I think it's very refreshing to see that kind of personal Q & A from the man. Oh... and "difficult crowd"..... YEP! and his company did'nt even get a bailout.

Sometimes the vitriol on this site can get a bit thick - regardless of topic. That said, a while back Papagrizzly said that he might enlighten us a bit further as to what it takes to work with factories/overseas suppliers/etc. to bring a product to market. I, for one, hope he gets the chance to follow up on that. Heck, PG, if you're not comfortable with that, send me a PM.
Thanks,
Phil

Yes, I have read this thread from the start and yes, I know you stated that you would be purchasing and reselling lathes built in Taiwan as the new South Bends. From my take on it, the operation of the new South Bend will be similar as the way you run Grizzly. You buy machinery produced in the Orient made to your specs with your name on it and sell it in this country. You also sell a large number of accessory items that are made in China.

I raised the question early on if you would be giving any USA companies the chance to bid on making South Bend replacement parts, but that question got no response. At least LeBlond did that and kept a small part of South Bend alive in the USA. From your responses it appears that everything with the South Bend name on it will be produced overseas.

Give the guy a break. Until there is product on the market, how can you fault it? I haven't seen evidence of him misleading us, lieing to us or misrepresenting his product and he's been very forthcoming with his plans which is rare for a large company. I'm sure that the new South Bend company will be in business to make money. You can expect that the product will be manufactured, distributed and sold with that in mind, not to tailor to everyone's wishes and dreams. I'm done venting.

It's not a case of my "giving him a break". We are only discussing things here. In an earlier post I wished him well in this venture. On the other hand, there's no reason to expect miracles here either. We are talking about a new line of oriental built machinery, that in a lot of cases, I think we will see machines just like Grizzly sells now. Machines such as the EVS lathes that were already being built in Taiwan by the "old" South Bend. We probably will see some smaller machines that will be styled like the old South Bends, but I doubt will be exact copies, or have interchangeable parts. I have no doubt Mr Grizzly is in this for the money and if I was in his shoes would also be wanting to make this a profitable venture.

Can you tell me the post number where he makes this statement? If this is the case, then I misread most of whe he has stated in this thread.

In post #55 he stated:

"We have contracted with a Taiwanese manufacturer that makes
high-end toolroom lathes to make these small lathes for us"

There was no question as far as Mr Grizz stated that the lathes would be built in Taiwan, not China

If you look at the S-B website, you will see the larger lathes (14", 16" and 18")are the same or very similar to the EVS machines the "old" S-B sold.

These don't strike me as having identical meanings. Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be saying that no one can impact the quality of parts/machines/whatever except the one making them, and that every part/machine/whatever maker makes only a single quality of goods, and that those builders are identical by nationality (ie, everything made in Tiawan has exactly the same quality, everything made in America has exactly the same quality, etc). If this is the case, why are Atlas lathes generally regarded as inferior in quality to other, older, American made lathes.

Finally, it seems your position is that there are no quality goods made outside the US. Can you tell me what brand of lathe is entirely constructed in the US at the present time? Also, what would, say, a 10" swing, 30" between centers version of that lathe cost nowadays?

Terry

Aw shucks. It's unfortunate that typed messages cannot impart vocal inflections to make ones point.
It makes certain remarks seem unkind and argumentative when they really aren't.
I've been guilty of "reading it wrong" many times, and through frustration, I've managed to make myself look like someone who's out to pick a fight when it wasn't the case.

I'm a 30 year veteran to the gun trade but I'm new to the machining world.
I need to add some machining equipment into my operation and was told this is "THE" place to be to listen, ask and learn from the best of the best.
Imagine my surprise to see the President of Grizzly right here in the mix.
What an opportunity for all of us. We can learn so much from his experiences as a developer/designer of tooling, how these type of tools get manufactured,etc.,etc. and even how a business can become successful.
(I think he got that part right.)

I'm hoping Mr. Balolia doesn't decide that this thread is counterproductive and decides to LOG-OFF forever.

Brian Powley
http://www.powleyengraving.com

You're playing word games to try to change the meaning. If a machine is built by a company doing business in Taiwan and SELLING that machine to an American firm, the American firm is "RESELLING" the machine here. Facts are facts. The Taiwanese manufacturer is responsible for the quality of the product. Is it possible for Taiwan to build a quality machine? I'm sure they can, but when price and mass marketing is introduced, quality often suffers. Sure, the US customer has input (hopefully) as far as design and quality. There is a long standing standard of quality of US built machine tools, I don't think anyone here won't agree with that. Taiwan makes some decent stuff, but let's face it, the quality factor isn't the same as US or European built machine tools.

If you have ever repaired Asian built machinery, the details would make you sick on most of it. Sand in gearboxes, porous castings, poor thread fits, poorly fitted parts are more the norm than the exception.

The only lathes built in the USA at this time as far as my knowledge are Monarch and Lehman. You can't seriously group Atlas (a home workshop machine) along with builders like Monarch, Hendey, K & T, Cincy or any other US builder of high quality equipment

To summerize,, China, or India = garbage

Taiwan, Brazil definitely a step up

USA, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan = Highest quality

If you took a poll, most would agree I believe with the quality rating of various countries that I stated above.

It is so obvious that you have little to no experience in manufacturing of good or importation of such. Grizzly is contracting a Taiwanese company to build their producer for them so that the price can be kept at a reasonable level. Taiwan has some of the most sophisticated manufacturing facilities in the world. Did you know that they alone have the largest CNC manufacturing base that can hold tighter tolerances than aero spec needs. Did you know the are a world force in carbon fiber technology in fact F-1 , Indy Car, World Sports cars and FIA world rally source most of their CF from Taiwan. manufactured goods from Taiwan can be far superior to USA , Swiss and German products because they have bother to make the capitol involvements ( due in part to cheap labor and cost of living) in the most sophisticated machinery in the world.


BTW an FYI on China manufacturing no foreign company can own manufacturing plants or property in China it is against national law, But in Taiwan a foreign company is free to purchase such plants or land for manufacturing purposes.

That all sounds very impressive, yet they still send lots of junk machinery over here, so, how does that happen??? Just take a look at a 10 year old Taiwanese bridgeport copy and compare it to a 10 year old genuine Bridgeport. If you know anything about the "real world" of machining you will know what I'm talking about. Price wise, used Taiwanese equipment has virtually no resale value, nor does anyone bother rebuilding it. I used to sell new Jet machinery in the 1980's and got out of it because we had so many quality control problems. So, don't tell me I know nothing about imported machinery. You quote a few lines from some magazine article about Taiwan and you're the expert.

Bssc,

"( due in part to cheap labor and cost of living)"

Investigate the "cheap cost of living and the cheap labor". You might be pissed to learn that they pay more than YOU earn. And with what YOU earn, you couldn't afford to live there.

Grand,

Some of those tools were not meant to go into production environments. They told YOU that they were as good as a Bridgie, you tried or did sell them, I'm sure you tried them before you took them on, and they SEEMED as good as a Bridgeport. OR, you DIDN'T know anything about them, just that you could sell a similar machine for 1/3 the price, you're gonna be fartin' thru silk soon.

"So, don't tell me I know nothing about imported machinery."

That doesn't mean that you KNOW anything about ANY machinery. If you were all THAT sharp on machinery, you SHOULD have seen the shortfalls on the Jets you were selling.

I think you are too critical of Jet machinery. I have friends who have jet DPs and they have lasted for years, albeit, they have probably drilled an average of 3 holes per machine.

My own, Buffalo, over 30 years old, STILL drills all the holes I need to drill. I don't use it 8 hours per day.

My basement tools are Chinese. I like them. I do nothing that NEEDS pushed.

I HAVE 2 SB 9's. I don't HAVE to use the Chinese tools. BUT>>>> I can't haul either of those down the stairs to the basement.

Cheers,

George

Agreed....