Ever Buy Counterfeit Valves?

The biggest beef that I have concerning valves..........is that valves that come from India and China can have asbestos packing...........and you can purchase asbestos in any form from these two countries.

Whilst the work I did in my earlier years was always with asbestos packing and jointing materials, which I might add did the job extremely well.............the use of asbestos is now, in many countries, including Australia, is banned.

Asbestos jointing material from India. Quote "Made from excellent asbestos fibres............"

And from China.........."We can supply you all grades of asbestos..........."

Apart from manufacturing some extremely shoddy valves, in both countries, they still persist in using asbestos.

As an ex-Quality Manager of a large valve manufacturer in the South African water supply industry, the influx of Indian, Chinese and Eastern European manufactured valves, especially in the smaller sizes (50NB to 250NB) were hard to beat pricewise and, with certain brands, qualitywise with our local manufacture. Many however, were not of good quality and clearly there were the reverse-engineered, unlicensed 'knock-offs' to be avoided. I suggest that the best approach is to buy from the manufacturer directly (either from their factory outlets or their authorised distributors, rather than from "industrial supplies traders and stockists", and get to know them well and develop proper procurement strategies and controls in partnership with them.

In the vacuum pump industry there a several "Chinese knock-offs" being marketed in the US and EU. Valves are not the problem, the whole pump has been copied. Back engineered versions of the Edwards small EM series and of their large industrial Stokes Microvac pumps are in the market. I am not sure how successful they are in selling them, even at the lower prices of the OEM.