First Chinese Atom?

[skilly]

[quote="benyeats"]
[quote="arielchina"]
[quote="bolus"]
Cool!  welcome.  Is it true that you already have 200 orders on a waiting list? I think I read that somewhere.  Any pictures of your first cars or the factory where they are made?
[/quote]~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hi Bolus,
Yes, it is true at beginning, but occasionally there are few bad apples among us and do mix up this deal. Right now we are still in discussion. Currently we are building a brand new R&D center and two-storey workshop which total of 65000 square feet. We are planning put these sites into service by the end of August. If you guys ever come to China, I welcome you all come here for a visit and drinking some Tsingtao Beer.
By the way do you know Tsingtao beer was brewed here local in Qingdao? I can take you guys to the processing line of this old and world famous brewing factory, and while tasting some different kinds of beers next to it.
Bolus, I was trying to post some pictures, but the file is quite rather large. The website it only allowed 128 KB. If you donâ??t mind, I have sent it to your E-Mail.
Thanks.

[/quote]

I have met the mayor of Tsingtao at a function in Las Vegas !  Quite nice beer.

Ben
[/quote]

I have drunk Tsingtao in Tsingtao 

[arielchina]

Hi all. Wish you all well.
I can see and feel the fuss about. I thought this forum is about sharing information based on the foundation of truth. I obviously and definitely will not be lying here in front of you guys, because I know I present the image of Ariel China period. If you donâ??t believe whatever I said, my response will be simple - please come over here to see for yourself.
DADOH, I never heard this very interesting news. Where do you get it from?
Thanks Bolus. Like I said it before this new plant called R&D Center, it is not called Ariel R&D Center. Our company has three divisions which are Qingdao Xinghua Automobile Engineering College, Qingdao Qingsheng Driving School, and the new â?? Qingdao Ariel.
Ben, I believe the beer that you drank over there is quite different from over here and also you guys only have one kind of beer. In addition, these are the exported beer and the taste is somewhat suitable for the westerns.
Mark Allen, inside the Tsingtao brewing factory?

[Heywood-Yablowme]

Sorry to be so..blunt,but I have learned to be,well..blunt.    I cannot honestly comment on the quality of a Chinese built Atom until I see one in person.  I don't like the angles of the rollbar you are using. That makes me start to wonder..

It may not be fair,but all I have to personally go on to base quality standards expected,is the quality of other products I have sampled from China,which are motorcycles,ATVs,tractors,power equipment.

To do an Atom right takes a lot more devotion to product than monetary gain.

Prove me wrong and build an Atom worthy of the quality expected, and I will applaud. 

Think...boutique manufacturing.

[apollyon25]

Actually, from having several clients with mass production in China, there isnt an issue with quality.
Usually they are considerably more quality oriented than the UK, US or "local" manufacturing.
They demand work instructions, change notes, everything tracked and traced and usually build 'exactly' to the statement of work.

And damn near EVERYTHING is made in China now...

I would expect quality audits by Simon et al regularly along the way and would expect that there are geographic restrictions to where Ariel China's Atoms can be sold.

[Heywood-Yablowme]

That may be so,but everything I have seen to this point has been not up to the best of standards,especially in precision and quality of material.  I can explain in much further detail,if necessary..but who really cares..right? 

I await to be enlightened.


"Do you really think his business model is to mass produce a less expensive made Atom?"

No,Bolus,I do not think it is Simons intent to mass produce Ariel Atoms for less money... let's just say I'm betting the "copies" will probably outnumber the originals 1000 to 1,and be first to market,at 1/2 the price 

[Heywood-Yablowme]

[quote="arielchina"]
[quote="Monza"]
take care Arielchina, you have a lserious ocal competitor here :

http://forum.atomclub.com/index.php/topic,9598.0.html


[/quote]~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hi Monza,
Thank you for your info, for us here in China, even for France; a competitor is not a bad thing. People have some choices to choose from and to do certain comparison with each other, even though it is a Atom Clone, I believe people will still look into the details, engineering, performance and other matters. A car is easy to build, but a high quality car is way much harder and to maintain. It is very hard to beat the name of Ariel. Monza, I really appreciate for your concern about our company
Good for them!

[/quote]

Just wanted to get this quoted.

I do hope ArielChina is sincere on their intentions.  

[bolus]

[quote="arielchina"]
Hi all. Wish you all well.
I can see and feel the fuss about. I thought this forum is about sharing information based on the foundation of truth. I obviously and definitely will not be lying here in front of you guys, because I know I present the image of Ariel China period. If you donâ??t believe whatever I said, my response will be simple - please come over here to see for yourself.
DADOH, I never heard this very interesting news. Where do you get it from?
Thanks Bolus. Like I said it before this new plant called R&D Center, it is not called Ariel R&D Center. Our company has three divisions which are Qingdao Xinghua Automobile Engineering College, Qingdao Qingsheng Driving School, and the new â?? Qingdao Ariel.
Ben, I believe the beer that you drank over there is quite different from over here and also you guys only have one kind of beer. In addition, these are the exported beer and the taste is somewhat suitable for the westerns.
Mark Allen, inside the Tsingtao brewing factory?

[/quote]

Dont mind curator, he likes NASCAR but still owns 3 Atoms.  do he isnt quite right in the head.    Please keep us updated on your progress and if you have any ideas on how we can help out your owners with their cars (and the language barrier) please let us know. 

[DADOH]

[quote="arielchina"]
Hi all. Wish you all well.
I can see and feel the fuss about. I thought this forum is about sharing information based on the foundation of truth. I obviously and definitely will not be lying here in front of you guys, because I know I present the image of Ariel China period. If you donâ??t believe whatever I said, my response will be simple - please come over here to see for yourself.
DADOH, I never heard this very interesting news. Where do you get it from?
Thanks Bolus. Like I said it before this new plant called R&D Center, it is not called Ariel R&D Center. Our company has three divisions which are Qingdao Xinghua Automobile Engineering College, Qingdao Qingsheng Driving School, and the new â?? Qingdao Ariel.
Ben, I believe the beer that you drank over there is quite different from over here and also you guys only have one kind of beer. In addition, these are the exported beer and the taste is somewhat suitable for the westerns.
Mark Allen, inside the Tsingtao brewing factory?

[/quote]

Thanks for you response Arielchina, hope your venture does well and the real item puts cheap copies to shame.  As you will understand my concern was that currently the atom is an exclusive and arguably relatively high priced item....with an exhasparatingly long waiting list. So mass production with ensuing economies of scale etc could clearly lower prices....not something current owners would want to see.
Thanks for confirming that these are NOT Ariel China's plans.

George

[Terry Kennedy]

[quote="Curator"]
Sorry to be so..blunt,but I have learned to be,well..blunt.    I cannot honestly comment on the quality of a Chinese built Atom until I see one in person.  I don't like the angles of the rollbar you are using. That makes me start to wonder..[/quote]

I think the rollbar is UK style and that all factories have to harmonize production with Ariel UK these days.

Brammo built up a large (some might say excessively large) number of structures for Atom assembly. Where Brammo failed was: 1) Not realizing that "more orders than we know what to do with" was not going to continue forever without some actual marketing effort; 2) Constant price increases; 3) Poor communication with customers.

Given the 1.3 Billion population in China and the gradual loosening of class distinctions, I expect they may sell quite a few Atoms. How many did Brammo make? 150?

Depending on the tax rules and the politics, a building may cost far less than the same building here in the US.

If I had to guess about the 3 Atoms in the picture, I'd say they came over from the UK and will be used for test drives, assembly training and reference ("See - look how it is done on the UK car - the part goes on the other way" type stuff).

I may be going out on a limb here, but as the Atom is Simon's project, I expect that Simon has the rights to copy / use any other Atom Manufacturing licensees engineering drawings. And Brammo certainly did make loads of drawings. It may be that the China licensee has obtained these from Simon and that would probably help speed up production.

If this were a normal production car, production would start with what are called "complete knock-down" kits which are everything you need to build 1 vehicle, provided in a number of crates. After the new facility has experience with the CKD kits and gets its own parts storage and inventory system set up, instead of sending kits the main facility will send all needed parts in bulk to be placed into inventory at the new facility. The stage after that is for the new facility to start building or ordering needed parts directly. At that point the new facility isn't depending on the original one for any parts, just information.

[AtomMadStew]

Quality not quantity. Even more so when cars to be used for track. I agree with curator everything seems to be made in china and the quality is not inspiring. Do hope you ariel china guys prove us wrong and build the best thing to come out of china good luck to you.

[benyeats]

[quote="AtomStew"]
everything seems to be made in china and the quality is not inspiring.
[/quote]

That is pure bo**ocks.  As you say everything is made in China so you are effectively saying nothing good quality.  This either means:

i)  You have only bought cheap products which are generally rubbish wherever they are made

or

ii)  You have ridiculously high standards so nothing will ever be good enough.

I have put a couple of products into production in China and the quality is fantastic.  An analogy I would use is one used operating a computer, garbage in, garbage out.  Knowing the Ariel UK set up I am very sure they will have strict quality controls in place to make sure the Chinese product is equivalent to the UK or US manufactured versions.

[quote="Curator"]
other products I have sampled from China,which are motorcycles,ATVs,tractors,power equipment.
[/quote]

Have any of them been branded by Western companies or where they local product ?  Their is a key difference.

[quote="arielchina"]
Ben, I believe the beer that you drank over there is quite different from over here and also you guys only have one kind of beer. In addition, these are the exported beer and the taste is somewhat suitable for the westerns.
[/quote]

I have also tried it in China just for completeness !

Ben

p.s. sent to you via my Chinese made Dell computer, typed on a Chinese made keyboard (5 years old and going strong), sent over my Chinese made Cisco ethernet system (probably I have not looked in the server cupboard at work), might go and listen to my Chinese made Apple iPod now or well you get the picture......

[AtomMadStew]

Well i can only speak from the things i've bought the last and most recent was a £700 tv which lasted less than 3 years and was beyond economical repair. I know tv's dont last forever but i do expect a certain longevity from a product. There are good products out there from china, just not the ones i've had. Or maybe i'm just a jinx

[Terry Kennedy]

[quote="AtomStew"]
Well i can only speak from the things i've bought the last and most recent was a £700 tv which lasted less than 3 years and was beyond economical repair. I know tv's dont last forever but i do expect a certain longevity from a product. There are good products out there from china, just not the ones i've had. Or maybe i'm just a jinx [/quote]

Some Snap-On tools (often considered the pinnacle of American tool manfacture) are now made in China: http://www.snapon.com.cn/snapon/en/index.htm

While I don't buy that brand, I do purchase lots of GearWrench tools, many of which were made in China.

I expect that the quality depends on how closely the manufacturing process is scrutinized by the partner in the other contry.

I was commenting to a friend about visible differences between different date codes of an old Russian display tube (IV-9, if anyone cares). He said that he'd even had major variations within a single box with a single date code. I told him that the <OTK> "quality" stamp simply meant that nobody was taken outside and shot that week

[AtomMadStew]

I have some gearwrench ratchet ring spanners and i didn't know they were made in china and i have to say they are good.

[benyeats]

[quote="Terry Kennedy"]
I expect that the quality depends on how closely the manufacturing process is scrutinized by the partner in the other contry.
[/quote]

Spot on.

[quote="AtomStew"]
Well i can only speak from the things i've bought the last and most recent was a £700 tv which lasted less than 3 years and was beyond economical repair.
[/quote]

Could have happened to a UK made screen, except there aren't any.  More seriously the sale of goods act protects you from this kind of failure, goods should be expected to last a reasonable amount of time, 3 years for a £700 telly is not reasonable so the retailer should fix it for you regardless of any waranty that may or may not be in place.

Ben