Some mildy interesting information about ISIS exhausts

[AJ PwR]

Most likely, this supplier from Alibaba could be the manufacturer of ISIS. I am not surprised if they are trying to be greedy to sell their customer products direct to the market. Just like the story about HI-PHONE 5 vs Iphone 5 in China !

[blu_]

Originally Posted by SkullWorks

well...without a design patent or a Non Disclosure or Proprietary info agreement, or a non compete clause...it won't matter

and even if it did you aren't going to get a conviction or even court time in china...their major export is stolen technology and knockoffs...

The Chinese only enforce patent infringement if the "victim" is a Chinese company. If you are foreign they don't give a shit.

[RYU]

EDIT TO ADD: Oh, and vote Romney. Give American companies a better chance. (Sorry for the plug. I love our country)

ISIS has probably already threatened the Chinese supplier to not sell to anyone else or lose their ISIS business and after reading this thread.

I came across this phenomenon when visiting SEMA in 2009. A California based individual contracted a company in China to copy a popular GT-One v5.1 NSX Exhaust from Japan (~$3-4k) to be copied in China. Since there are few patent/copyright laws in China (though getting better now) they showcased this product at SEMA barely even knowing what car it was for. I asked about it and was quoted $250 per unit with a min order of 10 units.

I put in an order for 20 units since I had 15 friends willing to buy and thought selling the last 5 was a no brainer. The quality looked fantastic (I also weld on the side) but knew nothing knowing about fitment since obviously I did not have a sample to test with on my NSX. Well, the company who first propositioned this Chinese company to order put a kabosh on my deal. They strong-armed the company in China and they no longer would sell to me at any price. I was pissed at first but that's business. This "American" company now sells the exhaust for $1200 under the Pride name brand. They evidently offer excellent customer service so the $950 profit margin likely speaks to that one would hope.

Original JDM GT-One 5.1


China Copy sold under Pride

[Sportsguy83]

IMHO, this is America, and we are all entitled to buy whatever product we want. Everyone is always looking for "bargains" and they sometimes come at a cost. The only thing that would be really nice from all companies is if they let it known where are their products coming from (Of course, another way of looking at this is that customer need to do their homework and find out where are there products coming from).

In this case, since we do have a few companies doing all there stuff in "USA", aside from the money factor it was easy for any of us to only considered made in USA products when choosing our exhaust systems. I went with Nameless.

To end, this is part of what's killing the USA craftsmanship, the Chinese knockoff prices the USA built system out of the market.

[Dimman]

Originally Posted by sportsguy83

IMHO, this is America, and we are all entitled to buy whatever product we want. Everyone is always looking for "bargains" and they sometimes come at a cost. The only thing that would be really nice from all companies is if they let it known where are their products coming from (Of course, another way of looking at this is that customer need to do their homework and find out where are there products coming from).

In this case, since we do have a few companies doing all there stuff in "USA", aside from the money factor it was easy for any of us to only considered made in USA products when choosing our exhaust systems. I went with Nameless.

To end, this is part of what's killing the USA craftsmanship, the Chinese knockoff prices the USA built system out of the market.

^ The Canadian and American companies that buy and re-brand Chinese knock-offs trying to pass them off as JDM or American are just as douchey as the Chinese ones that copy.

Or even full out counterfeit brands they are official distributors of, with their own 'special edition' Chinese versions.

[ahausheer]

Originally Posted by Laika

Strangely enough I got directed to alibaba today while looking for 6MM ID tubing at work and wondered "is this site real? do people really order from here?"

Now I know.

Alibaba is the chinese amazon or ebay. Its one of the largest shopping sites in the world. Just ordered 30 meters of vinyl wrap for 200 bucks from there. That site is the future. It seems scetchy but if u order from a seller with a good rating u are fine

[fuddbutter]

USD$800 for the zorst + shipping..
USD$1050 to get it to Aust within a week...

[Dimman]

Originally Posted by ahausheer

Alibaba is the chinese amazon or ebay. Its one of the largest shopping sites in the world. Just ordered 30 meters of vinyl wrap for 200 bucks from there. That site is the future. It seems scetchy but if u order from a seller with a good rating u are fine

It's just that Chinese companies outnumber the rest.

You can refine your search by country. For example:

http://m.alibaba.com/product-free/11...l_muffler.html

Yamato manufacturing, make Rein Hard exhausts.

[JDMenrique]

wasnt skunk2 caught doing something similar to this a couple months back?

[raz0rbladez909]

Originally Posted by JDMenrique

wasnt skunk2 caught doing something similar to this a couple months back?

Yes, I remember them downplaying it quite a bit as well. Dunno whatever came of it I do remember initially ISIS was only offered through Enjuku Racing in the past and that any issues with the systems went through them. But some of their exhausts and their intake manifolds are blatant knockoffs of current/past systems. I.E. Apex'i N1 Duals, Apex'i GT Spec, HKS Dual(350z) and Trust DD's were all ripped off and given their own Isis name, some of which weren't even that far off from the original names, and the SR intake manifolds were knockoffs of Greddys.

[Swift]

I may have been misunderstood slightly. I meant that they take a picture of said exhaust....and yes they build it but it looks nothing like the one in the picture or has the quality to back it up.

As Ryu mentions , I know of the NSX exhaust work and know that it was stated that a korean company produced many of the name brand exhaust systems.


I think its so sad that we can't get cost down in the USA. We have great robotic welders, and a human that is a certified welder can weld pretty dang quick even with tig. Its just that the CEO's of these companies want to much of a profit margin so they can buy a bigger yacht.

[bakerr6]

It's not the CEOs that care about the profit margins, its the stockholders. They pressure the boards to post up big numbers, and if your company cannot make big numbers, then the board will release the executives in order to appease stockholders. It's all a game

[dj petey]

As someone that owns a manufacturing business with factories in China i can tell you first hand that alibaba is just a directory of businesses. Some are legit, some aren't. Alibaba tries their best to create an online reputation a la ebay. The aliexpress site is as close to ebay as you can get in this regard. I've ordered from aliexpress many times without getting scammed. As far as the import/export business is concerned, many brands simply slap a logo on an already mass produced white label product. This doesn't mean the factory is ripping anyone off, it means the brand is buying a white label product created to be branded by different companies for distribution in different regions of the world. China hosts many trade shows specifically to cater to brands that do this. Products are ready to buy out of a catalogue and will include custom packaging and branding with a minimum order quantity. Welcome to the world of me-too products. Car parts are no exception. AFE/Greddy/Takeda intake is a good example.

[wparsons]

Originally Posted by SkullWorks

well...without a design patent or a Non Disclosure or Proprietary info agreement, or a non compete clause...it won't matter

and even if it did you aren't going to get a conviction or even court time in china...their major export is stolen technology and knockoffs...

Even if you have patents, NDA's, etc it won't help you at all. You'll never win a patent case like this.

Originally Posted by blu_

The Chinese only enforce patent infringement if the "victim" is a Chinese company. If you are foreign they don't give a shit.

Bingo! Anyone into RC stuff knows about this very well too. Chinese companies will make carbon copy knock off's, and even advertise them as being 100% compatible with the originals, and there's nothing anyone can do about it over here other than enjoy cheap products