India Tools

[Nikhil Bhale]

Near Satupura reserve? Or Melghat? Or am I looking in the wrong part of Maharashtra?

The next time I go to India, I hope I can visit more than just the Kerala area - I'd like to see more of the country, and taste more of the regional foods. (I LOVE the food!!!)

Near Melghat.

Rgrds
Nikhil

 

[Nikhil Bhale]

The problem is that the market in India is not very demanding of quality. And so the many hundreds of tool manufacturers there don’t have to try very hard to compete.

I think you are right in what you said.

But I think the real reason is that small industries and services are cheap and profit margins are low. So no one will buy expensive tools and further lower their profit margin. For example for about USD 10 service charge an auto service mechanic will overhaul a motorcycle engine in India but you have to pay more in developed countries.
I assume that the graph for quality of tool vs price is not a straight line (linear) graph. It will be an exponential graph. So for a little better quality you will have to pay a large amount of money. No one in India will accept that.

But large scale manufacturing units may go for quality. We have Widia, Sandvik, Izar, Tungaloy etc to supply those industries.

Regards
Nikhil

 

[Richard Hed]

A couple of observations: My undergraduate training is in electrical engineering, and I just retired from a 40-year medical practice, so I have had a great deal of interaction with Indian doctors and engineers. I found them without exception lovely human beings - friendly, thoughtful, hardworking, and SMART! Secondly, I have recently become "woke" to the threats that communists, socialists, and the like present to my country, so I am always looking for alternatives to Chinese goods, and while Indian machine tools are often not the best, I lean that way, since American-made tools are just so DARNED expensive. Thirdly, farmers in my area have gravitated in droves to Indian-made Mahindra farm machinery and without exception praise the value-per-dollar and the ruggedness. Right now I'm looking for a decent milling machine, and I'm looking first at Indian-made.

I thimk that Mahindra has had a recent improvement in quality--is that correct?

 

[Hrcoleman66]

I think you are right in what you said.

But I think the real reason is that small industries and services are cheap and profit margins are low. So no one will buy expensive tools and further lower their profit margin. For example for about USD 10 service charge an auto service mechanic will overhaul a motorcycle engine in India but you have to pay more in developed countries.
I assume that the graph for quality of tool vs price is not a straight line (linear) graph. It will be an exponential graph. So for a little better quality you will have to pay a large amount of money. No one in India will accept that.

But large scale manufacturing units may go for quality. We have Widia, Sandvik, Izar, Tungaloy etc to supply those industries.

Regards
Nikhil

You'd think so, but no. The three to four month life span of the Clutch Nut Wrench I refered to earlier (200 Rupees), will be extended to many years by a) using a better material and b) more reliable heat treatment, but the cost will only increase to about 1000 Rupees. Keeping in mind that the service centre in question is servicing upwards of 200 bikes a day.
There are two more factors to consider.
1. The OEM Service garage competes against the roadside shed or trailer that uses no special service tools (I saw one bike being serviced with the front wheel removed and the forks being supported by a screw driver.
2. If the service manager buys 4 or 5 tools at 200 Rupees, then they can be considered a consumable. They do not need to be accounted for as an asset. If he pays 1000 Rupees for a tool, it must be accounted for as an asset. I do not know for certain that this is a factor, but it may be.

But as I have said previously, no matter how hard we tried, we could not find the higher quality tool available in the Indian Market.

When we tried to obtain a sample for TVS for spark plug removal in the Overhead Cam bikes... gues where we had to go to find the cost effective solution?
China.

Cheers,

Hugh

 

[awake]

I quickly learned that what might be a reasonably travellable distance in half a day here in Australia, was generally a 2-3 day journey in India.

That was one of the big surprises to me when I was in India. From what I could see (maybe Nikhil will correct me!), part of the problem is that India really is big, and part of it is that the infrastructure often doesn't allow for an easy path from A to B. Some of the people I was working with were from the Nagaland (far northeast part of India), and invited me to visit there. I would have loved to ... but it would have taken a week or more of travel. Alternately, I could have flown from Kochi to Singapore, then to Guwahati, then travelled another day or two. At least at the time, there were apparently no flights directly from Kochi to Guwahati!

 

[Nikhil Bhale]

That was one of the big surprises to me when I was in India. From what I could see (maybe Nikhil will correct me!), part of the problem is that India really is big, and part of it is that the infrastructure often doesn't allow for an easy path from A to B. Some of the people I was working with were from the Nagaland (far northeast part of India), and invited me to visit there. I would have loved to ... but it would have taken a week or more of travel. Alternately, I could have flown from Kochi to Singapore, then to Guwahati, then travelled another day or two. At least at the time, there were apparently no flights directly from Kochi to Guwahati!

Yes you are quite correct. Roads in India leave a lot to be desired. We dont have world class roads but now we are taking baby steps in that direction.
Also flight connectivity is not extensive. Only 3 or 4 cities in every state are connected by air. But we do have extensive railway connectivity throughout India.

On other point one of my friend works for Mahindra Tractors in R&D department. He told me that they use mostly Sandvik tools in their machine shop.

Rgrds
Nikhil

 

[Hrcoleman66]

My wife and I did enjoy an 18 hour Train ride from Pune to New Delhi (about 2000 Km) when she came to visit. If ever you go to India, you absolutely HAVE to go somewhere by train. I recommend 1st Class AC (Air Conditioned), but I can see that traveling second or third class would be an experience all of its own.
(Notwithstanding the 13 hour delay in the train departing Pune... Another experience you have to have is sitting on a train platform playing "Uno" and have an armed guard tell you that you have to stop or be arrested... Oh, and another thing you learn while waiting for 13 hours on a train platform; The man with the whistle is king!)

Cheers,

Hugh

 

[Hrcoleman66]

I thimk that Mahindra has had a recent improvement in quality--is that correct?

Mahindra tractors are also quite popular here in Australia.

Cheers,

Hugh

 

[Richard Hed]

Mahindra tractors are also quite popular here in Australia.

Cheers,

Hugh

I saw Mahindra automobiles for sale in the Philippines. I was wondering if they wer3e selling krap to philippinos or if they were goo cars.

 

[Hrcoleman66]

There are three domestic (Four Wheeler) passenger vehicle manufacturers in India. Mahindra, Tata and Maruti (which is aligned with Suzuki). 2 in 5 small sedans on the road are Maruti. Mahindra and Tata export to South East Asia and Latin America. They are very much a "LOW COST" build. There is no luxury to be had in a base model and everything else is added extras and costs. If you get a taxi from the airport to your hotel rather than take an "Auto" (short for Auto-Rickshaw, otherwise known as a tuk-tuk) it's going to be a Tata, Mahindra or Maruti built version of a Suzuki Swift.

Again, for the low demands of the local market, they are perfectly fine.

The vast majority of the vehicles on the roads are two wheelers (small capacity Motorcycles), TVS, Bajaj and Royal Enfield. You will only see Royal Enfield outside of south east asia.

Cheers,

Hugh

 

[Hrcoleman66]

BTW, Mahindra, Bajaj and Tata have their fingers in lots of pies. Not only Automotive, but banking, Insurance and retail.
If you go to a Mall, you'll see foreign retail stores that have in small print on the logo/banner "A Tata Alliance" or "Marindra Alliance". Foreign businesses that want to set up in India have to align with a local company to to so.

Cheers,

Hugh

 

[kvom]

I once bought some India-made carbide endmills. They broke if I looked at them hard.

 

[goldstar31]

Much as I like the many fiends whom I have made in the Indian continent and the Far East, I think that stick with China. Yes Hong Kong is now in turmoil and a couple of us, one half Chinese sunk about half a bottle of good Scottish Western Isles malt whisky to recall happy memories- perhaps never to return.

Well, dam-mitt, I have enjoyed using a home made ENGLISH small dividing head on an ENGLISH lathe that has now an English DRO.

And they ALL work.

Norman

 

[deverett]

There are three domestic (Four Wheeler) passenger vehicle manufacturers in India. Mahindra, Tata and Maruti (which is aligned with Suzuki). 2 in 5 small sedans on the road are Maruti. Mahindra and Tata export to South East Asia and Latin America. They are very much a "LOW COST" build. There is no luxury to be had in a base model and everything else is added extras and costs. If you get a taxi from the airport to your hotel rather than take an "Auto" (short for Auto-Rickshaw, otherwise known as a tuk-tuk) it's going to be a Tata, Mahindra or Maruti built version of a Suzuki Swift.

Again, for the low demands of the local market, they are perfectly fine.

The vast majority of the vehicles on the roads are two wheelers (small capacity Motorcycles), TVS, Bajaj and Royal Enfield. You will only see Royal Enfield outside of south east asia.

Cheers,

Hugh

When I was in India (many, many moons ago) the taxis were all Indian built Fiat 1100 models from yesteryear. The 'Luxury' cars were Hindustans which were mid 1950s Morris Oxfords.

Dave
The Emerald Isle

 

[Hrcoleman66]

It was only about ten years ago that Royal Enfield redesigned the engine and running gear for the 350 and 500 cc "Bullet" based bikes. Up until then, they were still using the 1950s tooling that had been sent over from the plant in England.
The older bikes have a reputation for being much more reliable than the newer ones.

Cheers,

Hugh

 

[Richard Hed]

It was only about ten years ago that Royal Enfield redesigned the engine and running gear for the 350 and 500 cc "Bullet" based bikes. Up until then, they were still using the 1950s tooling that had been sent over from the plant in England.
The older bikes have a reputation for being much more reliable than the newer ones.

Cheers,

Hugh

I have an aquaintance (NOT a friend) who bought a Royal Enfield in the Philippines. He could not stop bragging about it and bought all brass this and that. He did , however, know bikes very well and he approved of this bike. I thimk it was in the 350 size.

 

[awake]

The older bikes have a reputation for being much more reliable than the newer ones.

I always wonder if part of the reason the older _____ (anything - fill in the blank) always seem more reliable than the new ones is that the older ones have been through natural selection - the crappy ones were scrapped long ago, and the exceptional ones are the ones that are left.

Of course, the situation varies widely across different types of items and different times. With regard to cars, for example, I wouldn't trade the reliability of my current cars for anything older. But I do remember the 70's, when everyone was suddenly trying to make more efficient cars ... at that time, some of the newer ones were definitely less reliable than the older ones. (Anyone remember the Vega??)

 

[Richard Hed]

I always wonder if part of the reason the older _____ (anything - fill in the blank) always seem more reliable than the new ones is that the older ones have been through natural selection - the crappy ones were scrapped long ago, and the exceptional ones are the ones that are left.

Of course, the situation varies widely across different types of items and different times. With regard to cars, for example, I wouldn't trade the reliability of my current cars for anything older. But I do remember the 70's, when everyone was suddenly trying to make more efficient cars ... at that time, some of the newer ones were definitely less reliable than the older ones. (Anyone remember the Vega??)

Yes, there are several variables at work, most of them with bell-shaped curves: quality by accident (that is, the ones on the high end of the bell shaped curve), the USA downturn in quality due to negligence on the part of the US manufacturors (1980s mostly) and of course, the present day competition to build cars that ARE NOT 3 year planned obsolescence, the new alloys, new materials and new techniques in making.

 

[awake]

With regard to other types of products, it may go this way: initial design is over-engineered, and priced accordingly; efforts to reduce cost result in varying quality of designs; finally (hopefully) a happy medium is reached. Or, technology is applied, resulting in early failures as the design is refined, but eventually resulting in dirt-cheap and highly reliable silicon ...

 

[Hrcoleman66]

I think with the case of the older Royal Enfields, it has a lot to do with the tranfser of the design from Cast Iron Cylinders and heads and vertical split crank/gear casings to Alloy Cylinders and Heads completely different crank/gear case architecture.