Opinions on Chinese manufacturing.

[XG_Falcon]

Ok, a little back story: I'm about to buy another dirt bike and I'm almost certainly going to purchase a Chinese product this time - instead of another Japanese bike (because I intend to ride it into the ground). A friend recently bought a 250cc 2-stroke "SDB" brand Chinese bike and when he bought it I was quite frankly amazed at the build quality of the bike, especially by the quality of the engine casting. He asked me to assemble the bike for him when it arrived from Internetland and I was actually surprised to see that many (but certainly not all) of the parts were on par in quality to parts from my Suzuki. At less than a quarter of the price.

This got me thinking about the improvements I have personally seen as a consumer of a wide-variety of Chinese manufactured goods over the last ten years. For example, one of my hobbies is recording music and to be honest it's becoming increasingly hard to ignore that practically all of my equipment was built in China. I'm not talking about cheap equipment designed in China but reputable brands like: KRK, Yamaha, Peavey, Samson, Behringer, TC Electronic, Marshall, Shure, etc. I have never had an issue with build quality. Ever.

It seems to me that the Chinese have allowed us to consume like crazy, even people that many would class as being "poor" Australians can have all the mod cons now...and yet I hear people talk down about Chinese manufactured goods every day of the week.

What are your opinions on Chinese manufacturing? Spin a yarn with me.