Production company forging material certificates 10

[Jaanos]

Hi Team, I hope everyone is keeping well at the moment.

I have started a small company manufacturing hitch mounted bicycle racks and have had our first production run manufactured in China recently. We looked at sourcing locally but the numbers simply didn't work.

As part of our agreement we stipulated that material certificates would be required for all materials used in production. Half of these were provided when asked and the other half took the last month of chasing to get them. We have 12 and 8mm 6061-T6 plate and both certificates provided are literally identical with all the little marks on the page being in the exact same location, the stamp location is identical, etc. It is obvious one of these has been forged and I am kind of assuming both of them probably have been.

Same story with both of the stainless steel certificates, certain details like thickness, etc have been changed but everything else is literally identical, including the certificate number! We have stressed the importance of the materials being the correct grade as these components will be mounted to motor vehicles so any failure may result in serious injury or death. What do you suggest we do? I'm thinking we will have to send some samples off to get tested? I would like to do this in China before we pay for and have the items shipped + pay import and duty etc but am worried about how to go about doing this and making sure we actually get a representative sample from the factory. Perhaps the sampling company would come and physically select the sample at random from the packaged goods? Any recommendations or idea would be very much appreciated.

 

[ctopher]

My last company they sent products to China. Their (China) material does not meet USA specs. So, we had to ship material to them for mfg. I have seen forged specs there.

ctopher, CSWP
SolidWorks '17
ctophers home
SolidWorks Legion

 

[chicopee]

No one in manufacturing and design should ever trust the Chinese. While the numbers may seem attractive from China, once the forgeries are discovered than the number will be astronomical due to lost rime, production and sales when seeking US firms. It is best to INITIALLY seek US firms for your projects. NEVER NOT TRUST THE CHINESE.

 

[JohnRBaker]

Yes, look at how much Chinese steel had to be replaced when they were refurbishing the Oakland-Bay Bridge in San Francisco a few years back:

https://www.americanmanufacturing.o...inese-made-bay-bridge-continues-to-fall-apart

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
EX-Product 'Evangelist'
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without

 

[BUGGAR]

So long as you mark your product, "made in China", I can avoid purchasing it and I have no problems.

 

[EdStainless]

Jaanos, Unless you factored in the cost of sending your people to China to observe and audit the production you were lying to yourself about the costs.
Ongoing QA is always a cost, in the US it is fairly easy usually. In Taiwan and SK it can be a little tricky, but with a good local agent manageable. In China it means being there yourself, maybe not every time but for the first couple of runs and then often enough so that they know that you care. Actually not too different than some Eastern European sources...

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P.E. Metallurgy

 

[BrianPetersen]

What do you suggest we do?

Choice 1: Don't manufacture anything that matters, in China. No certification of anything that originates in China is to be trusted at face value. Question EVERYthing. To those of us in North America or Europe, we know that the marking "CE" or "CSA" or "UL" or whatever, means that you have to dig into the underlying standards and ensure that the thing that you are applying the marking to, is in compliance with whatever standard applies, and document that you have done so, and only then can you apply the compliance marking. To them, it seems that it means you obtain an ink stamp with those letters on it, and print it where specified.

Choice 2: Make sure they know you are going to do the following, and then do it. Randomly test samples here, especially early on, but don't stop - ever. If they are pretty good, maybe you can make inspections less frequently, but don't ever stop. Document any and all non-compliance. Don't pay for defective product, and send it back, and raise hell with their "certificate" and whoever printed it for them. Make sure they know you are serious and then BE serious about it. It WILL be an ongoing battle. It WILL cost something. It WILL result in missed schedules (because of product that you had to send back and wait for rework ... assuming that your next batch isn't also non-compliant and also have to be sent back). There is a pretty good chance that this will be a painful enough experience that you question why you went down this path.

Choice 3: Have one of your representatives over there, whose full time job it is to ensure that they don't take shortcuts and don't cheat. Visit their test labs. Witness their tests. Document everything. Again, unless you have huge production volume, the cost and aggravation of this will make you question why you made this choice.

I have customers who have a plant in China. They chose option 3, but their production volume is big enough that they can justify it. For building their production equipment, they actually build it all here, to our standards (aside from voltage/frequency), obtain all of the required inspections and certifications here as if it were to operate here, and then ship it over there to run it.

I have had a few customers here (Canada) who bought a piece of production equipment in China with the intent of operating it here. The experience of getting this equipment to conform to our standards has yet to be anything other than painful.

 

[Jboggs]

You just paid your tuition in the school of hard knocks. In my 40 plus years of being in the manufacturing engineering field, I can honestly say that I could count the number of times I have seen ANY involvement of the Chinese in ANY transaction that actually ended up as they promised on one hand. And I would be stretching it at that. Certifications? Sure! How many you want? No problem.

If your equipment fails you get sued. But they know you can't hurt them in any way at all except maybe cancelling your next order. And when you do there's another customer lined up right behind you.

The manufacturer I work for is 1/4 of the size we were three years ago. We make a highly proprietary product here in the USA with technology that has been in development and lab tests for 30 years. There are now at least five plants in China right now making our product with machines that were made from drawings they literally stole from us. It really hurts when you realize that people you work with lost their jobs because machines in China were made from drawings you created.

I have also personally consulted with several inventors over the years, all of whom decided the "made in China" route was the best option for them. Every single one of them regretted ever doing it. If you can't make your product profitably in this country I'd say don't bother looking in China. That won't be profitable either.

I have even found several American "contract manufacturers" that aren't really manufacturing anything here. It's all going to China. Americans answer the phones and do the marketing and emails, but when it gets down to specific details that need technical answers, those answers are obviously coming from China.

 

[TheTick]

Chinese companies cheat on material. It's rare that they don't.

Part of what you pay for domestically is integrity and competence. Apparently you don't value these things enough to price them into your product. So either raise your price or lower your quality. That, or lie and put unsafe product out.

 

[GregLocock]

Jboggs, even if you cancel your next order the product will still be made and sold. But not by you.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376

http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm?

 

[Jboggs]

GregLocock - So true indeed! I told the last guy I consulted with that he better hope he makes his money quick because if it is a successful product the Chinese will steal it and run him out of business. Without even blinking an eye.

 

[EdStainless]

We never gave one Asian supplier enough prints to know what we were making. It was a pain because we had to deal with 4 or 5 different suppliers, but none of them had the assembly prints. And yes to find those 4 or 5 we visited 30-50 shops.
Our president made purchasing cover the cost of engineering and QA support. He knew that there would be a lot of it.

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P.E. Metallurgy

 

[ctopher]

When I was in China several years ago, directly across the street was another building that copied our products. Nothing we can do about it, they didn't care. In our building we held them to certain standards. When I walked over to the other building (the knock-offs), they held to their standards, which was very poor.

ctopher, CSWP
SolidWorks '17
ctophers home
SolidWorks Legion

 

[MacGyverS2000]

Whatever you do, don't tell them why you believe the certificates are false. Stamp in the same place? Next batch will have them scattered. Marks on the page? They'll clean the photocopier platen. It will get more and more difficult to tell if they're lying to you,so don't give them any unnecessary help.

Dan - Owner

http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com

 

[SnTMan]

"Hitch mounted bicycle racks". I'd guess the market is 99.9% Made In China. Unless you have a novel product worth a premium you are likely going to have to join 'em.

Best of luck,

Mike

The problem with sloppy work is that the supply FAR EXCEEDS the demand

 

[rb1957]

conversation from the Chinese supplier (via interpreter) …
I'm sorry I don't understand the problem.
The contract asked for certificates, and certificates were provided.

Oh! you wanted legal certificates. So sorry, we charge more for these …

Oh, and btw, you accepted delivery ('cause you trust in shipping inspection), so pay us.

another day in paradise, or is paradise one day closer ?

 

[cowski]

I guess there is more than 1 way to forge metals...

 

[mfgenggear]

Take one part from each lot and do a spectral analysis and recertify the material.
Check hardness or tensile requirements.

 

[Sparweb]

Two years ago I was invited to tour an aircraft manufacturing plant in China. Small 2-seat trainer types. There were days during my tour where I had trouble keeping my eyes focused because everything I looked at was a miniature "disaster". Fasteners, tools, mechanical systems, everything had problems, big and small. The grinding in the flight control stick turned my stomach. There wasn't a single person on the design who had flown an aircraft, let along licensed to fly one, and most of the design team were fresh out of university ("normal university" if you know the background) who had never designed a structure or mechanism before.

The tour of the factory revealed most standard procedures for handling and curing composite materials were not being followed, including the fuselage mold with a partial lay-up uncured in it parked beside an open shipping door during a rainstorm.

I ended my tour with a 2-hour presentation on the Cessna Corvalis flight test nightmare, outlining the problems Cessna had with production control (in Mexico in that case), the wing failure, and the FAA's response to that failure. This was well received, at least. It is important to point out that there are many people there who sincerely want to do a good job, but for a whole host of reasons they have no idea what a good job looks like. They can't learn from North America or Europe because of the Firewall, they can't look at our aircraft because China rarely imports aircraft, they can't be pilots because general aviation is severely restricted, and overall in the culture you don't tinker with stuff because of status and class appearances. I was relieved to hear last year that the company abandoned the project.

http://www.sparweb.ca

 

[BrianPetersen]

It is important to point out that there are many people there who sincerely want to do a good job, but for a whole host of reasons they have no idea what a good job looks like.

That agrees with my observations when a Chinese installation crew was involved in installing an automation line here in Canada. Good people, but short on experience.