Technical Top Brand Names Gone to $Hit

Gotta rant a little. Bought some Timken parts to replace some seals and bearings on a vehicle. Two months later, the inside of my wheel is soaked in oil and I have one hell of a puddle in the driveway! I'm not gonna talk about the vehicle because it's far from being HAMB material. What ever happened to American name parts being top tier?! Anyone else had to quit being a customer for life due to poor quality made parts? I don't feel like arguing with Timken trying to get a refund! Several of my go to brands have had to change because of this! I'm not alone am I?

 

American made used to mean something, not so much these days.

 

Craftsman the first that came to my mind. Sad, I grew up with my dads craftsman and would have been a proud life time customer but they just have gone too downhill for me last 15 years or so.

 

Not to play devils advocate .

parts installed correctly ?
Correct fluid ?
Seal packed with Vaseline or other light grease so not run dry ?
Housing parts assembled in good ? Not scored ? Free of damage ?
Everything clean ?
Were you hungry when doing the job ?


Not trying to be or sound like a dick as I am 100-% behind you that parts and quality of said parts have been getting shittier and shittier year over year .

it’s completely infuriating when you can get something as simple as seals and bearings as in your case , simple tune up parts etc etc without second guessing yourself after the job goes to shit .

hence why I asked you the questions up above .


I go through it daily at work with my shop and road techs . They spend the time doing the job only for it to fail in short time .
We go through all the questions I listed above , feel like shit as if we automatically screwed something up .

only to take it apart and find some BS part that failed .

customer don’t care he’s screaming for warranty , which we have to honour . We go back to our supplier for compensation . They say ? Sure we’ll credit you the $8.95 for the seal .

thanks man what about the 20 hours labour I’m out doing the job over ? Plus the pissed off customer ?


Sorry man I get so friggin angry at crappy parts .

 

I almost cried when I saw my first Craftsman tool not made in the US! They're not the same tool. Sane with Husky and Stanley.

 

I did everything right. It's annoying I have to do this all over again. Not the first time either. Had to stop buying NAPA brand parts because they went to pot a few years ago.

 

Love the customer that seems to think the part's warranty covers labor! I experience it with my side job and my day time job as a HVAC man. I always take my time and double check everything. Doing it has saved me more than I paid for

 

40 years ago when they started selling Japanese wrenches?

 

But it does !! Up here is as a service provider if your sell parts and labour as a service you HAVE to warranty the entire job for a minimum of 90 days .

BS!!!

the only supplier that cover labour on warranty is my engine guy IF there’s an issue he either sends out one of his guys to correct it or pays me a bit higher then my techs rate to do the repair . im still out the “lost potential “ on my tech earning pay on the hours doing warranty but at least his loaded costs are covered .

shit part is in 11 years I’ve been using this builder I may have needed warranty 3 times . Screw him for having the best warranty coverage , and being so good at what he does I can’t take advantage of it

 

Thought they started Chinese made in the 90's?

 

And I learned early on US made and US assembled are two very different things.

 

I'm going out on a limb and say that all too often the bean counters in the company have far more control over things than the qualty control department. The ability to make quality products is still out there but the concept of profit margin winning out over quality is what we face. On the other hand it may be that something in the mix that made the older seals so good is no longer available or allowed. Like a lot of other things automotive, some of that stuff we used 50 years ago isn't around because it presented too many health hazards.

 

I've got a set of cheap wrenches my dad bought probably around 1977 or 78 at a farm store. Some no name I've never heard before but he bought them because they had been made in the USA.

I have them today and never broken 1 and between me and my dad we have abused the crap out of them. They go from 3/8 to 1-1/4 and I'm talking about the old trick of putting the box end on the nut while putting another big wrench of the same name on the other end with my foot against it while holding onto the bumper and pushing with everything I had.

My dad always said back then that "cheap American stuff is still stronger than any import high quality crap" I would say that used to be true but sadly not anymore.

It seems that the only difference is the name and packaging now days.

..

 

A well designed, manufactured, and installed part will not need to be replaced for quite some.
Or....... parts could be made more cheaply, and need to be replaced more frequently.
Which do you think is the best way to make money?

We are mostly responsible for this situation. We have been buying stuff based on cost rather than quality for far too long now. It is very annoying, but welcome to the world we have made for ourselves...........

 

The pioneer imports ( metal ) were 50 years back fromTaiwan,
Not as nice but passable, Today they do better than China.

 

Jims right, it has been at least 40 years. But at least when it started, they either said Craftsman {good stuff} or Sears so you had a choice. But the overall quality really started to fade in the 90s. But same goes with my Snap-on and Mac stuff. Everything is made a lot cheaper and has been for years. I have worked weekends at the local Napa since 2009, and yes, I will admit the quality has gone down, most is built in China. But I have seen the quality of the over places to, and I will stick with Napa. Blame corporate America, if they save a buck a part and make 10 million parts, well you can do the math. I guess we call it free enterprise. But if we still built it here to the old standards, we remember the seal alone would cost you gosh knows how much. Quality or price, that is the question. Larry

 

The only two words you need to know.

I could give example after example of companies, businesses and products sent down the toilet by bean counters.

They don't seem to get anything other than numbers. Really short term numbers. They have NO concept of praticality, human nature or repercussions.

 

Americans love cheap junk, hard to stay in business selling high quality stuff double the price of all other competitors so blame society more than manufacturers. I have a Time magazine from ‘46. It’s interesting looking at the adds with an inflation chart. Something as simple as a crockpot type cooker went for like $20 ‘46 dollars. Something like over $100 in todays. Crazy when now you can buy a crockpot off Amazon for $20 todays money. These numbers are off the top of my head pulled out my ass but the idea is there, you get the point.

 

Here is a link that explains what happened to Timkin. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/07/business/timken-bows-to-investors-and-splits-in-two.html I cant place the original article right now. Timkin was a local business run by the Timkin family. They made bearings and steel. There was a hostile take over and the bean counters split the company. Things got worse when they started making bearings overseas. I believe they bought out an Indian company a few years later. Things just keep going downhill. They are still one of the better bearing companies but if you want made in the USA bearing you have to look on the bearing itself, not the box. I have purchased things in a box that was made in the USA but the contents were not. I go to great lengths to get USA bearings but will live with German, Swiss and even Japanese if I have to.

 

My Stewart Warner Speedometer's odometer stopped at 200 miles, no longer the quality they became famous for.

 

The bit you missed is that the 1946 crockpot probably still works............

 

I agree 100 besides you saying bean counters don’t understand human nature. They understand the average American when they buy something they buy the cheapest dollar amount item that fits their needs so they manufacture to those standards. As sad as it is, American consumers don’t appreciate quality anymore, We live in a disposable society.

 

I bought some new GM front wheel bearings (as in GM branded service parts)...Timken made in Poland.

 

Capitalism. Poorly regulated Capitalism.

A free-market was demanded. These results should have been expected.

It would have been a mistake to expect otherwise.

 

I heard a month or so ago that the Timkin bearing plant in Gaffney,S.C is shutting down . They are moving out of country.

 

I just heard the Titanic just hit an iceberg!! I thought it was un sinkable? AND the prop shafts had, get this, Timken bearings!!!!!! And seals!!!!

 

I went to Florida for my fire pump tech training. On the first day we were touring the plant and as we walked through the area where they stored all of the pump housings, I noticed that they were cast outside the US, in my best union smartass voice i asked why they didn't have their housings cast here, the big guy spun around and informed me that the one time that they did use a foundry in the US, they almost lost their ass due to porosity in the castings causing numerous pump failures, and realized that the lowest bid didn't reflect the best quality, so they switched back to the original foundry outside the US and haven't suffered a casting failure since....

 

I bought some Timkin bearings a couple of weeks go & the box had in small printing on one of the flaps "made in China".

 

Harbor Freight. ……
Walmart ……
We are all guilty.
Cost always drove the US economy.
Today is no different. Other than family owned businesses being next to extinct.

 

I bought ball joints for my 57 from rock auto because they were AC Delco, when they arrived it said made in China on the boxes. I guess they have different levels of quality over there too