PDA

View Full Version : American made small engines SUCK



Gabriel
08-19-2019, 12:47 PM
Yep. So un-AMerican coming from a greasy redneck...it's disgusting. Shame on me.

I've heard all the BS lies people tell themselves....Japan stole technology from us. They reverse engineered all our accomplishments and blah blah blah....keep laboring under that delusion.


Today's rant. 14hp Briggs powered generator. First off...the intake manifold must be taken off just to get the carb off. WTF! What lazy union labor gumby thought that was a good idea?
Anyway...Finally got it running good enough....FAR cry from Honda smooth I'll tell you that.

Then I run into this.
WHO put the oil filler neck and the dipstick under the gas tank and behind the panel that houses the electrical plugs where you cannot possibly get to them?
I had to take my zip saw and cut an opening to get to the dipstick. No way to get to the filler neck without taking off the gas tank. I can use a long funnel to add oil I suppose. *sigh*
I really want to buy American. I don't WANT to choose Toyota over Ford. Give me something that's not an engineering turd and I'll come back. Until then...pour me some Saki.

https://i.imgur.com/sVPvDVR.jpg

El Camexican
08-19-2019, 02:36 PM
I doubt B&S uses union labor in their engineering department. You can probably chalk stuff like that up to someone with a store bought engineering degree that’s never had dirt under his nails, or the infamous "Take the unit to your nearest authorized dealer" trend of the past 50 years or so.

Gabriel
08-19-2019, 03:00 PM
Yeah, I was more so just bitching and mouthing off (still no love for unionized labor though). You just don't see this kind of nonsense on Japanese engines. Not with any amount of frequency.

My FJ is an '07 and I'm still finding little details where someone actually stopped what they were doing and THOUGHT about it for a minute.
Like the oil filter. It's mounted almost upside down. More domestic engines with filters in positions similar just leave you to make a mess. The Japs cast an aluminum cup for the filter to sit in and there's a nifty little drain plug with a rubber cap on it. Pull the filter and let it make a mess...no biggie. Take a dixie cup under the aluminum cup and drain oil you just spilled. Wipe off the mating surface. Done. Very cool. VERY easy to get to. Only reason to be on the ground is for the drain plug itself. There's a skid pan covering everything with a nice pop out plastic cover.

83ATC185
08-19-2019, 04:36 PM
Ive had two push mowers with B&S engines. The first one cracked where it mounted to the deck after only 6 hours of use. I figure it must've been defective, so i got another one, it smoked when it was brand new. Required the use of straight 30wt oil out of the box. Smoked and knocked every time you cranked it, until it warmed up. Total loss lubrication system "Just add oil" which you did every other time you used it. That mower lasted for a year and a half before the engine case cracked in exactly the same way the first one did, the mounting area is 1/16" cast aluminum.

So I bought a troy bilt with a honda engine (GCV160?). Starts easier, makes more power, runs smoother, uses ZERO oil, and half the gas. Cranked the first time i pulled it after putting gas and oil in it, and has cranked the first time I've pulled it all summer long. A 90 year old woman could crank this thing. I'll never go back to a lawnmower with a briggs.

My sisters old infinity had an "upside down" mounted oil filter with a cup to catch all three drops of oil you spilled when you unscrewed the filter.

Compared to my truck oil change procedure which goes like "snake arm up through crossmembers and around hoses/wire. unscrew filter blind. let oil run down engine, wires, hoses, arm and into mouth, finish unscrewing filter and let it fall out of your oily fingers and into the bucket where it splashes everything within 2 ft with hot oil.

Some things are just designed better.

schlepp29
08-19-2019, 05:18 PM
You know it's a damn shame that these Briggs motors are bad like that. I remember the old ones being descent if my memory serves me well. I got one on my wood splitter I bought new in like 03 ish. Fortunately its been still good. But that's been a long time ago. I'm sure there crap now.

plastikosmd
08-19-2019, 05:57 PM
My old 16hp single is a tough bugger, but that one is older than me

ironchop
08-19-2019, 06:32 PM
I think your beef is with Engineers and not so much Union labor

Plus I've never met a Union engineer, however I've met a dozen engineers who are complete knuckleheads

Sent from my Z958 using Tapatalk

ironchop
08-19-2019, 06:42 PM
Part 2:

Obsolescence is the point. This giant Materialism machine can't keep chugging along unless you keep buying stuff. The quicker it breaks, the more of them they sell.

Have you purchased any LED bulbs lately?

Five years ago, my new LED bulbs lasted three years. I bought two different brand boxes six months ago and they are all already blown. I just put a new doghouse on an Altima.... What a cheap POS. Everything is plastic or paper thin steel. Everything is a POS. Nothing is built to last.

And if it is, nobody wants it because it costs too much. Better to enrich foreign labor and management than your own domestic friends and neighbors like me who depend on manufacturing jobs to feed our families.

Pretty much why I told my boss today that I'm leaving machining/manufacturing for good effective ASAP. I'm done fighting the rising tide of unappreciative fellow Americans who didn't give two sh*ts that their beloved NAFTA destroyed my career and my source of income as well as that of hundreds of thousands of others. Thirty years down the drain while everyone cries about tariffs or the rising prices of cheap asian goods because who friggin cares about the guy who spent thirty years of his life devoted to learning what used to be a noble trade only to be shouted down by the folks with little patience and little respect for one another.... So I'm done.... My wages have remained flat for more than twenty years. Meanwhile executive and investor compensation have skyrocketed and when the consumer demands cheaper crap, the cuts come to everyone in the bottom... Specifically from my paycheck.

Nobody has any respect for those of us in the manufacturing trenches who went from being the most important in the country to the most disregarded and loathed. A person works with what he's given and chances are, he's making junk because he's been instructed to make junk. Junk is what everyone demanded. Junk delivered to their door overnight by drone.....on credit.... No payments for 90 days junk. Delivered by the post office on a Sunday junk. So junk is what we get now.






Sent from my Z958 using Tapatalk

Gabriel
08-19-2019, 06:57 PM
I think your beef is with Engineers and not so much Union labor


Maybe for this particular instance but Unions suck too. They hold companies by the balls and stifle growth. You can't fire deadbeats without miles of red tape. Its BS.
There was a time many moons ago when Unions served a purpose. Employers abused workers and workers had little recourse. You cannot get away with that much any more. In 10 minutes you can have it all over social media and TV news eat that stuff up. It still happens and will ALWAYS happen but VERY VERY little of it.

I'm 42 and have had zero issues keeping a job since I was 15. Go to work, do what you're told and keep out of work place politics. Make yourself valuable to your employer by being worth more than he pays you. Then, the only reason you'll lose a job is if your employer is a loser and can't run a profitable company. I've never once seen a need to pay dues to a group of people to keep my job. I've worked one job that a union. I told them to pound sand and if they ever went on strike, I would walk right past them and go to work. Thankfully, TN is a Right To Work State. The way it should be.

Funny, I used to be on fire about this. As time passes and I get older....the more I really don't give a crap about it either way. LOL!

ironchop
08-19-2019, 07:18 PM
I don't belong to a union, so I don't care either way.

I will say this though...I get new kids fresh out of trade school all the time who are all excited because a trade school recruiter filled their heads with lollipops and fantasy about what kind of money they will make.... Kids today think $18/hr is easy livin... The Machinist kids? I tell them to get a job fixing air conditioners instead. It pays $10/hr more than what Machinist will make. The welder kids? I tell them to go Union pipeline/pipefitter and never look back. If you want to make any money as a welder, you need a Union job or own your own rig. Otherwise, a robot will have all your jobs very soon. These kids pee themselves when I shoot down their utopian fantasies. American manufacturing is nearly dead and you can thank globalism, Congress acting in behalf of big business, and an apathetic attitude on the part of the American consumer for it's demise.



Sent from my Z958 using Tapatalk

atctim
08-20-2019, 09:05 AM
I've heard all the BS lies people tell themselves....Japan stole technology from us. They reverse engineered all our accomplishments and blah blah blah....keep laboring under that delusion.




I am nearly positive you are confusing Japanese with Chinese. Japanese are known for their own awesome engineering that is far superior to American engineering. Chinese on the other hand do not observe copyright laws, and their idea of "R&D" is "Recover and Duplicate". One of my biggest pet peeves is when people confuse Chinese and Japanese goods. It blows my mind. Chinese goods = cheap crap 1/4 the price of American goods. Japanese goods = super high quality. Remember the names Honda and Toyota - Americans have been trying to duplicate their manufacturing processes for 50 years now. Chinese are known for their terrible quality and copyright infringements.

Unions is a discussion for another time - but I am so anti-union it would make your head spin. Unions have ruined so much - and no, not just manufacturing. Answer me this question (and by the way, I've asked several teachers this) - why do teachers need a union? And did I recently hear that NFL players are in a Union too? They need a union because???????????

schlepp29
08-20-2019, 09:28 AM
Back in the day of coal mining unions were very needed. Because of safety and unfair wages. Probably not needed as much now days. I belonged to the United steelworkers union for 14 years and that company shut the doors on us. But yes China makes crap

ironchop
08-20-2019, 12:46 PM
- why do teachers need a union?

Well here in Kentucky, it's an extension of the Democratic Party of Kentucky and therefore teachers like to do "sick outs" where a bunch of them call in sick to work which sometimes shuts down schools and then go to the statehouse in Frankfort to protest in the lawn whatever the progressive nonsense of the week happens to be...... all on my tax dime. How do I know this? Because my kid is one of those teachers..... See you can't do organized suck outs at any other career in America (except the National F*kwad League) without getting your butt fired, so the purpose of the Union for teachers here in Kentucky appears to be to keep them from getting fired for calling in fake sick to do political work (which is a MASSIVE conflict of interest for ANY public employee)



Sent from my Z958 using Tapatalk

Gabriel
08-20-2019, 12:54 PM
so the purpose of the Union for teachers here in Kentucky appears to be to keep them from getting fired

Sent from my Z958 using Tapatalk
Seems to be a reoccurring theme throughout all Unions regardless of the employee's actual value to a company.


Be interesting to see what could theoretically be done with someone like say..General Motors if all Unions were snatched and useless lazy "that's not my job" people were fired on the spot.

Arky-X
08-20-2019, 01:55 PM
I am nearly positive you are confusing Japanese with Chinese. Japanese are known for their own awesome engineering that is far superior to American engineering.

American and Japanese engineers staged a contest to see who could make the smallest widget possible. The Americans made the smallest round widget they could made with the finest toughest metal they had and sent it to the Japanese.
The Japanese drilled a hole in it and sent it back.

Arky-X
08-20-2019, 02:04 PM
It's hard to find anything that ain't crap. I would pay the extra money but it is seldom out there.

I have 3 attic fans in my house that go through the top of the roof. All 3 went out over 2 summers and one had wiring so weak around it, squirrels found their way in (that's another story for the Pied Piper.)
Got tired of climbing on top of the roof, removing shingles and putting another in place. Finally, after some digging and calling, a company sold some attic fans made in Germany. I shelled out the 3x the cost of the Chinese Home Lowes Depot crap and WOW!.....you could tell just looking at it how well it was made. That's been at least 4 years ago and those things are still churning and move some air.

Like ironchop said; obsolescence

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D56nut_9e8s

ironchop
08-20-2019, 05:32 PM
....

Compared to my truck oil change procedure which goes like "snake arm up through crossmembers and around hoses/wire. unscrew filter blind. let oil run down engine, wires, hoses, arm and into mouth, finish unscrewing filter and let it fall out of your oily fingers and into the bucket where it splashes everything within 2 ft with hot oil.

Some things are just designed better.

LMAO! Amen!

You forgot the part where, after the oil change, your entire engine bay smokes and pollutes the air until all the old used oil you spilled on the motor and associated components finally burns off.... By next Tuesday.

Sent from my Z958 using Tapatalk

Dirtcrasher
08-23-2019, 09:57 PM
It's hard to find anything that ain't crap. I would pay the extra money but it is seldom out there.

I have 3 attic fans in my house that go through the top of the roof. All 3 went out over 2 summers and one had wiring so weak around it, squirrels found their way in (that's another story for the Pied Piper.)
Got tired of climbing on top of the roof, removing shingles and putting another in place. Finally, after some digging and calling, a company sold some attic fans made in Germany. I shelled out the 3x the cost of the Chinese Home Lowes Depot crap and WOW!.....you could tell just looking at it how well it was made. That's been at least 4 years ago and those things are still churning and move some air.

Like ironchop said; obsolescence

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D56nut_9e8s

Everything I have ever bought or used that was German made, was an amazing piece of work and superior to everything else.

Those boys know how to make things....

As far as anything being made like a POS these days, just remember that the CEO and CFO plan on their millions of dollar bonuses if they can cut down material or labor costs.

If you were promised a massive bonus, you'd probably do it too....

sledcrazyinCT
08-23-2019, 10:20 PM
American and Japanese engineers staged a contest to see who could make the smallest widget possible. The Americans made the smallest round widget they could made with the finest toughest metal they had and sent it to the Japanese.
The Japanese drilled a hole in it and sent it back.

Germans probably weren't participants in this contest.....

El Camexican
08-23-2019, 10:38 PM
Everything I have ever bought or used that was German made, was an amazing piece of work and superior to everything else.

Those boys know how to make things....

I’m gonna go out on a limb and assume that you’ve never owned a Mercedes.

Gabriel
08-24-2019, 05:07 AM
German engines are AWESOME......until they’re not.
When they’re not; Oh boy.

El Camexican
08-24-2019, 09:12 AM
German engines are AWESOME......until they’re not.
When they’re not; Oh boy.

My engine was a rock, but everything bolted to it was junk. The only scenario that has me buying another one involves me winning the lottery, buying a new one and piloting it through the window of the dealership with The song “Balls to the Wall” playing at max volume.... that is of course assuming that the stereo is functioning.