Martin over on Dieselduck wrote the other day about OEM parts and how easy it was to be fooled with pirate parts passing as OEM parts.
I tend to agree with Martin on this subject but I will add a few things to it. The people that have pushed the market into this situation are mostly ship management companies. The way I see this all happening is simply a matter of money. As always, money talks!
When the request for parts or stores is sent to the company head office they in turn request a price bid from 3 suppliers. In most cases the lowest bid will get the order to supply. It should also be said that lowest bid is not always the best for us on the ships. Many of these things can be contributed to people in purchasing not having enough experience to deal with these issues.
In my current position as purchasing officer for a supply company I see this happening all the time. A request doesn’t turn into order unless it is competitive in pricing. This in turn has allowed for substandard products to enter into our market. If you want to have the order you have to supply a product that “can” do the job but at a cost that is acceptable to the management company.
Where we all have to be vigilant is where we allow these products to be purchased and used. Consumables are one area where these substandard items are used a lot. Spare parts for certain equipment should not be allowed to be substituted at all in my opinion. There is too much at risk doing it. I personally think that you can get away with using sub standard products when it doesn’t affect the safety of the ship or its operation. Example being an overboard valve. You would not use an inferior type valve in place for a certified quality product and risk having it all fail on you while at sea. This is maybe an extreme example but it could happen. Ask at same time; Who certified the valve and How? On the other hand you don’t need a high cost fancy flush valve for a toilet.
The word pirate parts does not exist – The correct word would be alternative supply. Example a fuel nozzle from produced by L’orange purchased at MAN would be original, however is the same nozzle purchased L’orange or other source (Still same nozzle) this would be considered an alternative supply. There is many suppliers some better than others – agreed, but is is to easy to generalize. Warranty is definitely and issue and lifetime as well, but given the case with the nozzle, there are many identical cases with other components. In most cases problems with specific components tend to take time for replacing from an engine manufacture point of view as there is a lot of things to be taken in consideration, however this does not serve the clients immediate need, therefore alternative solutions are needed. I fully agree that the engine builders can support 92 % of the requirements, but some times it is the last 8 % that keep the vessels in operation. And the engine builder can not reschedule and re-arrange due to one clients requirement. Further to that most of the alternative suppliers have general conditions and insurance beyond normal and some builders. We need to be critical, but not blind or deaf. Alternatively we would end up in monopolized marked, and the question then remain… Would we have a better situation than today…