I love my chinese saw

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Your still missing the point. I'm not bashing the chinese saws for being Chinese. China has the ability to make quality parts but generally only do so when contracted by a reputable company, like Stihl or Cummins or Snap On. (Yes, Snap On has tools made in China)
In those cases they (China) are making tools or parts to a certain standard of quality they were contracted to do. This is Much different than plagiarizing a quality tool so much so that the legitimate manufacturers parts are directly interchangeable. It's morally wrong no matter how you slice it.
It sounds like you understand this by the array of tools you listed that are quality and not cheap and have direct copies available at substantially less prices. You can buy one quality Dewalt drill that will last ages or you can buy a cheap China version and replace it several times over.
(I still have a corded Dewalt that is easily 25 years old that gets used heavily and still works as good as it did the day I brought it home)
Cheap tools (usually) save money up front but almost never in the long term. A chainsaw is no different.
How is it "morally wrong " ? Most if not all the clones are no longer in production? If you want a 288xp in like new or new condition your buying it from a communist/socialist country anyway, except paying 4xs the price.
I can get behind a business model that its unwise to spend money on a low quality tool but its equally unwise to be taken advantage of ; literally the definition of a fool.

Moral territory is subjective at best and I dont listen to the" just because " moral argument. If your taking the HIGH ground of Moral virtue you must see alot of others at the bottom.
 
I will take that one step farther. What brand of circular saw do you own? What brand of adjustable wrench? How about adjustable pliers? These things all have patents which have expired. Odds are that the brand you own are copies. The patents for these chainsaws have expired making it legal for any company to copy or otherwise use the designs.

Violating patents is something that China actively promotes. I do not understand why world governments, including our own, tolerate it. It should be met with the absolute harshest financial response possible. Sell me an 066 for $200? No problem. Sell me a 500 for $400, absolutely not. These days companies themselves are largely to blame for this. Case in point. I work for a large company who builds medical devices. Several years ago, this company was dumb enough to open a plant in China. I don't recall which product was made at the new plant, but within 24 months of the plant opening there were several Chinese companies selling the same product on the global market. Do I think that China is to blame for this? Yeah. Do I think that my company shoulders the bulk of the responsibility? Absolutely. For the time being, out senior management has learned their lesson and we haven't moved any additional production to that plant or opened any others. Their greed and arogance will soon cause them to forget though. The process will repeat itself.
 
Unless your Rigid circular saw can be torn down and rebuilt 100% with let's say, a Dewalt, nut for nut and bolt for bolt right down to the windings and brushes its another invalid comparison. Holzforma, etc is blatantly plagiarizing and it's shameful. BTW, did you know actual plagiarizing is considered a felony if you make more than $2k revenue from the copy(ies)? Hmm.
Carry on buying the plagiarized goods. Just know you are contributing to the problem several of you have already acknowledged.
 
I will take that one step farther. What brand of circular saw do you own? What brand of adjustable wrench? How about adjustable pliers? These things all have patents which have expired. Odds are that the brand you own are copies. The patents for these chainsaws have expired making it legal for any company to copy or otherwise use the designs.

Violating patents is something that China actively promotes. I do not understand why world governments, including our own, tolerate it. It should be met with the absolute harshest financial response possible. Sell me an 066 for $200? No problem. Sell me a 500 for $400, absolutely not. These days companies themselves are largely to blame for this. Case in point. I work for a large company who builds medical devices. Several years ago, this company was dumb enough to open a plant in China. I don't recall which product was made at the new plant, but within 24 months of the plant opening there were several Chinese companies selling the same product on the global market. Do I think that China is to blame for this? Yeah. Do I think that my company shoulders the bulk of the responsibility? Absolutely. For the time being, out senior management has learned their lesson and we haven't moved any additional production to that plant or opened any others. Their greed and arogance will soon cause them to forget though. The process will repeat itself.
Pretty sure my stuff is American as old as it is.
 
We'd probably be able to compete more with the Chinese except for our multitude of taxes we and our corporations have to pay. There's a 7% sales tax alone in our state and it also applies to services..
Clearly you've bever been involved with business regs in China.

I don't think taxes here are the reason we can't compete. It's greed...and China is smart enough to exploit that.
 
Clearly you've bever been involved with business regs in China.

I don't think taxes here are the reason we can't compete. It's greed...and China is smart enough to exploit that.
exactly. It is greed
Unless your Rigid circular saw can be torn down and rebuilt 100% with let's say, a Dewalt, nut for nut and bolt for bolt right down to the windings and brushes its another invalid comparison. Holzforma, etc is blatantly plagiarizing and it's shameful. BTW, did you know actual plagiarizing is considered a felony if you make more than $2k revenue from the copy(ies)? Hmm.
Carry on buying the plagiarized goods. Just know you are contributing to the problem several of you have already acknowledged.
Its not plagarizing if patent expired and company no longer makes
 
I couldn't disagree more. I'm not against the idea of paying more for a better product, and that means paying for the R&D needed to develop the product. Having said that, as far as R&D is concerned, at best a brand new MS661 is only marginally better than the 066 saws that first hit the shelves over 30 years ago. There are some who would argue that those old 066 saws are actually as good or better than what you can buy today. Until Stihl released the 500, the about the only saw in the past 30 years that was a noticeable improvement was the MS261. So much for the idea of paying a premium price to get the best R&D for the past 30 years.... That shouldn't be a surprise though since there's no real magic to designing or building 2 cycle engines.

What you are actually talking about isn't R&D and testing. You're really talking about overhead, of which R&D and testing is only a small portion of. The primary difference in the Chinese clones and their genuine OEM counterparts is overhead and profit margins, and overhead is the lions share of that. The cheapest price for an assembled Farmertec G660 is currently $190. Given, you have to buy 10 of them to get one for this price, but that gives us a pretty good idea of what it costs to actually manufacture the components to build an MS661. For the sake of argument, I'll even double that cost to $380 to make sure you're getting top quality parts (these would be costs to the MFG, not consumer costs). Now, how long would it take a skilled assembly worker to assemble a saw start to finish? I'll be overly conservative here and say that it takes half a shift. Lets assume this highly skilled assembly worker is making $40/hr. Lets double that to cover their benefits and make it $80/hr. That brings the cost of the saw to $800. Coincidently, that's about what some custom shops charge to build a ported, bulletproof, big bore 066 clone that walks all over an MS661 both in performance and durability. I digress. At this price point HALF of what the major MFG are charging you goes to overhead. I haven't worked for Stihl, Husqvarna, or Echo, but I suspect they are like the major manufactures that I've worked for over nearly 3 decades now. If so, the bulk of that overhead goes to pay for a bloated management structure that's not smart enough to pour pi$$ out of their own boot. Meanwhile, they outsource as much of their supply chain as the can to minimize cost. The cost savings doesn't get passed on to the customer. The only things that gets passed on to the customer are the quality issues that come with the outsourced supply chain. So long as people are willing to pay the over inflated prices, the mfg have no reason to change the way they do business. This is why a 1/2 ton pickup truck now costs over $40K. The only options that consumers have is to pay the price, or find an alternative. In this case, the alternatives are crap saws like Poulan or Chinese clones. Between those two options, I'd choose the Chinese clone every time because they are a far better saw and can easily be upgraded to be a pretty exceptional saw. When a major manufacturer can manage to get their head out of their rear, get their overhead in check and sell their product for a reasonable price, I'd be more than happy to buy their product instead.
It isnt always overhead. Corporate profits and dividends hike prices significantly
 
Was there a point to you joining, or was it just to justify your companies elicit business habbits?
Is there a point to you personally attacking me? I don't even own one of these knockoff saws. I think it is an important discussion to have and not sure why you are so hostile, especially towards someone you don't even know. There is nothing illegal about these saws that I am aware of.
 
The thing I dont get with name brand saws is why a 70 or 90cc saw cost double what a 50cc does.
They dont cost double to build and R&D is the same for both, big saws should be no more than 25% more than the small saws.
If prices were better on name brand saws, I wouldnt touch chinese ones.
The big saws have (or used to) a lot more metal in the bottom end. All around really.
 
Is there a point to you personally attacking me? I don't even own one of these knockoff saws. I think it is an important discussion to have and not sure why you are so hostile, especially towards someone you don't even know. There is nothing illegal about these saws that I am aware of.
Wasn't an attack, or personal, take it how you want, it's how i talk. If you think what I said was bad, try reading through some of the other threads.
just wondering why your first 5 posts as a new member are sticking up for companies with elict business models? Doesn't matter if there's a valid patent or not, they only apply to the USA. Steeling intellectual property is still theft. Doesn't matter if the specific product is available in the United States or not.
 
FWIW, I used my new Ebay Chinese $100 35cc top handle yesterday. Great cutting easy starting little saw. I'm happy. World economy. Do I feel bad? Hell no.
 
You left out the 056 in the Stihl line up.

Will investigate...thanks

I checked that one out. I added it to the next revision of the list. Thanks. It will appear on the site soon. Thank you. Quality saws are appreciated.

The 056 should now show up on the site. Thanks for the help with that reference.
 
Wasn't an attack, or personal, take it how you want, it's how i talk. If you think what I said was bad, try reading through some of the other threads.
just wondering why your first 5 posts as a new member are sticking up for companies with elict business models? Doesn't matter if there's a valid patent or not, they only apply to the USA. Steeling intellectual property is still theft. Doesn't matter if the specific product is available in the United States or not.
Just because its how you talk or other people are doing it doesn't mean it is appropriate. So do you think Glocks should be copied? Good ideas and tech are always copied by others. These old saws can't keep up with the new ones, nor are they built to the same quality. I am not defending these companies, but these are the facts. Like I said, I don't own one. Competition is good for the industry and, ultimately, good for the consumer.
 
Just because its how you talk or other people are doing it doesn't mean it is appropriate. So do you think Glocks should be copied? Good ideas and tech are always copied by others. These old saws can't keep up with the new ones, nor are they built to the same quality. I am not defending these companies, but these are the facts. Like I said, I don't own one. Competition is good for the industry and, ultimately, good for the consumer.
Sorry buddy, I'm not changing how I talk for you or anyone else.
It's not competition, there's nothing better about them outside of the price. And thay could be argued as well. Did it fix an issue with the original model? No, most times it's a worse copy. Did it improve on the design in any way? No, most times it's morphed into worse then the original.
Will people bang the original company when their clone fails? You better bet you bottom dollar, happens every day. So not only were intellectual right stollen, copied, and cheapened the original company still has to deal with the accusations of making bad products even though false advertising says the copies are just as good, look the same run the same. Bs. Whats even worse is there's people like you defending them as good for business.
 

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