They know what will break

[Phonetek]

Last night I was working with the mechanic. I was rebuilding a pit on one of the lanes. When looking at the diagrams in the manufacturers books I noticed that some parts were in red ink on them. I inquired as to why they were like that. Apparently they are the most frequent parts that fail and the most replaced. I found it fascinating. I asked, "Then isn't that an indication they have to either make them out of better materials or come up with a better design?" The mechanic laughed and said "Why? That's how they make money"

Duh, good point. He even showed me different distributor arm belts. They have 5 different ones you can order. One of them in particular was rather shinny vinyl looking and very flat with really shallow grooves. I said, "Wouldn't the pins just slide around on that and fall off or cause a pin jam because it has no real surface to grab the pins and it's looks very slick?" He said "Yep" I said "Why do they even sell it then since it obviously would cause nothing but problems?" His reply "Because they are cheaper some people are stupid enough to buy them because they think they will be saving money. Even though in the end they will be buying the proper and more expensive ones eventually and end up costing them more when all is said and done."

Ya gotta love how things work. Things like this aren't limited to just pinsetters or bowling though, it's everywhere. You just have to be informed and smart enough to realize it. I remember when I was in auto shop in high school. I was working on my mom's Lincoln for months trying to fix it. My auto shop teacher knew someone at Ford and obtained a book entitled "Things to diagnose the day after the warranty expires" I guess it's the good old American way.

[bowl1820]

pretty much every manufacturer has that information and can just about tell you to the day when a part will break.

Shoot the bean counters on a large construction project can tell you almost to the man, How many will die or be injured and how much it will cost the company.

But sometimes it's a trade off, you either use a cheaper part to keep costs down or use better parts and the cost goes up Then no one buys your product.

And some times you have to use a weaker part, because if you used a stronger one something more important breaks because of it. Then if you use a better one for that part the cost really goes up.

[boatman37]

Yep. Called Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF). Working in IT we use that quite a bit. We can use the vendors MTBF to try to determine when we need to start planning on replacing or having the required parts.

And in boating I use an aluminum propeller. Stainless is much more resistant to getting bent if you happen to bottom out but I would rather replace a $150 propeller than a $2000 repair to my outdrive. Same with building enginess. I used to use a weaker pushrod so if I had an issue with the valvetrain it would bend the $5 pushrod before it would break a $500 part.

[bdpeters]

yup sounds like the way it goes,

[Phonetek]

pretty much every manufacturer has that information and can just about tell you to the day when a part will break.

Shoot the bean counters on a large construction project can tell you almost to the man, How many will die or be injured and how much it will cost the company.

But sometimes it's a trade off, you either use a cheaper part to keep costs down or use better parts and the cost goes up Then no one buys your product.

And some times you have to use a weaker part, because if you used a stronger one something more important breaks because of it. Then if you use a better one for that part the cost really goes up.

LOL You're dammed if you do, dammed if you don't. Well from what I see here, this mechanic MAY try a cheaper part but he only gets one. If it works then he'll buy more. He did show me some universal joints that are plastic and 1/3 of the price that outlast the more expensive metal version. I guess you have to be open minded with this stuff and not only buy something because it costs more figuring it's better because in this case it wasn't true. Some of it is trial and error and in a case like those belts it's common sense. As for myself, I'm just going to listen carefully, watch and learn as much as possible because this guy knows his stuff.