Rubber parts, are they all shit these days?

[DaveDorson]

The good weather means I've actually felt a bit less rubbish and started to do bits and bobs on the driveway ornament new beetle that's been off the road for half a decade.

Purchased some "OEM quality" steering rack boots as one has gone, and the new ones are utter turd, really thin in places compared to what came off and I hold no confidence that they'll not perish within a year so they've gone back to the local motor factor.

 

Apparently they sell loads of them..  yeah cos they fail every fucking year Kevin.. I'm not buying any sub standard shit so I can climb under the car again 12 months down the line because some twat thinks it fine to pedal sub standard shit to people.

*Grumble*

 

So does anyone make good rubber parts anymore or are they all shit?

 

Have an image of the offending automobile.

 

[twosmoke300]

Generally yea but if a listing says “ oem quality “ it’s a sure fire way of knowing it’s knock off chinese wank . 

[sutty2006]

Yes. Everything rubber now is shite. Wife’s works Astra is 4 years old and the tyres are date stamped 2018, all Michelin. All perished to fuck. Had them all replaced yesterday for continental. 
 

[sheffcortinacentre]

Yes no more to say.

[Andyrew]

1 hour ago, DaveDorson said:

Kevin

 some twat thinks it fine to pedal sub standard shit to people.

Yep, all aftermarket rubber products are shite. Ball joint boots especially. 

As a guy working a motorfactors Selling budget brands to known top brands, from my experience in more recent times the expensive stuff seems to fail just as much as the budget stuff.  Some brands do buck this trend but you have to try them over a longer duration.

And in defence of the guy

Kevin doesnt make the parts. He Only flogs them.  If it fails in sub 12 months and kevin and hes gives zero fucks about helping you with the issue then hes a twat, but hes only sourcing parts from a supplier that his shop has an account with.

 

 

[RoverFolkUs]

Febi bilstein tends to be decent if the part you need is available in that make

[twosmoke300]

Yeh and blueprint etc who are all part of the same company .

Moog bits are ok as well . 
 

Firstline and shafttec are terrible tho .

[cobblers]

Even the good stuff is shit. The bad stuff is really very very shit.

Talbot express exhaust hangers now last 3 weeks. If you look at the MOT history of my old one you'll see an advisory every year for the past 7 years for them. I've had (decent brand!) ball joint boots turn to mush in 6 months on a van stores indoors and only driven a couple of hundred miles.

[beko1987]

I had exhaust rubbers snap within a month on my blue laguna. When I fitted the 3rd set I reinforced it with wire around the whole thing to take the strain off them and it lasted until I scrapped the car many months later... 

Can't really do that with joint boots though 😂

[sutty2006]

Speaking of ball joints, we are seeing a lot of them failing due to split or holed covers. Especially fixed end ball joints on hydrolic steering rams that are 4 figures to buy. Last one that got knocked at work for a new ram got a lick of silicone in the hole to get it through MOT. 19 plate truck that had already had 1 new ram on it in the past 3 years. Lots of track rod ends failing for perished covers. Terrible. 

[RoverFolkUs]

Avon tyres are utter dog crap. The rubber resembles parmasan cheese. Usually surface cracks in the tread after a year, I had to replace a set of 4 with about 5mm front and 6mm rear recently because they were all cracked down to the cords, date code on them was 2018! 

[Timewaster]

Add it to the list of modern stuff that either dissolves in no time or just doesn't work. 

 

Paint stripper,  weed killer,  wood preservatives,  shed roof felt, epoxy glue. shoes.... 

 

Probably all 100 times better for the environment (apart from shipping it half way around the world instead of from a factory up the road), and much less likely to cause us any harm. 

And also a fraction of the price they used to be. 

Just a shame it doesn't work. 

See also, fizzy drinks that used to be nice and now taste like paint and bags of crisps that only have 6 crisps in them. 

 

[Popsicle]

I don't think the general publics liking for large wheels with low profile tyres helps the situation, particularly with the state of the roads. Motorways used to be fairly smooth roads, but most of them are dotted with potholes these days, highways will close a lane or two off, couple of bods will wack some tarmac down and seal it up, few days later the trucks have worn it out and broke it up again.

My vehicle usage is not normal, 100k miles a year, all the shocks, springs and rubber components are not up to the job. Cheap or branded heavy duty stuff still fails far to quickly for my liking and wallet.

I had Monroe shocks, springs and top mounts fitted last August, 8 months and 80k miles later and it sounds like one of ems fucked already. The Meyle heavy duty drop links fitted at the time, with a 4 year guarantee, didn't even last 6 months.

Wiper blades are shit too, 6 bloody months and their smearing the screen.

[RoverFolkUs]

47 minutes ago, Popsicle said:

I don't think the general publics liking for large wheels with low profile tyres helps the situation, particularly with the state of the roads. Motorways used to be fairly smooth roads, but most of them are dotted with potholes these days, highways will close a lane or two off, couple of bods will wack some tarmac down and seal it up, few days later the trucks have worn it out and broke it up again.

My vehicle usage is not normal, 100k miles a year, all the shocks, springs and rubber components are not up to the job. Cheap or branded heavy duty stuff still fails far to quickly for my liking and wallet.

I had Monroe shocks, springs and top mounts fitted last August, 8 months and 80k miles later and it sounds like one of ems fucked already. The Meyle heavy duty drop links fitted at the time, with a 4 year guarantee, didn't even last 6 months.

Wiper blades are shit too, 6 bloody months and their smearing the screen.

That's a lot of use though, 80k miles is sadly a life time for a lot of cars so I don't think that's an unreasonable amount of mileage for a shock absorber to last.

[Popsicle]

26 minutes ago, RoverFolkUs said:

That's a lot of use though, 80k miles is sadly a life time for a lot of cars so I don't think that's an unreasonable amount of mileage for a shock absorber to last.

I agree its a lot of miles, but over a short period of time, its easy miles, plodding up and down motorways all day. When I started couriering 30 odd years ago, suspension stuff did seem to last longer and be more resilient. I definitely wasn't changing shocks, springs, drop links, ball joints, wishbones etc every year. I was just having new bits of chassis welded on instead and topping up the oil constantly with Asda's finest 20/50 at £2.50 for 5 litres 😀.

[Barry Cade]

I read somewhere the other day that Goodyear is trialling using dandelions for rubber production...

 

Edit...

https://corporate.goodyear.com/us/en/responsibility/sustainable-sourcing/sustainable-materials.html

[twosmoke300]

9 hours ago, HarmonicCheeseburger said:

Brings me onto springs, I remember hearing that we cannot use certain chemicals for curing metal anymore, and hence we have springs snapping on moderns?

Not allowed to quench them in oil so I was told . 

[New POD]

10 minutes ago, twosmoke300 said:

Not allowed to quench them in oil so I was told . 

I'm sure any noxious fumes could be safely extracted and turned into baby follow On milk. 

The chemical industry is very clever of they try hard 

[DaveDorson]

14 hours ago, Andyrew said:

Yep, all aftermarket rubber products are shite. Ball joint boots especially. 

As a guy working a motorfactors Selling budget brands to known top brands, from my experience in more recent times the expensive stuff seems to fail just as much as the budget stuff.  Some brands do buck this trend but you have to try them over a longer duration.

And in defence of the guy

Kevin doesnt make the parts. He Only flogs them.  If it fails in sub 12 months and kevin and hes gives zero fucks about helping you with the issue then hes a twat, but hes only sourcing parts from a supplier that his shop has an account with.

 

 

I'm not blaming Kevin for the standard of the parts, but his shitty attitude of we sell loads of them (he even had the cheek to accuse me of not knowing how to fit them correctly) has meant they've now lost my business.   I checked my accounts earlier and over the last three years they've had £6k of parts out of me, not a huge account I know but still.. 

 

I have some Febi Bilstien ones arriving today for the car. 

[DaveDorson]

11 hours ago, RoverFolkUs said:

Avon tyres are utter dog crap. The rubber resembles parmasan cheese. Usually surface cracks in the tread after a year, I had to replace a set of 4 with about 5mm front and 6mm rear recently because they were all cracked down to the cords, date code on them was 2018! 

I stopped using Avon tyres after a similar experience when I had my 924.

[DaveDorson]

12 hours ago, beko1987 said:

I had exhaust rubbers snap within a month on my blue laguna. When I fitted the 3rd set I reinforced it with wire around the whole thing to take the strain off them and it lasted until I scrapped the car many months later... 

Can't really do that with joint boots though 😂

My exhaust rubbers all tend to get a hose clamp around them when fitting now.

[DaveDorson]

12 hours ago, HarmonicCheeseburger said:

Part of appeasing the whole save the environment scene is removing certain chemicals from use in making products, since we use synthetic rubber I assume granted without evidence synthetic rubber has suffered in it's quality.  

It's not really the environment we are trying to save though is it?  It's humanity.  We will cause an extinction level event at some point but the planet will keep doing it's thing long after we've fucked it up for ourselves.

Ignoring that though, because this is a motoring forum, and I don't really want to get drawn into an Internet row over climate change, it's not in any stretch sound to create products that fail prematurely and need people to consume more of them.  It helps no one.  

[Bren]

3 hours ago, twosmoke300 said:

Not allowed to quench them in oil so I was told . 

I used to use "Kasenit" to case harden steel. A black powder which gives of great clouds when hot. I believe it is banned now.

I had one of the SD1 rad hoses go crunchy - not what you would expect from rubber. Utter shite.

Is everything crap these days?

[SiC]

36 minutes ago, Bren said:

I used to use "Kasenit" to case harden steel. A black powder which gives of great clouds when hot. I believe it is banned now.

I had one of the SD1 rad hoses go crunchy - not what you would expect from rubber. Utter shite.

Is everything crap these days?

Looks like it's still available

https://www.mkmetals.co.uk/product/30-2-reusable-case-hardening-powder-granul-400g-ea/

Iirc it gives off small amounts of Cyanide when heated. 

[PhilA]

Someone I was talking to commented the same; he said he recalled cutting up old (so; old, used, punctured) bicycle inner tubes and turning them into the rubber pulls to make a slingshot.

Try that with modern rubber, pull it a few inches and it breaks like string cheese.

[twosmoke300]

4 hours ago, DaveDorson said:

I'm not blaming Kevin for the standard of the parts, but his shitty attitude of we sell loads of them (he even had the cheek to accuse me of not knowing how to fit them correctly) has meant they've now lost my business.   I checked my accounts earlier and over the last three years they've had £6k of parts out of me, not a huge account I know but still.. 

 

I have some Febi Bilstien ones arriving today for the car. 

Or as I call it - one months worth of sales 😂

[andyberg]

Yes rubber parts are shit now. Needed an exhaust hanger for the  beetle as it was clanging against the chassis, new OEM* one put on less than 6 months ago. Clanging is back. First picture of new hanger, second is what mine looks like after 5 months 😡😡

[Cookiesouwest]

50 minutes ago, andyberg said:

Yes rubber parts are shit now. Needed an exhaust hanger for the  beetle as it was clanging against the chassis, new OEM* one put on less than 6 months ago. Clanging is back. First picture of new hanger, second is what mine looks like after 5 months 😡😡

Thats terrible.

Take it back to Parrot

[meowmeow]

8 months this lasted, and to think it took the original steering rack boot something like 30yrs to get to the same state.

Been through 3 rubber carb flanges in the last 6 years, finally coughed up for a NOS part and the difference is mad - aftermarket parts leave the carb and filter housing flopping around so they split from fatigue in a matter of months, whereas with the original VW part it all stays solid.

Dread to think what engine mounts would be like....

[DaveDorson]

The Febi Bilstien ones that turned up are more a pu plastic type bellow than rubber, which is far more in keeping with OEM.  Fitted the one that had perished and torn and checked the CVs while under there, they're all good and suprise suprise are the same plastic type material as the steering bellow I just fitted, and are fine, probably 22 years old now..

That just leaves tyres and sills to do before I book it in for a test. 

Might even get back on the road this year 😂