Chinese Steel and Mfg

[victor252]

Stumbled upon this today:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...int-pen-all-by-itself/?utm_term=.345eafdbd734

Basically China has not been able to produce smooth ballpoint pens because of their imprecise manufacturing methods.

I don't want to start another "China=****" thread but I thought this was pretty interesting because the Chinese gov't complained 'we seem to make a lot of low quality junk,' and eventually it was addressed.

“In the past, the government praised the big companies that export the most and have the biggest profits,” Huang Xinghua, president of the Platinum Pen company in Shanghai told NPR's Marketplace soon after. “They seldom praise companies that truly make good quality pens.”

 

[6PTsocket]

I wouldn't put to much weight on that. It was probably easier to buy a specialized item than to make it and still turn a fat profit. On the other hand, China makes all the neodinium rare earth magnets. They launch satelites into space, are about to sell cars in the US. They have a new fighter jet that is sending US designers running to the drawing board. The Japanese excel in precision stuff. They supply high speed train wheels all over the world and are the bug guns in optics. The amazing thing is how fast China has upped it's game. They have been dogged by poor steel but I have no doubt they will fix the problem.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

[visionguru]

I think you are reading too much into it. We import lots of things from China. Can we say that USA cannot produce those things?
Same with ball point tips, if there are mass produced tips from Japan/Germany, what's the incentive of making them?

China is a vast country. There are steel companies that have state-of-the-art equipment and manufacturing quality steels. But, their steel industry is way over capacity due to the housing market cooling down. Steel becomes dirt cheap. If you are the company owner, do you want to make high quality steel and sell it cheap, or just make the lowest quality steel to make ends meet?

Economics plays deciding role in quality, not COO.

 

[HanShotFirst]

China is capable of producing pretty much anything they want. They have the ability to machine optics and plutonium for nukes; they can do anything.

The issue is more about market. China tends to not make top tier stuff because people are unwilling to pay for top tier stuff that says Made in China.

High end stuff is not really in their wheelhouse; at least not in the near future.

 

[1982fxr]

Chinese steel has a ****** nose courtesy of India

 

[CobraRed]

China is capable of producing pretty much anything they want. They have the ability to machine optics and plutonium for nukes; they can do anything.

The issue is more about market. China tends to not make top tier stuff because people are unwilling to pay for top tier stuff that says Made in China.

High end stuff is not really in their wheelhouse; at least not in the near future.

Try to get something manufactured from Cromoly or M42 Cobalt in China, i dare ya

Cromoly they have to import from Taiwan. Many years ago the Chinese gov't decided they were going to invest heavily into Chrome Vanadium production and use it in place of CrMo. Now, pretty much zero CroMo is produced in China.

M42 cobalt they have to import from Japan. Same story, they decided M35 was going to be the consumer good because Cobalt is advertised as Cobalt, users don't know of different grades. Thus 0 M42 is produced domestically.

Chinese steel has a ****** nose courtesy of India

Very true

 

[scubadoober]

I find the math in this article a bit suspect. They produce 38 billion pens and were leaving 17.3 million dollars on the table. For one that equates to .00046 per pen in savings. Secondly, let's say that is a 50% savings over the import supplier putting the average cost at less than a tenth of a penny for the import. That means the revenue for the entire ball point pen insert sector is roughly 35 million dollars. C'mon......really? I think they are low balling the savings so they don't have to show it i their final cost. Hence increasing net, or maybe I'm reading into this too much.

 

[anndel]

Most of the time I buy Fisher Space Pens and their refills and Made in USA to boot. Other pens I buy are Sharpies and Milwaukee paint pumpers.

 

[zendriver]

China can build an 80 inch LED HDTV and a passenger train that goes 200MPH, but they can't figure out to make a ball point pen.

 

[Ji m]

On the other hand, China makes all the neodinium rare earth magnets.

^This
is actually a very interesting story that says a lot about how the country of China thinks outside the box.

To the best of my information/recollection:

When China started mining and producing Rare Earth Magnets,
there were several other places in the world mining and producing them.

1) China started selling them at prices no one could match.
if you OWNED a Rare Earth Magnet mine you couldn't pull them out of the ground for what China was selling them for.

2) Once worldwide R.E. Magnet prices dropped.
Eventually all the other RE mines stopped producing them.

3)Logic would say the company/country who cornered the market would now raise the price,
but they didnt!
Price stayed rock bottom.

4)The price of things using RE Magnets dropped as well, and new products started to use RE's as an added feature now that they were so inexpensive.

5)Aaaaand that's when China's RE Magnet sellers cut supply. (but still not price).

They'd promise *** amount, but deliver only **,
or less.
Or none at all.

6)Finally the sales pitch was made:

we can only continously gaurentee delivery of RE's to factories located here in China,
move production of whatever you're making here to China and we will gaurentee a steady flow.
Keep production wherever you have your factory now and plan your manufacturing around a resource that may or may not ever get there.

I know several countries sued China for this under the World Trade Organization,
but I never followed up to see what happened.

 

[Ji m]

China can build an 80 inch LED HDTV and a passenger train that goes 200MPH, but they can't figure out to make a ball point pen.

^a friend from France told me the story how one of their politicians helped himself get re-elected partially based on a deal he brokered for hundreds of million Euros to build ONE bullet train in China built with all the latest French developed cutting edge technologies.......

After that first one,
guess who built all the rest of them?

 

[Ji m]

Try to get something manufactured from Cromoly or M42 Cobalt in China, i dare ya

Cromoly they have to import from Taiwan. Many years ago the Chinese gov't decided they were going to invest heavily into Chrome Vanadium production and use it in place of CrMo. Now, pretty much zero CroMo is produced in China.

M42 cobalt they have to import from Japan. Same story, they decided M35 was going to be the consumer good because Cobalt is advertised as Cobalt, users don't know of different grades. Thus 0 M42 is produced domestically.



Very true

I bought a Billet Crankshaft from China last year.
The motor hasn't been built yet, so I'm still hoping for the best.

It's not for a Ford, Chevy, or Chrysler, so the crank companies here in the USA weren't interested.

 

[dogdog]

Chinese steel has a ****** nose courtesy of India

? From India ? How....

 

[dogdog]

China can build an 80 inch LED HDTV and a passenger train that goes 200MPH, but they can't figure out to make a ball point pen.

I think the article refers to mass production of the precision part of the ballpoint pen, and it is mention in the article that the chinese government in the pass doesn't care about quality, only profit... which is not a lie, they have no reason to invest in producing that part if they can import it cheaper and maintain a business relationship. It does mention that capability was ramped up gearing toward the harsh talk of the then elected US president. You guys do realize this article is back in Jan of 2017 last year right. If you guys remember all the tough gyna talks. It's a dying industry, which they also don't have a strong reason or priority to invest anything in it... who still uses pens to write their stuff, not much?


Also, that is from the Washington post.... I would double question the truth of the contents from them, I think they are known to be one of the extreme end newspapers.... I still remember that story they post about the Chinese SkyNet... LMFAO... and I thought they were building terminators....

 

[dogdog]

^This
is actually a very interesting story that says a lot about how the country of China thinks outside the box.

To the best of my information/recollection:

When China started mining and producing Rare Earth Magnets,
there were several other places in the world mining and producing them.

1) China started selling them at prices no one could match.
if you OWNED a Rare Earth Magnet mine you couldn't pull them out of the ground for what China was selling them for.

2) Once worldwide R.E. Magnet prices dropped.
Eventually all the other RE mines stopped producing them.

3)Logic would say the company/country who cornered the market would now raise the price,
but they didnt!
Price stayed rock bottom.

4)The price of things using RE Magnets dropped as well, and new products started to use RE's as an added feature now that they were so inexpensive.

5)Aaaaand that's when China's RE Magnet sellers cut supply. (but still not price).

They'd promise *** amount, but deliver only **,
or less.
Or none at all.

6)Finally the sales pitch was made:

we can only continously gaurentee delivery of RE's to factories located here in China,
move production of whatever you're making here to China and we will gaurentee a steady flow.
Keep production wherever you have your factory now and plan your manufacturing around a resource that may or may not ever get there.

I know several countries sued China for this under the World Trade Organization,
but I never followed up to see what happened.

They do say governments are the biggest corporation in the world...
Not sure what you are trying to get at.... they used dirty tactics just like any other big corporation to their advantage ? or They raised price after they monopolized the RE industry? I am pretty sure if the other countries are able to mine them cheaper, there is nothing stopping them to topple the China Monopoly. One of those complains we complain about OPEC no?

 

[Ji m]

They do say governments are the biggest corporation in the world...
Not sure what you are trying to get at.... they used dirty tactics just like any other big corporation to their advantage ? or They raised price after they monopolized the RE industry? I am pretty sure if the other countries are able to mine them cheaper, there is nothing stopping them to topple the China Monopoly. One of those complains we complain about OPEC no?

The story was honestly typed up by me for it's value as information only.

The story is really interesting, to the best of my knowledge,
accurate and I hope unbias*.
It helped me understand how their logic works.
They're playing Chess while most of the world plays checkers.




*I did a quick search, and wound up on Wiki (yeah, I know )

Looks like my biggest 'misrepresentation' was the stated reason for China cutting production.
Officially China claims it's export quotas "had environmental protection in mind"



Wiki says:
China
See also: Rare Earths Trade Dispute

These concerns have intensified due to the actions of China, the predominant supplier.[25] Specifically, China has announced regulations on exports and a crackdown on smuggling.[26] On September 1, 2009, China announced plans to reduce its export quota to 35,000 tons per year in 2010–2015 to conserve scarce resources and protect the environment.[27] On October 19, 2010, China Daily, citing an unnamed Ministry of Commerce official, reported that China will "further reduce quotas for rare[-]earth exports by 30 percent at most next year to protect the precious metals from over-exploitation".[28] The government in Beijing further increased its control by forcing smaller, independent miners to merge into state-owned corporations or face closure. At the end of 2010, China announced that the first round of export quotas in 2011 for rare earths would be 14,446 tons, which was a 35% decrease from the previous first round of quotas in 2010.[29] China announced further export quotas on 14 July 2011 for the second half of the year with total allocation at 30,184 tons with total production capped at 93,800 tonnes.[30] In September 2011, China announced the halt in production of three of its eight major rare-earth mines, responsible for almost 40% of China's total rare-earth production.[31] In March 2012, the US, EU, and Japan confronted China at WTO about these export and production restrictions. China responded with claims that the restrictions had environmental protection in mind.[32] In August 2012, China announced a further 20% reduction in production.[33] These restrictions have damaged industries in other countries and forced producers of rare-earth products to relocate their operations to China.[32] The Chinese restrictions on supply failed in 2012, as prices dropped in response to the opening of other sources.[34] The price of dysprosium oxide was 994 USD/kg in 2011, but dropped to 265 USD/kg by 2014.[35]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare-earth_element

 

[mowkep]

I'm pretty sure all of the magnesium tooling plate we use....is imported from China

 

[PMD1966]

I read a book last year titled "Made in China---Poorly". Written by a middleman who worked with American buyers and Chinese factories. The author spoke fluent Chinese and still had some interesting things to say about Chinese manufacturing practices.

 

[dogdog]

The story was honestly typed up by me for it's value as information only.

The story is really interesting, to the best of my knowledge,
accurate and I hope unbias*.
It helped me understand how their logic works.
They're playing Chess while most of the world plays checkers.




*I did a quick search, and wound up on Wiki (yeah, I know )

Looks like my biggest 'misrepresentation' was the stated reason for China cutting production.
Officially China claims it's export quotas "had environmental protection in mind"



Wiki says:
China
See also: Rare Earths Trade Dispute

These concerns have intensified due to the actions of China, the predominant supplier.[25] Specifically, China has announced regulations on exports and a crackdown on smuggling.[26] On September 1, 2009, China announced plans to reduce its export quota to 35,000 tons per year in 2010–2015 to conserve scarce resources and protect the environment.[27] On October 19, 2010, China Daily, citing an unnamed Ministry of Commerce official, reported that China will "further reduce quotas for rare[-]earth exports by 30 percent at most next year to protect the precious metals from over-exploitation".[28] The government in Beijing further increased its control by forcing smaller, independent miners to merge into state-owned corporations or face closure. At the end of 2010, China announced that the first round of export quotas in 2011 for rare earths would be 14,446 tons, which was a 35% decrease from the previous first round of quotas in 2010.[29] China announced further export quotas on 14 July 2011 for the second half of the year with total allocation at 30,184 tons with total production capped at 93,800 tonnes.[30] In September 2011, China announced the halt in production of three of its eight major rare-earth mines, responsible for almost 40% of China's total rare-earth production.[31] In March 2012, the US, EU, and Japan confronted China at WTO about these export and production restrictions. China responded with claims that the restrictions had environmental protection in mind.[32] In August 2012, China announced a further 20% reduction in production.[33] These restrictions have damaged industries in other countries and forced producers of rare-earth products to relocate their operations to China.[32] The Chinese restrictions on supply failed in 2012, as prices dropped in response to the opening of other sources.[34] The price of dysprosium oxide was 994 USD/kg in 2011, but dropped to 265 USD/kg by 2014.[35]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare-earth_element

Not to talk or take it too much into politics.
If I remember correctly there is a backstory to this.... regarding the Japanese backed by the US on some dispute in the south china sea over the rights of fishing ....and some dumb island.....and the incident started with the Japanese arrested some Chinese fishermen in that area....

 

[aafadca]

^a friend from France told me the story how one of their politicians helped himself get re-elected partially based on a deal he brokered for hundreds of million Euros to build ONE bullet train in China built with all the latest French developed cutting edge technologies.......

After that first one,
guess who built all the rest of them?

That's EXACTLY how they've been operating for years! If you wanted to do business there you had to play by the government rules. Which usually meant giving up patent/intellectual rights etc., knowingly or not. Then the Chinese will copy/produce products from around the world....without having the R&D expense. Very shrewd actually. Some American companies are so greedy they don't care about the consequences or future. They could make a decent profit building things here but then their bonuses wouldn't be as much. That's why I have no sympathy for them when they start whining. Also it's why I will buy Harbor Freight Chinese before I pay 3-4 times more for for the EXACT same product under an American brand name.

 

[Schurkey]

Most of the time I buy Fisher Space Pens and their refills and Made in USA to boot.

^^^ Winner.

I've got a small mountain of AG7s.

 

[markhm]

I have worked with factories in China and visited 100's of factories there. They were all involved in a form of metalworking. Basically, you get what you pay for. Most customers come to the factories with low-ball price targets. The factories rarely say "no" to a price--they figure out how to cheapen the product and still make money. (That book "Cheaply Made In China" spells it out clearly.) But Chinese can make quality. I am in a unique part of our industry and the items I buy in China are bought because they are the highest quality items available. I work closely with a factory in China that charges +/- 10% of what USA factories charge but the quality of the Chinese factory beats the quality of any of the USA factories. When my workers build a custom built item, they reach first for our Chinese sourced components, because they know the quality will be flawless. You see this in many industries. I just got a new Moto phone. It is from Lenevo in China. Best phone I have owned. But I will not buy Chinese tools unless I have no other options.

 

[shawhite]

I have worked with factories in China and visited 100's of factories there. They were all involved in a form of metalworking. Basically, you get what you pay for. Most customers come to the factories with low-ball price targets. The factories rarely say "no" to a price--they figure out how to cheapen the product and still make money. (That book "Cheaply Made In China" spells it out clearly.) But Chinese can make quality. I am in a unique part of our industry and the items I buy in China are bought because they are the highest quality items available. I work closely with a factory in China that charges +/- 10% of what USA factories charge but the quality of the Chinese factory beats the quality of any of the USA factories. When my workers build a custom built item, they reach first for our Chinese sourced components, because they know the quality will be flawless. You see this in many industries. I just got a new Moto phone. It is from Lenevo in China. Best phone I have owned. But I will not buy Chinese tools unless I have no other options.

Kind of sounds like you are talking out of both sides of your mouth on one hand China makes the best widget at 1/10 the price and their components are flawless but you won’t buy their tools. So they can make said widget but are unable to make decent tools. My limited experience with Chinese production is they are physically capable of making anything to a certain specification but their culture seems to be rooted in high production and increased profits. The items I’ve been involved in having produced usually start out close to there American counterpart but will gradually become inferior due to bad quality control, cut corners or inferior materials being used. All of this is usually to increase production which in turns increased profit. I’m sure if other countries used what amounts to slave labor they could produce products at 1/10 the price too.

 

[Parrothead]

You guys do know the Buick Envision is built in China and imported to the US, right?

 

[nh_yota]

Chinese stuff has a reputation for being cheap because it's supposed to be cheap. US companies don't move production to China because it's fun, they do it to save a buck on manufacturing and maintain or increase their profit margin.

It the not-too-distant past, China was limited to producing junk because they didn't have the means nor the market to produce high-quality things. Now that global manufacturing has shifted in their favor, China is seeing greater investment in technology and many of the innovations that traditionally would have come from the US or Europe are coming from China.

 

[Ji m]

It's a stone cold fact that "ethics" vary greatly from one culture to another.

What could be completely unethical in one place is considered normal in another.

If you are traveling to a far away place to do business you would want to find out what the limits of normal ethical business behavior are considered there.

Then expect the possibility of being treated on the fringes of that "ethical behavior" as a stranger in a strange land.

^this applies to anyone going anywhere,
not meant to single out any one culture, group, peoples, or places.

 

[markhm]

Looks like what I said was misunderstood. When I said "+/- 10% of what USA factories charge" I meant that if my item costs $100 in the US, I pay between $90 and $110 for the same item at the Chinese factory I use and I get the highest quality part available. This is a rare Chinese factory the understands quality and knows that the customers who come to it come for quality. It is clearly the exception.

I wont buy Chinese tools because I know that the companies that source from the tool companies want tools that look similar to USA tools but cost nothing and don't care what it takes to bring the cost down.

 

[dogdog]

It's a stone cold fact that "ethics" vary greatly from one culture to another.

What could be completely unethical in one place is considered normal in another.

If you are traveling to a far away place to do business you would want to find out what the limits of normal ethical business behavior are considered there.

Then expect the possibility of being treated on the fringes of that "ethical behavior" as a stranger in a strange land.

^this applies to anyone going anywhere,
not meant to single out any one culture, group, peoples, or places.

Unfortunate but true...

 

[1982fxr]

? From India ? How....

Just google for some reading. China is falling off while India surges. In steel.

 

[shawhite]

Thank you for clearing that up. Makes perfect sense put like that.

Looks like what I said was misunderstood. When I said "+/- 10% of what USA factories charge" I meant that if my item costs $100 in the US, I pay between $90 and $110 for the same item at the Chinese factory I use and I get the highest quality part available. This is a rare Chinese factory the understands quality and knows that the customers who come to it come for quality. It is clearly the exception.

I wont buy Chinese tools because I know that the companies that source from the tool companies want tools that look similar to USA tools but cost nothing and don't care what it takes to bring the cost down.

 

[dogdog]

Just google for some reading. China is falling off while India surges. In steel.

I did just google...
https://www.google.com/search?q=+China+is+falling+off+while+India+surges.+In+steel

Nothing about the bleeding nose from India. But mostly about their overproduction of steel... and curbing productions.

Not my fav news but it is a link, what it is saying is in-line with the other articles from routers and some Australia news as well.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...elping-american-steel/?utm_term=.c5be1866eb0c

Not that I know how to read all these mumbles...
https://www.trade.gov/steel/countries/pdfs/2017/q2/exports-china.pdf

LMFAO now this GJ post is the top of the search ..........

 

[MacMcMacmac]

Ridgid Pipe Threader :1

China pipe : 0

There was a heat number on it from 2013, and MADE IN CHINA stenciled on it, so someone must have had confidence it it at some point.

 

[Ji m]

Ridgid Pipe Threader :1

China pipe : 0

There was a heat number on it from 2013, and MADE IN CHINA stenciled on it, so someone must have had confidence it it at some point.

Yowza!

I've threaded lots and lots of pipe,
and never ever seen anything like that.

That said,
I also wouldn't power thread anything that wasn't clamped in a vice.

It looks like someone porta-power threaded this (sprinkler pipe?) while it was in place/attached to the system still.

I don't think it would have/could have happened if it was clamped up close to where the threads were being cut.

 

[MacMcMacmac]

Yowza!

I've threaded lots and lots of pipe,
and never ever seen anything like that.

That said,
I also wouldn't power thread anything that wasn't clamped in a vice.

It looks like someone porta-power threaded this (sprinkler pipe?) while it was in place/attached to the system still.

I don't think it would have/could have happened if it was clamped up close to where the threads were being cut.

I was using this:

So it was as well supported during threading as it possibly could have been. Could have held it shorter I suppose, but I still wouldn't expect it to twist open along the seam like that.

 

[xin]

Ridgid Pipe Threader :1

China pipe : 0

There was a heat number on it from 2013, and MADE IN CHINA stenciled on it, so someone must have had confidence it it at some point.

Possibly not heat treated and/or poor quality steel?

 

[driz]

Ridgid Pipe Threader :1



China pipe : 0



There was a heat number on it from 2013, and MADE IN CHINA stenciled on it, so someone must have had confidence it it at some point.

There’s one reason why that Chinese pipe had China written on it in English. That’s because US Customs Import laws demand every county of origin EXCEPT US have to be labeled so the end user can clearly see where it came from. Large industrial shipments don’t always need individual marking for obvious size reasons. One thing for sure though. Every single piece of large structural steel and beams will be.
One of the tricks certain companies use is to ship their China steel to Canada or Mexico then market as Canadian or Mexican. Then the Canadian / Mex company marks Canada / Mexico on the beams and gets it into US free of duty under NAFTA. That went on for years and surely still does. To this day we stupidy let them mark with paint markers instead of casting it permanently into beams like many Canadian foundries do. Very hard to catch and harder to prove fraud there even by chemical analysis considering the amounts involved. Catching that stuff is a never ending game almost always involving China.
Practically everything from that place is sketchy from cat food to vitamins, drugs ,bugs in shipping pallets and packing. The list goes on and on in a never ending tail chase. Since 911 FDA and CBP Agriculture keep them fairly well in line though now that staffing levels and computer programs track shippers. Strangely the Chinese prefer to export the good stuff and peddle the poison to their own, go figure.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Ji m]

I was using this:

So it was as well supported during threading as it possibly could have been. Could have held it shorter I suppose, but I still wouldn't expect it to twist open along the seam like that.

Wow, really?

To twist up along the whole length of pipe like that I'd think the threads would have to get cut on one end of the pipe while it was being held/supported by the opposite end.

I guess I'm missing something about how it was being used
but I take your word on it, and stand corrected.

 

[dogdog]

Dam I want a machine like that.

 

[anetode]

Recent and relevant: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...aluminum-stokes-trade-war-fears-idUSKCN1GD4ZW

Several large tool conglomerates are currently trying to bring manufacturing back to the US by making products under the banner "Made in the US (with imported/global materials/parts)" -- this might set back their plans.

 

[tym]

Recent and relevant: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...aluminum-stokes-trade-war-fears-idUSKCN1GD4ZW

Several large tool conglomerates are currently trying to bring manufacturing back to the US by making products under the banner "Made in the US (with imported/global materials/parts)" -- this might set back their plans.

Get ready for things to get more expensive.

Plus, reciprocal tariffs on Murricuhn goods 'round the globe.