Cracked Wheel Inserts? We've got you covered

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Dave

 

Interesting Dave. You bought 1x piece of each size from Ricambi America earlier this year, Feb 4th to be exact --- I assume for the sole intent of copying?

 

I think that given copyrights are, and should be respected, however..no one here is from Ferrari SPA... and competition is good. I buy from both vendors and need good competition as a buyer.

Most of us who lurk on here, and do our OWN WORK, need deals to begin with. Look at the BMW guys. They have very nice high end cars, although not F class obviously minus the I8 and M1, you don't see the vendors on that side of the fence garbling up about competition. Think UMNITZA vs everyone else out there.

I am a firm believer in quality goods and competition help the community.

This is an item that had little competition.

I would love it if other vendors even would produce more parts. Look at Hill. You don't see anyone griping that he makes parts that Ferrari does..

It's all perspective.

He my have done this innocently as he stated, I can't imagine any other scenario on a rather inexpensive part.

If I can buy a quality part for less (Like my Challenge grill, see my post about that) there was a guy in Italy selling aftermarket ones that are exact to OEM (they come from same shop even..) and a distributor here got all in a huff that I was broadcasting a saving of over $400.

To each his own, but I don't see why Dave should be persecuted for doing what everyone has been doing since the trade wars on the silk road.

 

Is Ferrari taking a Honda NSX to study it and improve its product before releasing the F355 to the world acceptable?

Nothing I can see wrong in this offering. It's business. The only unique thing about the HE inserts were that they were the only ones available outside of a Ferrari peice. Now there is competition which brings down the price to a more reasonable level. As a consumer can't see anything wrong with that. And I have spent a fortune on HE products via Ricambi so happy to support both sponsors.

I think sponsors should keep the bickering behind closed doors. It doesn't look good for them.

 

Free markets benefit from competition, and ultimately the consumer wins. If Hill Engineering has a product that was publicly offered for sale, and somebody buys it and comes up with a better, cheaper solution and brings it to market, well guess what....... that is the free market at work! If Hill doesn't like it, they can come up with a cheaper better product themselves.

This is Darwinism baby. Are people so naive as to think that Michael Dell never bought an Apple computer to study and dissect so Dell Corp could in turn build a better product? Welcome to the real world. Evolve or die.

 

I work for a manufacturer that supplies many different product categories all over the car for the OE market and for the aftermarket. The strategy is completely different for both of these sales channels, but the strategies can be complementary if executed properly.

Most of the products that we supply to the aftermarket offer some subtle improvements over and above the original design. In most cases, these re-engineered features are to provide a better product for our customers and to ensure that we avoid any patent minefields that may exist. In a lot of cases, patents expire and are not renewed by the OE given the ability of the aftermarket to supply the product and the OE's desire to de-commission their tooling after end of life and buy from OE/aftermarket suppliers under an OE service agreement.

In the aftermarket, it's a common practice to have multiple supplier manufacturing the same OE replacement parts with subtle differences.

I think competition is a good thing as long as there aren't any copyright and/or patent infringements and that all of the vendors that play in this space offer value to the community.

 

No different than what dave did to sticky no more, right?

IF that was ok, then this is ok.

If that's not ok, then neither is this, and vice versa.

Free market, right?

Personally, I guess I'd like to see sponsors here play nice, but if they don't well, hell, that's the way to ball bounces.

D

 

I recently had my F355 wheels refinished at a shop in Ohio. They wanted to charge me $20 for each insert. And I had at least 15 to be replaced. That was a lot of cash. I asked them to take a harder look and we agreed at around a $10 cost each.

I'm all about saving cash where I can but I also believe in paying for the right product with the right support.

That is obviously going to vary from person to person on individual experiences and needs.

Hopefully competition will push for better service and better products. Grievances should be worked-out outside of F-chat. We really don't need any more drama in here. I have both Ricambi and Dave on speed dial for items and service and guess what, neither were on my list for those inserts. I dealt with the expert shop handling the wheels. That worked out fine for me.

This just can't be a giant market to really worry about is it, or will the masses be buying popcorn?

Robb

 

I'm also into manufacturing in the scientific industry currently.
We don't patent our designs we want competition or technology stagnates. Were not knucklescrapers.

Products need to be improved upon
Competition is good

Old stagnant same old ways is not the future, it just makes you smelly.

More in the pool the better the party

 

My 2 cents, if Dave can offer a better product for a lower price that's great. He talked me through a bunch of things during my major and it's obvious he's a freak for small details. I'm sure all of his stuff is top quality.

If you're going to branch out into some of the Hill type stuff, and why not it would be great to have a U.S. manufacturer, why not change the name of that line to something other than StickyRX? It doesn't look right on a wheel insert and doesn't sound like something that's Ferrari quality to someone that doesn't know you.

Maybe also sell the stuff through the likes of Ricambi and Ferrparts and everyone is happy? I'm sure they sell competing brands of other things. After all they're just resellers and not manufacturers.

 

Since Dave is a sponsor, he is within his rights to make whatever he wants and offer them here for sale directly. Were he not a sponsor, he'd be in a lot of hot soup with Rob. I also am interested in lower cost alternatives for miscellaneous Ferrari replacement parts when and wherever I can source them.

That said, it appears tacky to me to purchase a Hill part from Ricambi for the purposes of copying it for profit. It would have been a better story if the 2 parts bought from Ricambi actually were bought for use. I do not have an issue with taking a factory part off a Ferrari and then copying it. It doesn't look good to source a part from a competitor and fellow sponsor for the purposes of offering a competing product, even if that part was designed and produced by yet another manufacturer (Hill in this case).

Bottom line: no issue with offering a better part, but bad practice to take the template from an other vendor(s).

Those are really pretty, Dave, regardless.

 

Applause

This is a very simple design nothing innovative about it. Saying you copied a thrust washer is a far reach.

~Sponsors must act like gentleman PERIOD.

~It is extreme bad taste IMHO for sponsors to post and disrespect or badmouth each other.

~Days of exclusively are over in our world, the sooner we accept it we can go full steam ahead.

~forum members, they get way too heavy also with the sponsors. When I see that it simply makes me fell that person has deeper issues.

I'm a peaceful person.

 

We work in this space as well. We provide security, authentication, and anti-counterfeiting solutions to parts like this, as well as luxury goods. One of the big differentiators is that we are preventing someone from selling an inferior part as a superior branded part, especially for things like car parts or other things that can fail in a catastrophic or untimely manner, putting the user at risk. So we see things like this all the time and the need to protect intellectual property and make sure people are getting what it is they're actually paying for.

This is a little different. This is an evolution of something rather basic. You can't patent a basic washer or insert. You can improve it in a ton of ways, though. If you take Dave at this word, and I don't see any reason not to, he bought something from Daniel in good faith and realized that it was not as good as it could be. He's an engineer. I work with a bunch of engineers. They can't help themselves. If they can make it better, they will make it better. As everyone else said, not only is it a knock off of a knock off but the reality is that competition is better for the community.

Daniel is a truly valuable part of the community. He has done a ton to give us access to parts cheaper, more quickly, and better parts where available. That's a big deal and for anyone to say otherwise, they're kidding themselves.

Ultimately, however, Daniel is not Dave's competitor; Hill Engineering is. That's where the bulk of the problem lies. Does Daniel buy what sounds like better engineered and manufactured products from Dave and offer them alongside HE's (although I would suspect there's an underlying sales agreement and contract in place preventing something like that not to mention Dave might not go for that), or does he urge Hill to make something on par with Dave's at that same price point? Or does he say that his part is better, stick with it, and it's a free for all?

There are a lot of issues here and it's complicated. And a lot of fighting isn't good for the community as a whole.

I will add this. Dave's answer to this as an engineer is to make a better part. Well, Daniel has ammunition, too. He can lower the price of his parts in response. That's how a free market works and there's nothing wrong or unethical about that.

 

Much ado over nothing. If the market were big enough we'd be buying inserts for $1.00 from China.

 

I thought Dave took a shot at making the F355 a/c panel overlay after being dissatisfied on what was available in the market. The old overlay was not correct in font usage, or line weight. Ferrari did not offer an overlay for this piece.

So now Dave supplies a true "re-original" for the a/c overlay that owners can use for their restorations and it's actually accurate. I know he spent a lot of time, money, and effort to produce those. He sells them for less than the cost of the first one available.

That caused the original manufacturer of the overlay to redo theirs AND lower the price.

Perhaps it is the same case here.

I've been extremely pleased with his work and know that he's out to do things right rather than for the quick buck.

Robb

 

When HILL copied SKF tensioner bearing and made a better product everyone was happy.
So whats the problem when Dave made a better cheaper product? All the power to him.

 

On a semi related point. I caught a bucket of **** here years ago when I was a sponsor for simply suggesting that the parts I got from another sponsor weren't quite as great as they led buyers here to believe.

When I asked them to back up their claim of high quality by replacing the parts, they told me I had installed them wrong and to essentially pound sand.

sooo... what do SPONSORS think of this? Therein lies your answer.

Dave M

 

That's the truth! How many of these are even sold in a year nationally?

I don't see the issue. Dave bought a part he needed. Realized it could be improved upon, made those changes, and offered the community an alternative.

Like so many have pointed out, this is a perfect example of free market capitalism.

Honestly, I doubt this is the last of the sort from Dave.

 

Dave

May I interest you in Ganesh CNC and lathes? If you are in the market, let me know and hopefully I can get you a good deal.

Good luck with the new product BTW

 

Those inserts used by the factory are Speedline parts...

Something that no one makes and you cannot get(even from Speedline) are the CH style for the 355 Challenge Wheels......

The CH ones look like the 308 inserts with a groved/ribbed edge but are a different size
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