Chinese Quality Fade

I am surprised at the response to.
That article actually makes good project meterial to correct the entire situation, not just the HT engines.
 
Reliability has always been my main concern. My first kit was a Staton. I put a lot of miles on it last year. I've broken stuff, but the engine keeps putting along. I did have to change a spark plug once. On my tadpole, I went with the Lifan because I didn't wish to spring the $ for a Honda at the time. If the Lifan breaks, I probably will go Honda next time. The HT was never a consideration. I've read enough here to know that I could not trust one for a daily 50+ mile commute.
 
I've read enough here to know that I could not trust one for a daily 50+ mile commute.
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The title of this thread is "quality fade".

Can you specify exactly what you don't trust about it ?

I trust the main components of the HT, ( Piston/Cylinder/Head)
It's the other bits and pieces that are upgradable.

Overall in the heatwave we have at the moment, I ridden the new HT everyday, and it is not all straight roads, there are 1 mile hill rises,stop/starts.
The engine itself has not missed a beat, but I don't ride it like trying to break land speed records, I ride for what it was designed to do, assist the peddling and I cannot expect much more.

OK, I have clutch problems that should not be there in the first place.
So if the ball bearing on all other HT's had no problems for the past 2 years, then all of a sudden a batch of ball bearings are not case hardened and cause to simply disintegrate. By adding a locally made replacement ball bearing, does not mean the entire HT engine is untrustworthy.

This is the type of feedback the suppliers need, in order to go back to the factory and shove the disfuctional component up the bean counter's nose.
Cos it is the bean counters who try to advise the owners of the factory, the the engineers need to "fade" something to increase profit.

Sack the bean counters who probably don't know the differance between an oily rag and bees wax.
 
Irish John said:
What sort of kit is it I wonder? Where was it made? Any pictures of your mount?
1969 - anyone who can remember those days wasn't there!
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Info;

http://www.motoredbikes.com/forumdisplay.php?f=72

There are many bike engine kits around that were made in the 1940's thru '70's that were dependable. Many good kits out there now, too, but most don't mount within the frame like the Chinese type.
 
My next bike project would definetly be rack mount. I love my Happy Time but when some roadies look at my engine in the frame and my tank up top it looks to much like a motorcycle with pedals. I love riding the trails and I think a rack mount still makes a bicycle look like a bicycle and I probably won't get harrassed as much.
 
Irish, you might be interested in reading this paper


http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20060107_1.htm

In particular the section

The American professor thought that I did not hear him clearly, so he repeated one word at a time: "Your country is the only country in the world that has been able to grow economically while shrinking the gap between poor and rich."

"Where did the evidence for your conclusion come from?"

"From one of your published statistics."

So that was it.
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BoltsMissing said:
Irish, you might be interested in reading this paper


http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20060107_1.htm

In particular the section
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Bolts, can't see what that article had to do with quality fade except pointing out that the industrial revolution in China is the biggest the world has seen so far. All industrialising economies have had past reputations for shonky practices, Britain, France and towards the end of the 1800s the United States was known for all sorts of funny business particularly not respecting international copyright but as they progressed they realised that their own inventions could be ripped off and began to respect patents and copyrights. They even poisoned countless Europeans by preserving their export meat with strichnine, arsenic and cyanide. the situation got so bad that European industrial nations managed to unite to put an embargo on US meat imports. That was no mean feat to unite countries that had a long and mutual hatred of each other. It is just something that all industrial revolutions seem to suffer - Quality Fade is not new but it isn't much fun to be at the receiving end.
 
able to grow economically while shrinking the gap between poor and rich."
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Irish, one of our common cliches we often hear when there is a convenient Gov policy change, or "new" policy or whatever the ink finally does, we hear,
"the rich get richer and ther poorer get poorer" rada rada...ok?
You hear that phrase many times all over the place, it's stigma.

But it seems the experts in that paper have observed that in China this is not the case. So the question is, what are they collectively doing differant that seems apparant in a billion mass of of population ?
How can billions of human minds think NOT in the paradime of, "rich get richer etc" mentality, rater than, whatever it's called, but the poorer get rich and the rich are getting poorer.....yet it seems it's ok. They are then gaining a "balance"...

Ya have to go way way way back in ancient history to understand, not even Alexander the Great attempted to conquor China back then...he would have lost because even if there was civil unrest within the Chinese region, they will band together and get rid of the intruders, then get back into their own.

The Olympic games in China ? do they really understand what it's about, does anyone really know what the original reason for the Olympic games is all about ?
The Chinese see it as a financial opportunity, taking then a golden egg from the west.
But if, and only if, globaly things come to it's senses, and it won't cos money talks and bull****e walks, then we are stuck with the HT concept of things unless it takes some miracle to go back to making our own products in our backyards again, the same as they do, and the financials add up to sway this side of town.
 
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BoltsMissing said:
But if, and only if, globaly things come to it's senses, and it won't cos money talks and bull****e walks, then we are stuck with the HT concept of things QUOTE]

I love that expression Bolts you are right about one thing - the poorer are getting richer alright and there are new classes of rich that weren't there 30 years ago. I think it mainly because of the communist government. There is no direct democracy but the government do endeavour to use their wealth to benefit all of the people. In late 2006 I was in Shanghai at a talk given by the region's chief planner. They aren't at all focussed on the Beijing Olympics but totally geared to the Shanghai Expo which is a bigger money spinner. This guy has the sort of power that nobody in a democracy ever has - for example if he wanted the new airport moved it would be moved and so would all the infra-structure servicing it. They have targets to green the whole Shanghai region that would be impossible to achieve in the west in 50 years yet their time frame is 15 years and they are ahead of schedule. I asked if there was any public consultation in the regional planning process and he smiled and said there wasn't but asked me to point out anything in the plan that was not obviously for the benefit of the people and I couldn't. There was more construction happening in the Shanghai region than in most of western Europe. The construction boom dwarfs anything that happened in the US at the start of the last century and that in turn dwarfed Europe's industrial revolution.
The sad thing is that many good things originated from Britains industrial revolution such as the Garden City Movement and later the City Beautiful Movement came out of the US boom but nothing very innovative has evolved out of the biggest ever Chinese construction boom. Every design consultancy in the western world is over there working but all they seem to be giving them is more of our own crud. It is a missed opportunity of epic proportion. Everyone I know in my 35 years of working in Europe & Australia has, at some time worked in China in recent years. I'd have been unemployed without them but the projects although sometimes amazing mostly lacked that something special. There were a few exceptions that were nearly magical but fell short because of poor quality controll. They look great in photos if you don't go in too close.
Anyway I know that Beijing Olympics budget for just drainage outstrips what Sydney spent on their entire Olympics. Not that we will ever know Sydney's real budget expenses because they were kept secret but since 2000 there hasn't been a lot spent here on anything. Yes they do things big in China. I remember in the 60s at school in Ireland when they announced that they would limit their birth rate to one child per couple and everyone said that it was an impossible task and hadn't worked in India etc. They achieved it in less than 10 years. When they decide to clean up their environment they might well achieve that too while we are wallowing around in a mountain of discarded white goods and HT engines. At least we have the gigantic holes in the ground where we dug out the aluminium to sell to them so we can put all the discarded goods in those!
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