Following up on my emulsion tube issue this week:

These carbs were purchased from Webercarbsdirect.com and were represented as genuine Webers.

They are not. They are Chinese knock-offs.


The retailer refuses to take them back.

You've been warned!




Do everyone a favor and spread this around to help others from getting screwed.

The only thing on the carb that says "Weber" is the cover plate and two stickers with "serial numbers":

I knew this was coming. There have been more issues with those carbs, noted here, than I can remember. I think a new set bought via amazon was the only time the vendor helped to resolve the issue.

The vendor kept skirting around the issue until I used "fucking junk" in a reply. He then said "now that you've cussed on the phone, I don't have to help you; keep the carbs".

I'm not the purchaser, though. I'll have the owner call them.

From Bud Pauge at Redline Weber (apparently the real deal):






Joe

I will send you two each F11 e tubes

but I will note

these are not Weber Carburetors, These are one of two versions

Note one you did not send any pictures of your Carburetors and those numbers you mentioned are not Weber identifeing or production reference numbers.

I believe you have if you see a weber logo cast on the carb body it will be on a Flat side of the carburetor.

the other side of the carburetor will be rounded.

These are alternative branded Webers assembled from parts of no identity or known manufacture and assembled in the Edlebrock Weber production plant in North Carolina. They are not a Genuine European Weber Product.

Im sorry to give you this bad news.

Weber Carbs direct is not a direct importer of Weber Carburetors and more commonly supplys Chinese alternative product and supplies them as Weber with out any real note that they are only Weber like they have never seen the inside of a Weber Production facility.

At one time when there was an issue with Weber Production ( at one time the plant was closed for just over a year due to a labor issue) during this time they recived permision to offer alternative product. This time has ended Weber has been back in production in Spain and has been producing product at there own plant now for 8 years.

This has been the plant of supply for Weber for nearly 20 years now.

So pending your pictures to confirm I am wrong you can confirm if you note a flat sided carburetor with logo cast on the flat side or no logo anywhere other than a round sticker the serial number is just there way of selling the belief you have a real weber give it a serial number it must be real.

again Im sorry for your issue

can I ask are you a Worldpac customer or is series 9 a worldpac customer

If the purchase was under 9 months ago you could return them as not as ordered required Genuine European Webers.

At this point they are what they are.

Should at some point you have other issues or lack the performance expected from a Weber we understand the frustration in good faith you thought you had a Weber. We will offer to sell at redused cost a Genuine set because we did not import or sell these alternative carburetors we cannot exchange them or sell them below cost.

The bad news is if they are the chinese Copy they are selling them at weber like prices ( you would have to confirm what you paid ) but commonly the square sided US carburetor is something like 100 dollars a pair less in value and the chinese ones to give you an idea of how they are made are a full 100 dollars a carb less expensive you can usually purchase a chinese conversion kit for something like 450 to 499 not more than 600.
The flat sided carbs I believe are also in the 599 range.

In the future please be aware, Redline fuel managment and WEber Carburetor conversions is a division of Worldpac. Redline has been a Weber direct importer for over 45 years. I personaly have worked for some form of US direct importer for weber for over 55 years. We currently are one of only two world direct distributors of Weber Carburetors .

We have been supporting and supplying only genuine Weber Product. We do manufacture our own adapters , linkage parts and specificly calibrated and set up Weber Conversion kits. When we supply a carburetor in a conversion it has been opened float levels checked and set and today a specific calibration change for the current emissions fuels

you note your in Florida the pump fuels in the south east are blended to meet emissions standards using up to 18% blend alcohol /or ethanol as an emissions supplment thus it is not posted on the pump. I have worked very closely with some of the chemical team at Joe Gibbs racing and would suggest in there studies to creat there new fuel additive line the Engineer Lake Speed Jr has found that in just the mid atlantics over the last year there have been no less than 167 different fuel variations all with Oxygenated or alcohol related chemical additives. Which is why like Lucas fuel additives Gibbs now supplies a line by the name of Driven fuel additives and fuel stabalizers.

Many of your customers have noted mood swings in there cars you will find weber carbs will wake up some times over night and simply run like Sh---- and you may have just performed a tune up. the fuel swings can be over night.

So with that

in the future if we can help with your shop Weber needs tuning guidance and any tuning and install information we are glade to help

I will note that the carburetors you have at best may as well be a Dellorto you can tune them to function they will run the car.

What they will not do is tune to the same fine detail and if we use lap time as a reference to function quality they simply will not get with in 1.5 seconds of a weber tuned car. ( tuned right that is )

Several companies were given the right to use the license to copy a Weber

Solex, Dellorto, Mikuni, even the SK made in japan for Toyota. each make a nice looking replica. Back to back on any given sunday a weber application will simply out perform all of these applications.

Our frustration is there are people out there that simply take advantage of others a domain name is not a registered legal name. Weber carbs direct is not a registered business name it is a domain name because of that many people think they are purchasing a real weber from us and are simply purchasing from an importer and packager that is not related.

I am very sorry for what might be bad news

I am interested to hear any comments you might have observed. and any pictures of the carburetors and the serial numbers or other details you might reference..

WK288 is not a Redline carburetor conversion

;I am very interested to confirm any numbers from the carburetor base and any pictures you might be able to offer.

I will send out the e tubes because at this point you believe you have a Weber. We can deal with that fall out down the road.

Thanks for your input comments and I hope future support of Genuine Weber Products

Joe,

Thanks for posting this. It could save someone a lot of time, money and frustration.

I hope it all works out for your customer.

Skip the f bombs joe. I hope this matter is resolved for your customer. How long since the purchase was made? It might be time for the customer to dispute the sale with his/her credit card company. Can't hurt to try.

I bought mine from webercarbsdierect through eBay a few years ago, they're made in Spain.

I guess that things have changed since then.

Tough lesson, good info.
Bottom line support Redline for you Weber needs.

Not just 914's: https://www.google.com/webhp?rls=ig&gws...bsdirect+review

The kit that I got from them was the weber redline brand, I haven't had any problems with them.

i saw some fake webers that seep out of casting porosity. gas sweats

I used webercarbsdirect.com occasionally for several years. Then about 8 months ago I buy a set and they are Chinese EMPI knock-offs in Weber boxes. I too was pissed. I called their tech line and I got "transferred" to another person and curiously, the line got dropped.

I called several more times each time I got "accidentally" hung-up on. After about 3 calls I think they blocked my number and all it would do is ring and ring. . .

EDIT: IRRELEVANT, SEE ALIBABA CHINESE SUPPLIERS POST BELOW

I went to their site and saw "GENUINE WEBER" all over the place, so wrote their sales e-mail and asked:

I'm told that a set of your 40 IDF's for VW are actually Chinese knock-offs? I was a little surprised to hear that since your website says "genuine Weber" repeatedly. I know Weber doesn't make carbs in China, so could you affirm that the castings and all components and parts in the carbs you sell are sourced from Weber Italy or Spain?

Got this back, quote:

Hello All of our Weber Carburetors are genuine. Weber Carburetors have not been made in Italy since 1990. As with most automotive parts these days our products are manufactured throughout the world. We carry both Asian and Spanish made Weber Carburetors. What product were you looking to purchase? We will check to see what Genuine Weber Carburetor we have in stock. For more understanding of Genuine Weber see enclosed likn from our website. Thank you

http://nebula.wsimg.com/6cd0ee31d45c522709...p;alloworigin=1

Unquote.

What's odd is the Weber statement in that document refers to Redline, Interco and Worldpac, to the point where I'm a little confused about who's who.

If you want to really get their attention file a formal complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (here: http://forms.ag.ny.gov/CIS/consumer-complaints.jsp ) It's online and fast, just let WeberDirect know that you've filed a formal fraud complaint (it's interstate so the Feds have jurisdiction) and give them the complaint number. That should help the guy get over your use of a swear word.

Then the Long Island Better Business Bureau here: https://www.bbb.org/consumer-complaints/fil...int/get-started

Finally the New York State Attorney General's Consumer Fraud complaint form, here: http://forms.ag.ny.gov/CIS/consumer-complaints.jsp

It looks like ridiculous overkill, but if you let them know they're going to be getting all these different calls they'll almost always be much easier to talk with and willing, even eager, to resolve any issues.




And could you please let us know how this turns out? I'm very curious.

"Authorized source or licensee". Ok. Lots of verbiage. Takes a more smarter guy ten me to figure it out. I think I'll take a look at the weber direct ste.

China has become capitalist America without the legal protections. Once you give them permission to make something you lose ownership and control of distribution.

EDIT: IRRELEVANT, SEE ALIBABA CHINESE SUPPLIERS POST BELOW

Forget that, I don't think it will matter.

This is getting more interesting. Here's a better Redline explanation, from 2008: http://genuineweber.blogspot.com/

But the craziest thing is this, the Alibaba search results for "weber carubretor china", with 502 HITS!!! 502!! And look at all the IDF's!! http://www.alibaba.com/countrysearch/CN/we...carburetor.html

Good lord! I just have to say, there's NO WAY you'll ever know what's genuine Weber any more. Just the castings, none of the internals? Or carb body castings too? Are all those Chinese companies really respecting the trademarks? If not can you even depend on the identifying keys Redline listed any more? I kind of doubt it.

What it says to me is FUEL INJECTION. Or at the very least Dellorto.

EDIT: Ha ha, even SPANISH IDF's, out of Ningbo/Shanghai: http://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Auto...0122851231.html

Fifty bucks apiece?

$50…the manufacturing costs must be about $7.49. HOLLY SHEET!!! looks like there's money to be made selling pos carbs. these sort of threads make for some interesting reading.

Go through your credit card company if they are refusing to refund you. Selling a product that isn't what it is labeled as is fraud.

Buy older carbs and rebuild them....it may be the only way to be sure

Joe has been doing an awesome job of dealing with way too many issues with my motor rebuild. I am glad he is posting so everyone knows what you can encounter with a project. As for the carbs they were purchased last May as a birthday present to myself. I am disappointed that what was supposed to improve the performance actually caused a engine failure. I actually pulled a set of good Italian carbs off to put in "new Webers". For those novices who want to rebuild their own motor understand there is a very good reason to hire a true professional like Joe. He has also had to deal with another issue with a different supplier who sold a camshaft that required significant additional work that was not disclosed at the time of sale. The company that sold the camshaft is reputable and was recommended through 914 World members. The supplier stated he would not have sold the camshaft without additional parts until I called and they admitted that they indeed took the order over the phone. The camshaft supplier did give the additional parts at no charge but that did nothing for additional labor required.

Thank you Chris.

It's been a very long road for a TIV rebuild. We both learned stuff.....




I specialize in /6 engines. The suppliers for those engines, in general, are accustomed to delivering high-quality parts that fit correctly the first time.

The /4 suppliers, in general, appear to be a bunch of con artists.

From this point forward, /4 rebuilds at S9 will be $5k plus parts......

And I may insist upon LN cylinders with JE pistons if you want it done here.

China is crapping all over the USA by sending us their absolute junk. I buy parts almost exclusively with my CC and when there is a problem I file the dispute. I have never lost yet. The key is to be absolutely clear in what it is you are ordering and expecting. When it is not what you ordered, and you have proven that, you win. Then it is up to the CC company to deal with the vendor.

Not really. I've been buying Chinese parts for over twenty years now, from plants that were already ISO-9001 certified Six Sigma as well as from smaller companies where we've set up our own quality programs in their plants. The Chinese can hold their standards just as high as anyone else in the world, but the reality is that we, U.S. consumers, insist on buying the absolute cheapest stuff they can make. We're the ones who dictate that they supply us with the low-priced junk, so if anyone's doing any crapping it's us, crapping all over ourselves. You want better stuff? You can have it but it's not free, you're gonna need to pay for it.

I am perfectly willing to pay for quality. I just think, as in the case that we are discussing, China is misrepresenting their products. They should not be able to brand and advertise their carbureutors as Webers when they are not.

That's the real issue, grey market crap being sold as the genuine article. I went through this when I was looking for a piece of audio equipment once. Two different companies with the same name, both in China. One is overseen by the U.S. owner, the other stole the name and to this day makes inferior products and sells them under the same name. It's an interesting story, the company is jolida if anyone wants to research it.

Yes, same story. Jolida, huh? Wow, noted. This the fault of Weber in Italy for not enforcing their trademarks. If Weber would file a formal complaint with U.S. Customs that would stop those imports. I know that works because I've had shipments held in Customs until every item was inspected, because a competitor had filed a complaint. In this case the problem is the importer, WeberCarbsDirect. They apparently have license to use the name and mark, and they're selling that product at the price of a real quality product, but apparently haven't established any quality standards. In other words they, in New York, are in control and they're crapping on the U.S. consumer.

My point is that the Chinese CAN produce quality products, and I know that because I and a lot of other U.S. companies buy good stuff from them, but no one's insisting that they do. Instead we're insisting on low prices and at the same time indicating (as far as the Chinese manufacturer knows) that we may care about quality but not enough to pay more for it. It's WeberCarbsDirect who has to communicate that for their customers, but they're not, instead they're making a few extra bucks. Don't blame the Chinese, they'll do whatever you ask them (and pay them) to do.

I'll be buying webers for my own car. Just to clarify, Redline is the trusted dealer?

Yes, but at this point I don't think I'd put my hand in the fire for that.

if you want webers, find a clean used set of italians. go thru them yourself or pay a PRO to do it. stock in used dels and idfs just went up.

joe, did the customer's carbs cause or contribute the other engine problems?

This whole ordeal makes me want to pull my hair out. If you Google Redline Webers the first advertisement that pops up is webercarbsdirect. You look at their website and check the FAQ's there is a link for "What is a genuine Weber?" that states the whole licensing agreement for using the Weber name as well as their trademark W. They also specifically mention North American Weber, Interco and Worldpac as genuine and all Weber labeled carburators and parts must be licensed. I have contacted my credit card company and am waiting for a response. Webercarbsdirect website states that the carburators have a one year warranty. They were purchased 5/26/14. Yes the cylinder that had no compression is the same as the faulty emulsion tube was on. Thanks to DB for his responses regarding my situation. Funny thing is I pulled off the existing carbs which were the good Italian ones after I couldn't get them to operate properly.

Weber has been owned by Worldpac for years.

Any carburetor that is bought today MUST be blueprinted before installation. I don't care who makes it or where it comes from.

That said, since we have to recreate everything anyway (right out of the box), I have had the best luck with the EMPI HPMX carbs, which is sad, as they are Chinese. The "Genuine" parts and carbs have a quite interesting source of origin, too.

Anyone who buys any carburetor new and thinks they are just going to install it and drive away has another thing coming. Sad part is people spend more money on "genuine" and etc to avoid problems, but they don't know, what they don't know.

Back when I had the parts sales division I stopped selling carbs, because everyone wanted their inability to be able to tune or understand their carbs to be the seller's fault.

Usually the older carb bodies have air leaks from wear around the throttle shafts. A good machine shop can remedy the problem by filling the orifices and align boring them, or better yet, additionally machining them for throttle shaft bearings. I only buy 'old' Italian Webers.

ISO 9001, 6 sigma is as easy to fake as a 11 dollar bill. And crap quality isn't just affecting -4. Read all the threads on pelican 911 forums about crap bearings, clutches, etc. And I'm talking about genuine Glyco and sachs, but which are farmed out to BFE (or BFC or BF wherever).

Seriously? Help me out, I'd like to see how you do that.

You can bash China for sometimes producing crap, but as mentioned previously here, high quality is possible from there. Its all about finding an honest factory, clearly defining your standards, and them sticking to them. You can find dishonest business people in ANY country. I work with the technical outerwear market, and the finest technical garments in the world are coming out of Asia. We barely know how to make the stuff here anymore.

Here you go. Add this to your resume.

Click to view attachment

I think that's been their plan all along. When 'we' can no longer manufacture anything, watch the prices for the junk stuff increase to more than what 'we' could have made the same products here for.

Ruin another productive country's industrial base and you win.

For my resume? Sorry, what?

Their "plan"? Come on, you're giving them WAY too much credit, and not giving our people nearly enough. It's called competition, and supposedly we're good at it. When it's worth our while we can manufacture anything we want. WHEN it's worth our while.

Mt neighbor has silk bedding made over there as well as a host of other products. You have to find the right people and inspect everything all the time. It's a cultural thing.

When this discussion began I e-mailed webercarbsdirect and asked them this:

I'm told that a set of your 40 IDF's for VW are actually Chinese knock-offs? I was a little surprised to hear that since your website says "genuine Weber" repeatedly. I know Weber doesn't make carbs in China, so could you affirm that the castings and all components and parts in the carbs you sell are sourced from Weber Italy or Spain?

They (sales@webercarbsdirect.com) responded:

Hello All of our Weber Carburetors are genuine. Weber Carburetors have not been made in Italy since 1990. As with most automotive parts these days our products are manufactured throughout the world. We carry both Asian and Spanish made Weber Carburetors. What product were you looking to purchase? We will check to see what Genuine Weber Carburetor we have in stock. For more understanding of Genuine Weber see enclosed likn from our website. Thank you

http://nebula.wsimg.com/6cd0ee31d45c522709...p;alloworigin=1

"All our Weber Carburetors are genuine" sounds pretty good, right? Just bit of doubt about that one phrase "We carry both Asian and Spanish made Weber Carburetors." That's wiggle-room, so I asked, straight up:

OK, good. I don't want the Chinese so I guess the question is if your 40mm IDF carbs in stock are made in Spain. Is there any price difference between the two?

And this morning the answer:

Hello Sorry only the Asian made carbs in stock. Thank you for asking

Notice how he never said "Chinese" but instead "Asian"? Strange as it may seem costs in China have been going up pretty significantly in the last decade or so, meaning a lot of the low-cost manufacturing is migrating to Vietnam, Thailand and India, which may explain the use of "Asian". That's for price-only manufacturing, because standards in those countries are typically inferior to Chinese quality. In other words using "Asian" is not a good sign.

From that previous Redline explanation it would seem that Weber Italy lost control of its mark long ago, so if you buy from webercarbsdirect you're going to get whatever they think it best to supply, and unfortunately that appears to be the cheapest carbs they can get. With that in mind Joe's original advice, "Buyer Beware!!" may be the best. Anyway, now you know, so you can make intelligent choices.

I think the DB has a lot of good points and the actual email exchange with the company was very enlightening.

As for competition, if you have a government that is willing to subsidize sales at a loss you can effectively run others out of business and then jack up the prices. I think that has indeed happened as a plan in some arenas. Or if you have a group of wealthy individuals agreeing to fix prices you can do the same sort of thing. I think all of that is going on in this day and age and the capitalist model is largely broken with large scale businesses. Competition simply doesn't exist between some businesses.

At the weber level though the product is simple to manufacture if you want to, so we have a chance. Isn't PMO a US product?

Competition as we used to know it doesn't play today. How can American manufacturers, with American workers on American soil, compete with the extremely low wages paid workers in Asian and South American countries?

Hell, American workers all over the country are fighting for a huge increase in the minimum wage as it is

Increasing the MW is clearly not a wise decision if we're attempting to successfully 'compete' in the global manufacturing economy. Add union wages to the mix and we're shooting ourselves in the other foot.

So the alternative has been to outsource manufacturing to foreign companies, and in doing so, we've subjected ourselves to accept inferior products in a lot of cases (this Weber issue for example).

The prices of imported products will eventually increase to the price level of American made products, and by then we will no longer have the work force, facilities or tooling in place to correct the problem.

Wow, I wonder what I have?? There is a small Webber logo on the side of these carb?? I've had them many years & always thought they were Webber. I had them on sale Saturday at our local Porsche swap meet asking $150 or BO for the pair. Nobody was interested or picked them up to inspect. Looks like I'll use them for boat anchors.
BTW: I had two of my grandkids selling my stuff at the swap meet for pocket money & the only thing selling good was my car models.
Tom

Aren't those for Fiats?

DO NOT; I repeat, DO NOT use those as a boat anchor. Weber 40DCNF carbs are good carbs. Do you have the type4 intake manifolds for them too?? If so, I'd be interested in them for a project I have on the back burner.

PM me when you have the time. . .

By making a quality product and selling it with enough margin to make a living.

I worked for an all American manufacturing company for the last 5 years.
They do everything right here in Hayward, CA from product design, engineering to manufacturing, sales and yes, even customer service.
Nothing is outsourced, it's all in-house.
The company is privately held and the two owners explicitly asked for the workers on the production floor to be unionized(!) and they pay competitive salaries.

All that and yet the company has been profitable for the last 40+ years.

Well as expected webercarbsdirect has not returned my phone call. As soon as you say you have a problem the send you to the special unmanned line. On the other hand Redline did answer my original call and as promised called me back by the end of the day to place my order. To answer the question if Redline is a trusted dealer YES!! even Wikipedia says that Worldpac is the importer for Weber and they retail through Redline. They were beyond helpful and new genuine Webers are on their way. An expensive lesson to be sure, but it is what it is. I also filed a complaint per DB's suggestion now am just waiting for the black helicopters to appear.

The key here of course is "the company is privately held". The CEO of a 'publicly' held company must show the stock holders every year (or quarter) that profits are continually going up. If he can raise the stock price and profits 10% by sending 50% of the jobs off-shore, he will do that or start up dating his resume. Greed it good. "After all, we are not communists"..... Don Barzini.