Quality Control and Internet Suppliers

[George ( C&C 40 )]

Hi All,


I was thinking about this after coming up with manufacturing defects on two name brand electronics items recently purchased through internet suppliers. Both suppliers were very nice and replaced the items without question but what were the odds of it happening in the first place. I mean factory sealed name brand stuff and two of the three items had manufacturing defects.

I've had a Port Supply account which supplies me with items through West Marine for 6 years and I can't ever think of once having to replace an item purchased through those guys. I can think of three items I've had to have replaced that were purchased through discount internet marine suppliers in the past 6 months alone.

Is it possible that quality control at the big marine supply factorys sort their items into three piles -- Perfect items that go to top price retail outlets, Probably good enough items go to the discount houses, and failed items that get thrown away? Or am I being paranoid? Just unlucky? I'd love to hear from anybody in the quality control field.


George Jones

[Figment]

I'm associated with a handful of manufacturers/suppliers that deal with port/west and other points of sale, and I don't know that any of them conciously do the three-piles thing, but I DO know that the big houses (West in particular) "ding" their suppliers something like $125 for each occurrence of error. That will eat up a profit margin pretty damned quickly, so I'm sure that on some level some extra attention is paid.
oh, and that "occurrence of error" thing can be as blatant as a defective product, or as simple as a typo in the address of an invoice. They have weight to swing around, and they know it.

I think you've just had strange luck, George. At least 50% of the time I walk into West, there is someone at the service desk doing a return, and there are ALWAYS two or three people waiting in line with defective product at Defender.

[Tim]

I think it's simply a case of bad luck, George, and the fact that the quality of manufactured goods continues to decline in a general sense, as manufacturing companies are forced by the economist's favorite "global market" and the consumer's ever-growing need for inexpensive (rather than quality) goods to speed up production and lower costs, often leading to inferior quality. I think we may be seeing more of this to come, unfortunately.

I don't think it has much to do with the retail (or wholesale, as the case may be) supplier. For example, I ordered a fuel tank from Port Supply last year--an expensive aluminum tank. The tank arrived with serious damage to the top and fill neck. When I got the replacement tank, it was similarly damaged. In both cases, poor packaging for shipment was the culprit--someone just didn't care. I ended up using a plastic tank from a different supplier.

Similarly, I ordered some self-tailing winches, also from Port Supply. The first winch arrived with the self-tailing mechanism smashed--and, if you believe this, the replacement winch was ALSO smashed. I finally got a third winch that was in good condition, sent from a different warehouse.

In my Port Supply cases, clearly the warehouses were at fault, and this was not a case of necessarily defective goods from the manufacturer. But it shows that defects can come from any source.

That said, if you seem to be getting frequently defective goods from a certain supplier or manufacturer, then that would be good enough reason to shop elsewhere in my book. Who has time for that silliness?

[A30_John]

Speaking of defective products, this Spring I bought a holding tank made by a popular manufacturer of marine products. While "dry fitting" the tank in my boat, the tank slipped and knocked against a shelf. Here's what happened to the high strength polycarbonate fitting:



Given the nature of what this tank was going to hold, I opted to return, rather than exchange the above item. After a lot of research, reviewing the Glissando installation etc. and reading many posts on this forum, I opted to do this:



I designed, assembled and installed it with some help from a friend who helped measure the pieces. Here's the end result:



It's a plywood/fiberglass composite tank. The final inside surface is coated in 5 layers of epoxy. It's tough, works great, and I'm very pleased with the result.

[Rachel]

John,

I think you made a good choice. I had (what looks like) the same tank, and it. too, cracked in that vicinity. Too bad we were about 2,000 miles from the nearest West Marine at the time <laugh> Luckily we didn't have to use the tank too often.

--- Rachel

[George ( C&C 40 )]

Hi All,

Thanks for the replies. It probably is nothing more than a little bad luck. I'm sure the new stuff will be fine. It was good to talk about it though.

George Jones

[A30_John]

John,

I think you made a good choice. I had (what looks like) the same tank, and it. too, cracked in that vicinity. Too bad we were about 2,000 miles from the nearest West Marine at the time <laugh> Luckily we didn't have to use the tank too often.

--- Rachel

I'm very pleased with the decision to go this route with the tank. I would do it again without hesitation. All of the tanks I looked at in the marine supply store made me nervous.