TA22: Tie Rod ends/Ball Joints, etc - OEM vs After Market

[o_man_ra23]

If you can guarantee metallurgy and tolerances (through random production line testing as per how the original ones would have been tested), then I wouldn't have a problem with them. However, it would seem that the majority of stuff being produced in China/Thailand etc still does not get subjected to the full testing process.

Just remember, if the thing fails at 100kph, it is you who is going to plow into a wall/truck/train/ditch/whatever. So after you get over bending your pride and joy, and realise you are permanently maimed/dead/otherwise, are you going to want to trust a poorly tested product??

Of course, if they do provide proper testing (each item should be xrayed, and one in every x should be failure/tolerance tested) then I would be happy to lay out some coin for one if they meet manufacturer specs.

They would likely also need to be ADR approved, which will involve a series of tests being run here in Aus no doubt.

[SilverRA23]

Ah nothing like educating a production manager on how QA works

I made an enquiry with the supplier for shits and giggles.

MOQ 1000... piece price $10.50

That's a bigger investment than I am prepared to make to support the Celica brethren...

[o_man_ra23]

$10,500.00, add freight - $2500, add duty @30% - $3150, add GST - $1365

Per unit price is now $17.52

If you sold them at $60 each on flea-bay and made the purchaser pay postage, that's a healthy profit - which is then taxed at probably 30% or so. Assuming that tax rate, and if you sold all of them, then your $17,520 investment would net a profit after tax, duties, freight of $29,740 (round numbers). This is assuming you don't have other expenses such as warehouse rent etc (ie you stick the stock in your shed/garage). Of course, there will be no doubt a handful of returns which you would need to warrant, so knock a grand off that profit. For every $ extra you add to the price, you can add about $600 profit total (assuming returns), so at the $130 that I had to pay for the last 555 idler arm, there is a decent amount of profit there, however you can bet your arse that some of that 1000 will be sitting 'idle' (pun intended) if you put your price up that high.

This is also assuming the manufacturer gets the items ADR approved, or they are ADR approved by the notion they are made to OEM spec and have QA docs and OEM standards which back that up.

Oh, and judging by the quality of some of the shit that gets sold (and not necessarily for cheap either), there are a number of production managers who NEED desperately to be taught QA.