American made stuff

[KennyV]

Too many folks are wanting to blame someone else for what is happening around them...
It is natural to look for a simple explanation for things... there are no simple explanations for any complex situations.

China, like every other country can and does make some outstanding products... Every country, including these United States can make Junk... I know, I've seen it...
The company that specs the components & overseas the quality control, is ultimately to blame for shoddy equipment...
We have members here at LMF from China... and they are faced with the same type problems we have... Everyone is trying to get the best for the chore at hand... This is already the end of 2011... everyone will have to realize we are in a World economic environment...
A labor force can NOT demand higher pay... just because the cost of living is going up...
People will have to produce More labor or live WITHIN their means...

The only way to make it appear, that you can afford to buy a high quality item, when you can't .... is to make that item cheaper... and after a while the item will be as cheapened as it can get... At that point no one will be happy with it... Not the manufacturer, not the distributor & definitely not the consumer...
It will take a while, but eventually we will have to "live within our means" and spend a LOT more of our 'leisure' time researching the true value of our necessary purchases...
Fortunately ... We have LMF... :smile:KennyV

 

[reynoldston]

Sorry for all you Chevy guys, but Chevrolet is getting worse with domestic parts year after year. Also a Chevy Malibu is not one of the higher end ones, its more of a consumer car

Don't know what a consumer car is but I know the Chevrolet Malibu is a good car for the parts stores and repair shops they just make all kinds of money off from them.

 

[SONOFADOCKER]

Working a shop that sells and services all power machines - the new stuff is junk and 50% we have to modify the builders design . Cheap fatigued metal in ten hours of use . Broken cables ends in the first use . Crankshaft and valve specs way off .
When a Pre 1990 machine comes into the shop the owner is told to keep it running at all costs .
Our $2800.00 lawn tractors have steering failures , PTO failures and hydraulic failures after a few uses . Serious electric issues - MICE eat wires and all the new stuff does not have the simple Pre 1990 easy to patch systems.
Who really makes who machine - the companies keep getting bought by other companies .
Real shame !

 

[motorrefurb]

I remember working on this realllllly old snowblower that was extremely sturdy and it was made here. And by consumer car I mean commuter or economy car. We all have to cut the white collar jobs and start getting blue collar :confused2:

 

[ChuckT]

(I am most definitely not a member of the xyz party or any other select group, 'cept maybe Curmudgeons anonymous.):laughing:

I think I have heard this argument advanced, first time, back in the fifties. I think it glosses over 2 important facts.

1) - foreign made = (means) exotic and therefore confers "status" to the possessor. This is probably a direct result of the Protestant Work Ethic and the American way of life.

2) - the price of consumer goods whether it is food for our tables or mowers for are lawns is inflated more by profit margin than we are willing to acknowledge. If you take the price of whatever item you want to purchase and divide it by 2 (halving it) you got the true cost of that object to the local merchant, divide it by half again (1/4) and that's the price to the distributer, half again (1/8) is the price of to the buying agent. Somewhere past this - two steps? three? you've got the original cost of manufacturing.

So simplifying the 'food chain" will drop the consumer's out-of-pocket cost? Sorry Bunky but that doesn't happen. The difference goes into the pocket of whatever step simplifies the chain. Why? Because there no real reason to change the price.

If we can - we need to refine and redefine ourselves as a society with real values and real goals and sadly I do not see that happening.

I hope all of you get to read this, it is long, but very important.

This land of the free has turned into a land of people who are controlled by foreign made products which lack desired quality, making us not so free.

We do not have it in our character anymore and have zero pride to defend what was once great in the USA. What a joke, yeh, Americans standing up and boycotting Chinese or Japanse products.

 

[Mini Motors]

I would somewhat disagree with your first point, Chuck. I think it used to mean exotic. "Imported" used to stand for more than it does today. And I think the Japanese auto industry did a lot to hurt that. The early Japanese cars were cheap, unsafe cars. They may have had decent engines, but would fold up quickly in a crash with/ or compared to, heavy American cars.

 

[Mtn.Mike]

I have owned both John Deere and Cub Cadet products over the years. I bought my John Deere 2305 CUT from a small dealer in Central NY state.
I then found out that this dealer wasn't selling enough product for John Deere so they took away his franchise.
When a large American company can do this to a dealer who had been selling John Deere for over 60 years what does that say about "made in America"?.
I wrote to John Deere voicing my displeasure at the above and never received a response
Incidentally the engine was a Yanmar diesel made in Japan.
I still have the John Deere and a Cub Cadet commercial mower and have nothing but good to say about both machines.

Mike

 

[motorrefurb]

Mike, that's the deal with our products, they are high quality, but no where to be found.

Chuck, that's a great way to put it. There are so many different parts of the cost you dissect it so much until you find the tiny actual price to manufacture it. Foreign countries are smart about this and don't do all the middleman stuff, so the price is basically labor, shipping, and the cheap metals that they use to make it.

I am sickened by big box stores more and more. People are carrying around these massive boxes that, yeah they look nice, but get ready for that to break and then deal with the stress. Most or all leather couches and furniture in those stores are made in China or Taiwan. Most of the people who buy these are these people with a bunch of little kids. Yeah, of course they don't care if its made foreign, they are probably the whitest collar people around who don't know what a anvil is. This is getting sickening day after day............ Once I get rich I will fix this problem. Who has ideas for me to get rich !!!!???? :biggrin::biggrin::biggrin::biggrin:

 

[Sammy the Red]

............ But back to subject, someone please! Make a company that makes domestic lawn equipment!

What cheappie mowers are you looking at ?

I think that there are more domestic lawn mower manufacturers in the US of A than any other country...... But, I could be wrong...... Just my 3 cents worth.

 

[KennyV]

I think that there are more domestic lawn mower manufacturers in the US of A than any other country...... But, I could be wrong...

There are a lot manufactured here in Kansas... :smile:KennyV