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World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

bloomberg.com

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Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#121

Post by bitwize »

sasaf5 wrote: post #117
nextos wrote: post #8

I don't immediately discard an item because it's made in China, as I know of some high quality items made there. Most Apple products, some Xiaomi products or Meermin/Feit shoes. However, I tend to be very skeptical about its quality. Moving manufacturing to China is most often done to reduce cost. The only industry where it's not done due to cost, but supply chain issues, is electronics. And with cost reduction comes…

Particularly I miss low-spec, high quality items. I want a good laptop for writing, it has to be only powerful enough to run emacs and a browser. but it has to survive being trashed around and the battery must be available 10 years from now for replacement. Good luck finding that kind of product...

They're called "used ThinkPads".

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#122

Post by malloryerik »

sasaf5 wrote: post #117
nextos wrote: post #8

I don't immediately discard an item because it's made in China, as I know of some high quality items made there. Most Apple products, some Xiaomi products or Meermin/Feit shoes. However, I tend to be very skeptical about its quality. Moving manufacturing to China is most often done to reduce cost. The only industry where it's not done due to cost, but supply chain issues, is electronics. And with cost reduction comes…

Particularly I miss low-spec, high quality items. I want a good laptop for writing, it has to be only powerful enough to run emacs and a browser. but it has to survive being trashed around and the battery must be available 10 years from now for replacement. Good luck finding that kind of product...

I'm very skeptical, but there's supposedly emacs for Chromebooks: https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/EmacsForChromeBooks

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#123

Post by tensor »

jimmaswell wrote: post #6
avocado4 wrote: post #3

Perhaps if manufacturers will move out of PRC into nearby countries it won't have a large effect on prices for consumers and businesses in the US, but at the same time will force China to make structural changes in adherence with the rules of global trade and human rights. Too bad Trump has alienated traditional US allies - if major economies teamed up in this effort it would have been a much easier goal.

I don't think allies are going to be permanently "alienated" by one president's remarks.

It will be if that president becomes your monarch, which is looking increasingly likely.

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#124

Post by stevenwoo »

For a background on the bicycle manufacturing business, there is a section in this article (on starting a bicycle company) on the history of how bicycle manufacturing shifted to Asia. https://www.pinkbike.com/news/we-went-to-taiwan-and-started-...

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#125

Post by saltcured »

baroffoos wrote: post #55
mymythisisthis wrote: post #23

Bicycles are something that you need to be careful buying. Don't buy a BSO - a Bicycle Shaped Object. Just because it looks like a bike, doesn't mean you can comfortably ride it. An entry level bike is about $1200. You can comfortably ride it for hours, or up hills, carry a heavy load, it won't easily break, and it'll have a smooth ride. I feel bad for people that go out and buy a BSO; BSOs ruin cycling. We need to h…

An entry level bike is not $1200. Thats a mid range high quality bike. If you trips are short you can be totally fine on a $400 road bike. I would just avoid department store bikes that are typically under $300 but are built to look like high end mountain bikes. The suspension on them is totally useless and makes it ride worse than a bike with no suspension.

Yeah, there are lots of basic, good quality bikes in the $400-500 range. People just need to go to a real bike shop or a place like REI with a good bike department and helpful staff. It is true that once you drop to the $200-300 range, there is a lot of junk to avoid.

My current bike is 10 years old. I bought a $500 hard-tail Marin mountain bike to use for commuting, expecting that it would be able to take some abuse. My wife has a similar vintage bike from the REI house brand at the time (Novara) and it seems of similar quality. I am pretty sure both have Giant frames under their paint. These aluminum frames and disc brakes are a revelation compared to my previous long-term bike which was a lugged-steel Bridgestone with cantilever and cam rim brakes.

I have been almost negligent with maintenance, mainly just oiling the chain and replacing tires and tubes. I don't miss re-packing the bearings and freewheel like my old bike. I am not sure how much that is due to modern tech versus changes in my riding habits. I haven't left the asphalt with the current bike.

I did have to have a wheel re-spoked once after I pounded it in a deep pot-hole with narrow street tires mounted. My Shimano trigger shifters are near the point of needing some kind of major tune-up. I think I would have preferred to keep the simpler indexed levers from the 1990s, as they required a little more operator skill but were less finicky.

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#126

Post by sasaf5 »

bitwize wrote: post #121
sasaf5 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Particularly I miss low-spec, high quality items. I want a good laptop for writing, it has to be only powerful enough to run emacs and a browser. but it has to survive being trashed around and the battery must be available 10 years from now for replacement. Good luck finding that kind of product...

They're called "used ThinkPads".

Yes, that's the closest I could find.

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#127

Post by flyGuyOnTheSly »

bigiain wrote: post #110
flyGuyOnTheSly wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>But it's a lot of trouble to find high quality items these days. I want to own few things and keep most for the rest of my life. I concur on both fronts. Might I suggest you check out thrift or second hand stores? I have a collection of old aluminum cased power tools made in the mid 20th century in North America, and I think the most I paid for any one of them was $12 CAD. They look amazing. You can take them apart…

Take a bit of care with those... When I was a kid I was using my granddad's orbital sander - with a beautiful alloy body, when one of the brushes _finally_ wore right through, and the spring and pigtail popped out of the brush holder and put the live 240V AC conductor into the casing... (Not at all helped by the fact I was using the extension cord from the double insulated electric lawnmower, which had earth pins on…

A valid warning, indeed!

I will admit that my drill has had the grounding pin cut out of it's once-3-pronged plug.

Apparently it was common for contractors to cut it out as many of the houses they were working in didn't have grounding sockets.

I've only used it a couple of times, after checking it over mechanically inside, so I'm not too worried about it.

The beautiful thing about old power tools however is that replacing the power cord is as easy removing 4 easily accessed screws in the outer cover, removing the cover, then removing 3 further easily accessed screws that connect the plug to the electrical system of the drill.

Which as you remind us, I should probably do sooner than later.

Thanks for the story, and thankfully you still have an arm to type with!

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#128

Post by z3phyr »

sasaf5 wrote: post #117
nextos wrote: post #8

I don't immediately discard an item because it's made in China, as I know of some high quality items made there. Most Apple products, some Xiaomi products or Meermin/Feit shoes. However, I tend to be very skeptical about its quality. Moving manufacturing to China is most often done to reduce cost. The only industry where it's not done due to cost, but supply chain issues, is electronics. And with cost reduction comes…

Particularly I miss low-spec, high quality items. I want a good laptop for writing, it has to be only powerful enough to run emacs and a browser. but it has to survive being trashed around and the battery must be available 10 years from now for replacement. Good luck finding that kind of product...

8 megs and swapping

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#129

Post by tdfx »

mimo84 wrote: post #116
datatrue wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Made in China is over, that ship has sailed. - US recently declared China to be a dangerous competitor, - both parties are full-force anti-CCP. except maybe a few candidates like Joe Biden - Taiwan view China as dangerous as well - Way cheaper labors exists in SE asia

what's anti-CCP?

Suspicious of and hostile towards the Chinese Communist Party.

Re: World’s top bicycle maker is moving U.S. orders to Taiwan factory

#130

Post by bigiain »

henriquemaia wrote: post #70
UI_at_80x24 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Sadly, it's all about price. This is the problem, but not how you are stating it. If CEO's didn't make 300x the lowest paid employee, and "shareholders didn't demand" exponential growth quarter after quarter, then the price to be 'Not made in China' would be reasonable. Fix these problems then the damages caused by seeking "cheapest possible AND cheaper" would be non-existant. *NB: I am a shareholder. I want my inve…

>If everybody stops being so greedy this is possible. Problem is that we, as evolved creatures in a world of scarcity, are hoarders by... nature. Greed is just a morally misguided way of hoarding. So, waiting for people to stop being greedy is much more difficult than just making the right moral choices .

And it's not _just_ greed.

Is a person struggling to make rent in New York or San Francisco or Sydney being "greedy" when they demand more pay than workers with equivalent skills in rural China or Vietnam or Bangladesh or Rawanda?

Global economies mean that while some things stay rooted in local pricing (like the food and shelter at the top of Maslow's hierarchy), while other things can be _way_ more valuable if you stuff them in a shipping container and send them to the docks of Oakland or New Jersey...

If I can house and feed my family for $US10/month in Rawanda, and my neighbours can only afford to pay me 30c for my widgets, but they can sell for $100 in San Francisco, of _course_ I'll jam 100,000 of them into a container and pay $5,000 to send them there...

That'll keep working great for the Rwandan guy - up until his kids decide they want iPhones and cars and university degrees, and the costs of their expectations increase until they cannot afford a manufacturing-based economy to fund them either...

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