Quote:
Originally Posted by davischevy
Is anybody ready for American made antibiotics?
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Your timing was good with this one Larry. Pretty sure I don't want the China made cure for what is ailing our country at the moment.
After we went full blown shelter in place here, my boy was losing it a little bit. Not getting out to ride with his buddies, no school, no girls.
It was tough seeing him get down.
We built his bike ramp and he has been using it a lot but he had wanted to also change up some parts on his BMX bike as well. I hate to ever turn to retail therapy and hate even more to teach it to my kids but this has been a bit of an exception for the last few weeks. He needed something to do and it needed to be something to build him up a little.
We had already popped for a frame for Christmas for him. A bigger BMX frame that suited his 6'2" height. He was 5'0" when he got his last one in '15. The frame is called "The Tallboy" by S&M in Santa Ana. Yes manufactured in So Cal. I happily paid a couple of extra bucks on this purchase.
Fast forward to 3/25 or so. I can tell that he wants to trick out that Tall Boy frame with some cool parts while we are on lockdown here. I ask him to put together a parts list which he quickly does in 15 minutes, maybe less. I look at the list and ask him to refine the list by country of manufacture which he also does but I can tell that he wants to ask why.
The second draft of the list showed most of the parts to be made in China. I asked him to revise the list again and search for the same, equivalent or better parts to replace the first list but the stipulation was that NONE of the parts could be made in China. This time he asked why and the short explanation from me was that China was the main reason that we were on lockdown now and looking for BMX parts to pass the time. I knew that he didn't fully understand but he wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
What he came up with was as follows;
S&M Twitchforks Santa Ana
S&M Perfect 10s (Bars) Santa Ana
Profile Cranks - Florida
Safari Seat and post - UK
Front and Rear Wheelsets - Taiwan (although they won't won't claim to be part of china) and they're pretty high quality.
All in all, we spent likely +150 for trying to keep it mostly local or US friendly. He was able to see the difference in quality between the new parts vs. the old "pacific rim" parts and he also understood that I make my money from people just like S&M and Profile when they build factories, offices or housing here. One hand washes the other.
He's pretty proud of his bike now and has even pointed out other parts that he's found that are made here. Although my wallet is still recovering from the first round of BMX hotroding, it was a lesson well learned and researched by him. Tuition money well spent on my end
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