Are there any regulators made in USA?

[Eric Sedletzky]

I know a guy who invented a shower mirror system that wouldn't fog up so you could shave in the shower. They sell them at Costco and other places.
Anyway, I did some work for him at his warehouse in Napa where he is based.
We had a discussion about manufacturing and costs, etc. He started off here in the states but soon realized there was no way he could do it here. I even saw some of his first moulds that he made for plastic injection moulding. They were for prototypes and test runs, etc.
He spent months over in China trying to set up the production with a plastic injection company. Every little detail had to be gone over. There were language barriers and understanding barriers about how these worked and what he wanted. It was a very difficult thing to set up and a lot of hand holding he said. Then final products needed to be tweaked and adjusted which basically means you start over. They don't always do what you specify if they think their way is better. It's no piece of cake to have stuff made there, it's a lot of work.
Finally he got what he wanted with a minimum if problems with the units but quality control he said is always an issue. You have to be on these guys constantly because they will cut corners behind your back. So with that much time and effort invested it becomes very difficult to think about bringing this stuff back here. The only benefit I could see would be being right there to manage quality control because the plant is basically down the street.
Even Elon Musk had to babysit the auto plant in Fremont (former Numi Toyota pick up plant) and slept on the floor in his office because of the extreme deadlines and pressure associated with making sure everything goes according to plan.
I used to get my plates laser cut pretty close to Tesla. You should see how many buildings they've taken over in a several mile radius of the main plant. Even my laser cutter does a lot if work for Tesla.

 

[Manatee Diver]

Finally he got what he wanted with a minimum if problems with the units but quality control he said is always an issue. You have to be on these guys constantly because they will cut corners behind your back. So with that much time and effort invested it becomes very difficult to think about bringing this stuff back here. The only benefit I could see would be being right there to manage quality control because the plant is basically down the street.

The other benefit is that they won't resell your product under a different name. As regardless of how rock solid you think your agreement is, Chinese Nationals are largely immune from foreign IP lawsuits.

Honestly reshoring is never going to be easy, as there are a lot of other industries that revolve around the actual making of the end product. It will take years and a lot of investment by the governments to do so. But at the same time it is a major risk being so dependent on a single country for our manufacturing. We saw what happened during COVID. At the very least we need to diversify things, with the best bringing back at least a bringing back some of it.

 

[cerich]

I know a guy who invented a shower mirror system that wouldn't fog up so you could shave in the shower. They sell them at Costco and other places.
Anyway, I did some work for him at his warehouse in Napa where he is based.
We had a discussion about manufacturing and costs, etc. He started off here in the states but soon realized there was no way he could do it here. I even saw some of his first moulds that he made for plastic injection moulding. They were for prototypes and test runs, etc.
He spent months over in China trying to set up the production with a plastic injection company. Every little detail had to be gone over. There were language barriers and understanding barriers about how these worked and what he wanted. It was a very difficult thing to set up and a lot of hand holding he said. Then final products needed to be tweaked and adjusted which basically means you start over. They don't always do what you specify if they think their way is better. It's no piece of cake to have stuff made there, it's a lot of work.
Finally he got what he wanted with a minimum if problems with the units but quality control he said is always an issue. You have to be on these guys constantly because they will cut corners behind your back. So with that much time and effort invested it becomes very difficult to think about bringing this stuff back here. The only benefit I could see would be being right there to manage quality control because the plant is basically down the street.
Even Elon Musk had to babysit the auto plant in Fremont (former Numi Toyota pick up plant) and slept on the floor in his office because of the extreme deadlines and pressure associated with making sure everything goes according to plan.
I used to get my plates laser cut pretty close to Tesla. You should see how many buildings they've taken over in a several mile radius of the main plant. Even my laser cutter does a lot if work for Tesla.

dude should have read this before he started in China. I did and it helped, but it is also why I avoid doing anything in China with one exception. Quality Bleed or Fade is a real thing, and it takes not just clear communication and leaving room for profit for the factory but also constant attention or it will happen

 

[NauticalNick]

Looks like Atomic reads the boards lol

 

[eightytwenty]

The way I understand it, Atomic 1st stages are MUSA, but the second stages are not.

 

[lexvil]

 

[-JD-]

The way I understand it, Atomic 1st stages are MUSA, but the second stages are not.

Given the Designed, Machined, and Assembled language, that leaves moulded components like the 2nd stage housing, diaphragm, plastic diaphragm rings, purge cover, etc. as possible imports.

As a reg "system" that is still arguably a predominantly USA product.


Even a Corvette, built in KY, is going to have a not-insignificant global content.

 

[eightytwenty]

Given the Designed, Machined, and Assembled language, that leaves moulded components like the 2nd stage housing, diaphragm, plastic diaphragm rings, purge cover, etc. as possible imports.

As a reg "system" that is still arguably a predominantly USA product.

Predominantly sure, probably the closest to truly being "Made in USA" in the thread. However, our friend @Eric Sedletzky asked for:

scuba regulators that are made solely in the US, from materials to machining to final assembly?

Which Atomics are not. Still fine regulators if you like pistons, but not solely MUSA.

Even a Corvette, built in KY, is going to have a not-insignificant global content.

Sure, but these are entire second stages we're talking about. Essentially half of what AA makes is MUSA, the rest gets shipped in from elsewhere.

At the end of the day, it's not really that big a deal. Taiwan has pretty excellent machining capabilities, and although it would be cool to support a MUSA brand, I've never had any issue with any of the Taiwanese-built regulators I've owned, and the truth is that most folks won't unless the company they're buying from has QA issues. CNC mills are gonna shave metal the same here as they would in Taipei.

 

[lowwall]

The US has a very high standard for a business to lawfully use the term "Made in the USA". If those B2 second stages weren't actually made in the US, Atomics is risking FTC action.

Here's the pertinent regulation, 16 CFR 323.2:

"In connection with promoting or offering for sale any good or service, in or affecting commerce as “commerce” is defined in section 4 of the Federal Trade Commission Act, 15 U.S.C. 44, it is an unfair or deceptive act or practice within the meaning of section 5(a)(1) of the Federal Trade Commission Act, 15 U.S.C. 45(a)(1), to label any product as Made in the United States unless the final assembly or processing of the product occurs in the United States, all significant processing that goes into the product occurs in the United States, and all or virtually all ingredients or components of the product are made and sourced in the United States."

Compare that to, for example, Switzerland. For a watch to qualify as "Swiss Made", it only requires that 60% of the manufacturing costs and 50% of the essential manufacturing step must occur in Switzerland.

 

[rsingler]

CNC mills are gonna shave metal the same here as they would in Taipei.

True. And this has given us a lot of value performance. But three things muck that up.
1) Is the metal billet the same alloy as would have been used here? There are lots of brasses.
2) Taiwan has its own profit margin challenges. There is a LOT of subcontracting over to mainland PRC for a Taiwanese product.
3) PRC adherence to spec is zero if there are savings in a cheaper sub-component. And they may not even tell you.
So unless you pay someone to watch the assembly line in Taiwan, and pay a second someone to watch the subs, and have a separate QC function at assembly, there will be all sorts of variance. And with those people's salaries, there goes your pricepoint.

For DIY'ers, no big deal. Buy a replacement widget, grumble a little and install it. But for someone who wants a quality reg with the machining burrs removed, the torques correct and the second stage tuned (because it's a drop ship product to you), you're gonna get about 70% of it right. And in a half percent or so, you're gonna receive a problem reg that you'll be sending back.
So, one in two hundred buyers. And one in fifty of those is a ScubaBoard member. So we hear about one in ten thousand of the everyday problems of buying an import over the Internet and expecting to jump straight into the water. Heck, even my Scubapro regs arrive out of tune straight from the box, but they have a dealer to do final QC. Which is why Deep6 is so special to me - they QC everything before it's mailed.

Like I said, if you're DIY, no big deal. But everyone else?