Uncle Tony and the problem with aftermarket parts...

[Ace-Garageguy]

 

[RSchnell]

I'm glad I'm retired from the restoration business. If the deal goes down that I'm trying to work on a couple cars, those will be the very last cars I build for myself or anyone else. The things Tony talks about in this video are 80% the reason why I'm glad to be out of it. You think bad repro parts are a hassle for newer stuff? Try some of the C1 Corvette & early Ford reproduction parts that is currently or used to be on the market. Most of it should have been driven right across the scale and not sold to anyone. A lot of times I ended up having to make parts which added heavily to the bill, but what else are you going to do?

[Ace-Garageguy]

52 minutes ago, RSchnell said:

I'm glad I'm retired from the restoration business. If the deal goes down that I'm trying to work on a couple cars, those will be the very last cars I build for myself or anyone else. The things Tony talks about in this video are 80% the reason why I'm glad to be out of it. You think bad repro parts are a hassle for newer stuff? Try some of the C1 Corvette & early Ford reproduction parts that is currently or used to be on the market. Most of it should have been driven right across the scale and not sold to anyone. A lot of times I ended up having to make parts which added heavily to the bill, but what else are you going to do?

Yup. I'm finishing up my last two client builds, but I'll still be building my own cars, mostly the old way, with OEM junkyard bits or quality NOS parts I've been collecting for decades.

It's sad that most people not in the business realize...or will even listen when you try to tell them...how so much has gone downhill since the offshoring of everything began, for nothing but a quick buck and expediency, and that there's little to no quality-control before all this garbage is sent to market.

There still IS quality out there, but it's always hit-or-miss whenever you buy anything you're not intimately familiar with, and a product that was decent last year may have been re-sourced this year, and may now be 3rd rate trash. Having to constantly re-engineer defective parts, or find some other way to cope, has taken the satisfaction and much of the profit out of the profession and caused pricing for quality, reliable repairs to skyrocket.

I buy OEM parts if at all possible, but that's not always an option, particularly as the remaining stashes of NOS parts are almost entirely gone.

And there's nothing to blame but short-sighted American corporate policy and price-first prioritization on the part of consumers.

So they all got exactly what they set themselves up for...shiny and cheap and useless.

And most people have no clue, nor do they care.

Edited April 29 by Ace-Garageguy
CLARITY

[Scott8950]

A few years back i got a hard lesson on this. I was working on a chevy  blazer needing a fuel pump. The gm pump was $390 and a Chinese pump was $90 the people i was fixing it for didn't have much money so we got the $90 Chinese pump. Long story short the Chinese pump lasted 4 months so they ordered another Chinese pump and i swapped it out and it lasted 5 months before dying.  I went and bought the gm pump and its been in the car 7 years now trouble free. 

I won't work on anything using Chinese parts anymore it's just not worth the headache and it cost more in the long run.

I watch Tony's videos  but i actually was a fan of his in the 80s during the 5.0 mustang craze.

Edited April 29 by Scott8950

[1972coronet]

21 hours ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

And there's nothing to blame but short-sighted American corporate policy and price-first prioritization on the part of consumers.

AMEN ! I remember when the offshoring spread like a rash in the 1990s ad sequitur. 

Oftentimes, there isn't much a of a price variation between the subpar garbage that's made in... well... not in the U.S. (or England, Germany, Japan, etc.) ; and in too many instances, the stuff made in China, etc., is the only option (!!). This is especially true of replacement items / parts for vehicles (brake rotors ? Guess where those are made... not to mention the frictions !).

21 hours ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

It's sad that most people not in the business realize...or will even listen when you try to tell them...how so much has gone downhill since the offshoring of everything began, for nothing but a quick buck and expediency, and that there's little to no quality-control before all this garbage is sent to market.

Not to mention the TKO's (Taiwanese Knock Offs) of legitimate car parts, shaving equipment, and patio furniture.

[MeatMan]

And it doesn't end with mechanical parts either!
I had a 2005 Chevy Equinox that got tapped on the side by someone in a hurry to leave Starbucks.
Long story short, the dealership replaced my rear passenger door with an aftermarket piece since that's the only thing Nationwide would approve. Two years later it started rusting while none of the factory doors even had surface rust. Even though I kept the car clean that  door rusted. It was probably compromised since day one.

[Mike 1017]

My brother favorite part is the Chevy fuel pump a with nylon stocking material for the filter. After a while it starts to break down and gets sucked into the fuel line.

Mike

[Ace-Garageguy]

5 hours ago, MeatMan said:

...Long story short, the dealership replaced my rear passenger door with an aftermarket piece since that's the only thing Nationwide would approve. Two years later it started rusting while none of the factory doors even had surface rust. Even though I kept the car clean that  door rusted. It was probably compromised since day one.

While much aftermarket sheetmetal and other body parts (like lighting assemblies) aren't up to spec in material or fit or function, though the insurers insist they are, that sounds more like an installation/finish issue than a bad part.

If it's rusting where the skin is rolled over the frame, the repair shop probably neglected to seam-seal it properly prior to paint, and moisture trapped inside is having its inevitable way...or, the primer/paint on the edge of the roll is simply too thin to provide adequate protection.

Both of those are common problems I see constantly on fairly recently-repaired vehicles...as is paint blistering and flaking with subsequent rust, or early clearcoat failure.

The fact is that even the worst aftermarket steel part will be adequately rust-resistant IF it's prepped and painted correctly.

Still...poor quality shop work is another hallmark of the industry now, with insurers skinning every last dime out of every repair, shop managers who push every job through as fast as possible at the cost of quality, and techs who will cut every corner to get more billable hours in every week.

The body shop I contract with to do their last-ever hot-rod build is family owned, the second-generation actually in the shop doing the crash work right, and they've built their reputation for quality first over decades. The manager will fight insurers to get paid exactly what every job is worth, and sends the ones who are just too cheap on down the road.

And we never have a shortage of work...ever...so anyone who blames "the system" and insists that you HAVE to cut corners just to get by these days is simply full-of-it.

EDIT: Actually, our biggest problem recently has been getting OEM parts from dealerships for current-production or quite new (3-4 years old) vehicles, and is one of the many reasons the owner is working towards closing the doors soon, selling the property, and retiring early.

Atlas is shrugging, and not just in the car biz.

 

 

Edited April 30 by Ace-Garageguy

[TECHMAN]

I  "baby-set" a chain of auto parts stores from 1979 until we sold them out in 1992.  Those years were pure joy to go to work, and with each transaction, you took care of the customer and SOLVED his problems.   I went back into the parts market again in 2008 until retirement in 2018.  HOW THINGS CHANGED!!!!!   The "quality" of the parts was like rolling the dice.....   OEM parts were even BLAH_BLAH_BLAH_BLAH in many cases.  IE:  One of the fuel pumps (mechanical) that I had sold for YEARS to different customers with "mild" small blocks for street/strip use, would barely put up 3 pounds of pressure now, where the earlier ones would put up 5-6 pounds out of the box, and the arm on these "newer" replacement pumps would have a half inch of play, which meant that the lobe on the cam for the fuel pump was lucky to even wiggle the arm on the fuel pump.....    The last ten years were NOT MUCH FUN, you "defected out" SO MANY parts,  and the folks that once "trusted you" to solve their issues lost faith in you and your products.   Simple truth

Edited April 30 by TECHMAN
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