As a newb to Vanagons (2007? ) sourcing parts from my local supplier, it's
possible he was selling me NOS of actual made in Germany or similar quality
parts. Though a very naive POV, I tended to assume that all the parts he
had access to were made in Germany. Not so much it seems.    ;)    Good to
get your input Ron.  From chats with my local supplier, it seems that parts
sourcing can be a "cat and mouse" game sometimes.

IMO, in a perfect world, a company or other persons with a bajillion
dollars should 'round up all the relevant manufacturers and establish some
kind of QC and material content standard. i.e. rubber compounds and amount
of lube installed on something like an upper ball joint.  (ya. I suspect
that my lower mile UBJ's may be getting stiff. My manual steering return is
not 100% correct)

With that in mind, I wonder where
http://www.etkashop.com/vwcp/Bus-LT/T-3/  gets their parts?

On Fri, Aug 23, 2013 at 10:21 PM, The Bus Depot <vanagon@busdepot.com>wrote:

> The Continental belt that inspired my original post ......
>

>
> Welcome to globalization. Continental has various supply sources, just
> like most other major suppliers. I have received a single shipment of the
> identical part number in the identical box (not Conti specifically) that
> contained parts which were absolutely nothing alike inside the box
> (different tooling marks, different countries of origin, sometimes branded
> on the part itself sometimes not). I have seen the blatantly identical
> parts (and I mean identical) variously labeled as made in the USA, Germany,
> or Taiwan depending on who the distributor was. And don't even get me
> started on retailers. There is one Vanagon parts retailer I know of who
> flaunts "made in USA" products that I happen to know are not, and another
> that sells Chinese made products as "Original German Quality." (The latter
> is at least a value judgment and therefore could be debated, but I still
> find it a bit misleading.)  We list German companies as such, with a
> footnote that the product itself may or may not be German made, and try to
> list in the description those items that we actually know to be OEM or
> German. Even that is a moving target, since who knows what the next
> shipment will bring, making it a constant battle to stay accurate.
>

--
Neil n

Blog: tubaneil.blogspot.ca

'88 Westy http://tinyurl.com/c8rlw6p

'81 VanaJetta 2.0 "Jaco"  http://tubaneil.googlepages.com/

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http://tinyurl.com/d7gd5ej