swaps it out for some cheaper made stuff they sell now. One thing about a well made tool, it just feels right when you hold it.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
The Channel-Lok website has the info on why theirs are better: it has to do with the design of the teeth, and that requires a better quality mfr process. So far, they can afford to stay in rural PA to do mfr.
Of course, they're family owned company, so they aren't reporting to Wall Street on their quarterly returns.
Channel-Lok is a special case. They're family owned, over several generations (which is a quite a feat in itself) so they're not beholden to the latest quarterly returns. They just have to stay in business and do enough to pay the owners their salaries. I don't think there's many mansions in Meadville, PA.
American shit quality stuff is just as shit as Chinese shit quality stuff. The argument that U.S tools are better than other tools has never held up. It's like going into the Dollar-store and complaning that the stuff is cheap. You get what you pay for, no matter where it was made.
Not necessarily. If a tool is cheap enough, it becomes essentially disposable. Many things that used to be expensive and require expensive repairs are now simply thrown away when they are worn or obsolete.
Snap On Industrial owns Bahco, Williams, CDI. Apex Tool Group owns just about everyone else (Weller, Wiss, Sata, Nicholson, Cleco, Armstrong, Crescent, Gearwrench, Dotco, Lufkin, Allen, et al). A lot of those brands are made overseas in countries like China, India, Israel and more. My point being, you just don't know what you're getting unless you can put your hands on it and understand manufacturing & quality control. Unfortunately, most people don't. I believe this because I work in the industrial distribution business. I sell hand tools, metal cutting & forming tools and QC tools(including fixed-limit gaging). I sell from over 1500 different vendors. Some of the tools I see, and sell, are cheaply made. But most of those are for the consumer market. You truly get what you pay for these days no matter where they're made.
I think the term the author of the article is looking for is 'design criteria'.
I rarely post two responses to the same Slashdot article, but I've read everybody else's responses and nobody has yet mentioned the value of his or her time.
When buying the cheapest product, too many people do not factor in the value of their time.
Let's say that I buy a $10 tool instead of a $50 tool. If the $10 tool breaks, then I will probably waste a minimum of an hour of my time replacing it, not to mention wear and tear on my vehicle. To me an hour of my time is worth more than $40. Saving anything less than $50 on a tool that has the possibility of malfunctioning is a losing proposition.
Get yourself the best tool, and save yourself the grief of wasting your valuable time.
Additionally, nobody has mentioned the value of his or her physical or mental health. When a tool malfunctions, it takes a toll on you. Maybe the tool will only injure you slightly, but was it worth it? Stress hormones in your brain shorten your lifespan, so why make it hard on yourself by making your work more stressful due to malfunctioning tools? We are not machines with replaceable parts. We are fragile humans, physically and mentally.
When I buy a tool, I want that tool to last. A good set of tools can be passed to the next generation. My family owned a hardware store. We sold this stuff everyday. A quality tool had a premium price point.
However, we have all been conditioned to go the cheapest route possible. No one wants to pay for a quality product anymore. It's all about price. And companies are outsourcing to meet consumer demand. So, now, I just buy the same tool over and over as the import crap breaks. Ultimately paying more than just buying the good stuff once.
I personally refuse to buy made in china due to the expectation of low quality crappy product. I will only buy Made in USA when ever it's possible for hand tools.
But people are too cheap to pay for quality.
Buy a real tool, keep it forever.
Whenever I am at the local home center, I check out the discount pile. One day I saw a bunch of Crescent adjustable wrenches being sold for 1/2 to 1/3 value, and they all said "Made in the U.S.A." on them. At that moment I knew they were going to be replaced by foreign made versions, so I picked up a few for my collection.
"Gee, I sure wish the US would quit dicking around, bite the bullet and go metric. We can build good stuff, but we’re pissing into the wind by sticking with the imperial measurements, when the entire world uses metric."
First prize for Mr. Argraiv for being rational in a subject everyone is a dick:
I just saw a satellite description by NASA with height in meters (great) and weight in pounds... (how much is that in VW Bugs?)
Every time someone claims the US uses metric in scientific endeavors, I go "Oh, really?"...
In almost every case I've found that tools made overseas (especially from China) are simply cheaper, less precise, and of a lower quality than the ones made in the US.
Sockets, ratchets, screwdrivers, wrenches, drill bits, calipers, hex keys, etc etc etc, the fact is that the Chinese versions are basically shit.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
when they're probably all owned by the same 50 or 60 people? I mean, you're stuck buying the tool anyway, and a cheap tool breaks and has to be replaced.
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anywhere it's been tried. What you were probably thinking of is the many, many Fascist Dictatorships that happened to use Karl Marx's books for rhetoric (Russia, China, North Korea, etc). Democratic Socialism works just fine, thank you very much.
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I recently bought some very expensive Armstrong (made in USA) ignition wrenches, hoping I'd get some very precisely formed tools. They were crap. Now days, Tekton tools are better quality than most consumer-grade tools.
I go through quite an ordeal to find quality tools for reasonable prices. For screwdrivers, its German made Wiha. For wrenches, sockets, and some other things, Tekton has taken the limelight.
For a .0005in resolution dial test indicator, I tried a Chinese one. It was crap. So I bought a second B&S BesTest on Ebay and got a good one.
Electronic pliers: Tronex (the very best there is), Erem, Xuron. Even the German brands have become crap now: CK and Xcelite. Larger wire cutting pliers by Swanstrom are very nice.
I just opted to not buy another set of cheap needle files, and instead bought a $70 set of Grobet/Teborg ones. Very worth it!
I tried an economy model Mitutoyo caliper to have a 2nd pair in addition to my good Mitutoyo calipers. It was crap. Now iGaging makes calipers for $40-$60 that are as repeatable and solid as good Mitutoyo. Maybe I won't trust them when .0005-.001 accuracy really matters, but for routine measures, they are great.
A popular assignment to set students was to give them a reasonable quality tool and a poor quality tool to destructively test and compare. In some situations good enough gets the job done and in others a poor quality tool is not going to last as long or sometimes even do the job at all.
Yes, they could be doing all the tests in first year, but by second year they can get some understanding of why and which tests to select without being told.
" This includes things like "crimes of omission", where they will actively seek to work around the spec and poke holes where the inspectors may not be looking or may not have even thought to look. "
That is not a crime of omission it is a wqay to make a tool cheaper which is still up to the original spec. Everybody does it even in the US. Those who don't will offer the same spec for a higher price and same quality perceived and will therefor disappear by getting less of the market. This is especially visible in non tangible good like service and software. You spare where you can , getting cheaper, if only to bring more in for your shareholder. Anybody pretending this does not happen in the US (or EU or...) is fooling themselves.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
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visit randi.org
That would be the Gripping Hand.
I paid good money for was anything but when it turned out it was made in China.
The if it fails bring it back where I bought it from no questions asked replacement is the only tools you should buy.
Inherited some chrome vanadium King Dick spanners many years ago. They must be 40+ years old by now and still in use. A bit pitted in places, but they'll probably outlast me.
Yes, they do have "KING DICK" stamped on them, though you'll be disappointed to hear it's not huge.
You have the choice of buying a wrench made in the USA and one made in China. Which one should you buy?
Neither. You should buy a German, Swiss or Japanese tool. It will almost certainly be excellent and your money won't go to an evil country.
"80% quality for 50% of the price" has long been the Chinese mantra and it works great for them. The "American" brand are also made in China so while they might be a bit rough around the edges, in general, they are still of comparable quality. Even true "USA made" tools are not worth the money for the average person. They tend to be way more expensive and the extra quality is simply not worth the price difference. If American based companies want to survive they need to learn to compete. They need to lower their prices to the point where the superior quality is worth it. Capitalism in action.
I got tired of buying XL socks only to find they were closer to medium. I finally found some made in the USA - not only do they fit - they are thicker and better made.
I do believe in "good-enough" Some imports are good enough - but cheap tools that break can also be more expensive when you add in the cost of repeated replacements.
I have found that Japanese and Taiwan machine tools tend to be of very high quality - compared to the China stuff.
Also - be aware that the safety features of imported machines can be missing - providing nightmares of law suites.
You have the choice of buying a wrench made in the USA and one made in China. Which one should you buy?
Obviously neither. I would by a german one or if not available one from Switzerland. Sweden steel should be good, too. At least it once was.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
yeah when your ETH port was loose on those, IT WAS NEVER BECAUSE YOU TRIPPED OVER THE CORD- it NEVER WORKED, not even once!!!
of course it did, when you got it. THEN you tripped over the cord, or your kid did, and YOU BLAMED APPLE.idiot.