Cleveland Mo-Max cutters quality NON EXISTANT?

VersaMil manufactures a flycutter arbor for it's machine tools, and with the arbor I've ALWAYS provided a Mo-Max 5/16ths lathe bit.
High Speed steel supposedly ground on all four sides to fairly accurate dimensions. These cutters up to a year ago didn't SAY where they were made,
but I always measured them and tended to have to grind one side, because they were almost always oversize by .003. I can handle doing that, grinding a .315 cutter down to .312.
But the batch I got in today, proudly labeled INDIA in bold print, are just so horrible it's unbelievable. Every one of the cutters were tapered, and they varied not
by three thousanths, but'10 thousanths of an inch. One tapered from .312 down to .300. Every one of them was a different size, most not square. Now maybe as a lathe bit
squarness and parralelism isn't THAT important. But these bits go into a broached 5/16ths hole, so they at least have to fit, and fit somewhat snugly.

So is this the norm for 2012? I realize square high speed steel bits that need to be ground by the user are probably getting to be a limited demand item, but if
Cleveland is going to put their name on them, wouldn't you think they should at least make them SORT of correctly. It certainly ruins your day, when you have
expectations of a semi quality part, and you open a box of absolute junk. If they're this sloppy with their grinding, how am I supposed to think that the STEEL is any better.

Certainly Clevleland could still make these effectively in the USA. 100's could be ground in one chucking on a variety of grinders. Certainly there's some care needed, but
making a few hundred bits in one grinding, isn't rocket science. It's one thing to ship work off shore to save labor, but why bother importing junk. The same set of tools I put the flycutter arbor in,
I provide a 2 foot long feedtable that's flat within .001 over the entire table. In excusable to have a 2 inch cutter taper by .010.

I EDM a lot of cobalt form tools, and wouldn't touch any tool stock from India after getting burned once. Made a tool for a customer cutting brass, tool edge burned up before 50 parts. Now I only buy Latrobe Dynacut M43.
The company was recently bought out by Carpenter, but the quality is still there.

Another possible source is Arthur R. Warner Co.

Kinda related:

There are parts I make in phenolic that are used in automated assembly lines. I've been making these for years. I buy a few hundred pounds of phenolic from the supplier I've been using for years and now every single part I made from this last batch has had to come back for rework. The material is dimensionally unstable. I noticed it didn't smell as bad as phenolic usually does. Thought it was kind of nice at the time.

I call my supplier and it turned out they've switched from a domestic manufacturer to "import" (read: China).

I can't begin to tell y'all what a headache this has turned out to be...

I've also noticed the quality of other materials I've been getting over the years has been going down hill. Domestic manufacturers included. And the assortment of off-the-shelf stock isn't as good as it once was.

The MBAs have taken control and are probably making pretty nice bonuses for themselves...

Warning, one of my favorite rants will follow, it's worth what you paid for it:

The simple response is why do you keep buying it?
I would not have tolerated having to touch .003 off.

The MBAs do this because they know they can bleed the name for all it is worth.
Also many end users will tolerate a sloppy part to save some money. Your regrinding is a great example here.

More people need to stand up and kick their supplier square in the butt.
Even when it was only .003 out was it really worth your time it grind it in?

Think about this, are you simply hooked on the brand name?
Is it just comfort that keeps you from finding a new source?
Even with getting absolute crap you try to find a way to help Cleveland make good stuff saying they should make them here, process them this way of that.
Why support them if they don't support you?
You are at some level deep inside "addicted" to them and they know it.

I see this all the time with various carbide brands, "XYZ is the best". This is a gut feel and you don't realize where it comes from.
Something, be it a friendly rep with hats and coffee cups, tons of ads pushed in your face, or maybe even just a good experience at the tool show plants this in your head. People will play on this sub-conscious emotion.

Although most here think the MBAs running these places are stupid, they are not. I interact with a lot of them and the ones that rise to the top are very, very smart people.
Their job is to maximize profits and they know how hard they can push the game.


Bob

perhaps they use chinese 'starrett' calipers to measure the 'cleveland' tool blanks .

anything has to be better than watery indian tool steel - even chinese watery tool steel .
M-42's probably more like M-24-1/2 ! but perhaps they could grind it straight .

union butterfield and morse still make hss square blanks ...(even t-15 and cast alloy).
hell, even shars m-42 would be better than anything from india.

Does anyone make a quality CARBIDE TIPPED tool bit that has a correctly sized shank? It seems they are rather inexpensive these days. Especially if you could get some off Ebay or at an auction from old stuff that was of quality. Just a thought.

.003 over I'd consider to be 8mm, I've had that issue with O1 drill rod, 5/16's stuff I've gotten was always .315", they must figure its close enough so we'll grind it all to 8mm?.
Lots of HSS comes from china and some of it is decent, not seen anything good from India yet.
I have a box of 3/8" Osborn hss bits(england I think) but it was given to me a few years ago, good quality but I don't know if they're still in business.
For the times I use hss, the chinese M-2 ones have done what I need, mainly cause I don't even know where to get anything better in the other sizes.