Chinese knock-offs

Post Reply New Topic

Figured I’d start a thread to talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly of Chinese knock-offs.

There are some things that I find it’s a-okay to buy cheaply made, and others I’m not so sure I’d trust. Some tools are an okay value even if they’re not as good as the real deal, but other things that you have to trust with your life - like stilts for instance - I’m not so sure I wanna trust a Chinese knock-off brand.. sure, they’re 30-50% of the price, BUT, if they make them with inferior metals and something breaks someone could get severely injured or die. Mind you, according to Amazon they sell a lot of them and people tend to like them.. but who knows of they’ll stand the test of time like major brands? Hmm.

Anyways, I just ordered a couple of Chinese knock-offs of wooden balance boards with maze puzzles in the middle. You have to balance & move the board to move little wooden balls into the centre - makes balance workouts have a fun goal. Figured for around $30 each instead of $200-300 that if I have to do a little wood filling and sanding/finishing to make them smooth it’ll be fine. I mean, besides cheaping out on finishing, how badly could you screw up a wooden balance board? Unless maybe they’re tiny and the wood is very thin compared to the original.. whatever, in which case I’ll gift them to lightweight kids.

You have any success or failures ordering inexpensive Chinese knock-offs? Let’s hear ‘em!

_________________
No for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.

I'd rather spend the money on a known to be a good quality product than go through the hassle of dealing with something that's poorly made. Or find one that's used.

From where I came from, this is too common.

It's basically an art here -- to buy something of quality, while getting fractions of the original price.

Show Spoiler

The majority here doesn't have the means to buy anything with cost and quality...
And so many here would do the best out of something flimsy and cheap...

Or get lucky and find something worthy and cheap.
I dunno. The standard of living here is relatively low. So do standard of products.


Many here cannot truly discern between 'genuine quality' from 'expensive'.
Smart ones would find 'genuine quality' nevermind if it's 'cheap' or not.


So many here would go for something very cheap. And using it to it's fullest.
Some even do it as a business of buying and selling.

Gained Number Post Count (1).
Lose Time (n).

Lose more time here - Updates at least once a week.

I love Chinese knock-offs of music gear. Caline, JOYO and Mooer all have great products. My Caline CP-81 10 Band EQ cost $80, the MXR 10 band EQ that it's a clone of costs about double.

Not Chinese, but, my Arthur Guitar Sound clone of an SLO-100 preamp/X88R cost $300, whereas an actual Soldano X88R costs more like $3000. One was handmade in Bulgaria, the other is handmade in the USA. I'll take the Bulgarian one kthnxbai.

Not Chinese, but Korean I think. We’ve had really good luck with sets of Woosung and Nexen tires. I think Woosung became Nexen. Anyways, for brand new tires (I usually buy lightly used tires), they’re quite a bit cheaper than American brands and tend to grip the road just fine And last a long time - good value.

_________________
No for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.

Idk what's up with me, but I like buying things from outside of the USA. I look for buying things from China, Japan, UK, Germany, South Korea, any place you can name. I also don't mind buying things from the USA, but for some reason, I look for things from outside of the US.

I saw a whole channel of videos on YouTube of strange Chinese or Japanese knockoff toys. I found them fascinating. For example there's this one toy that sort of resembles Doremon (that blue robotic cat with no ears) that plays a drum, but then his face splits apart and underneath it's an elephant with flashing eyes and a moving trunk.

Lot of Chinese knock offs are just bootlegs items and they copy other products. Lot of their stuff is even fake so be careful when buying electronic or memory card stuff and video games since they tend to be bootleg. Also they use cheap material.

I try to avoid buying from China and Taiwan now. But it really depends on what I am looking for. I have gotten my son a Goodnight at Freddie's doll from there because it was under $5 and it looked okay. It looked like a real Freddie doll.

Chinese knock-offs of IKEA furniture are actually an improvement...and cheaper