The post on the rusty shifter levers got me wondering--are there counterfeit bicycle parts? I happen to know that there is counterfeit chain saw chain, and that stuff sells for less than a bike chain, so I assume that it would be worth somebody's effort.

I got a couple of Shimano 105 chains last year on Ebay for about $20 each including shipping, and I wondered if I was getting the real McCoy. The packaging looked authentic, but so does the knock-off saw chain. One of those chains has about 2K miles on it with no detectable wear (ruler method), so if it is a phony, it's apparently a pretty good one.

That eBay Khuota frame people have been talking about recently comes to mind. I know they're not selling it as a Khuota, but they are saying it's the same as a Khuota when it might not be.

Basically anything new on eBay has to be suspect, doesn't it? I think a chain would be something very easy to copy and nobody would know the difference. Same with bars, stems, etc.

There has been a rash of fake Chris King headsets in the past couple years.

Other parts as well.

-Z

That's the problem with manufacturing in Asia in a third-party facility ... lots of "fakes". Of course, some it are actual fakes, others could be "Ghost Shifts" where the factory makes extras that don't go to the company that placed the order. For example, say you order a bunch of handlebars from a factory, 5000 bars, the company makes your bars and ships them as promised. They then make another 1000 or 2000 that get sold in the aftermarket. They may or may not be using the same grade of carbon/alu. but they could probably turn a tidy profit. The original bars required that the company who designed them spent R&D money, performs stress testing, has support/warranty services in place etc. There's also the problem of the factory just selling off the design process to someone else who can then make fakes etc. at a cheaper facility.

A bigger problem would be some other company just knocking off your design, manufacturing a true "fake" of lesser quality. To me, faking a Shimano shifter seems somewhat difficult, due to the larger number of internal parts, but I bet it's possible as well as profitable. Oddly, Shimano doesn't really manufacture shifters in low cost markets (China), AFAIK their 10 speed stuff is made in Japan (DA and Ultegra I believe) or Malaysia (105).

To anser the OPs question, i'm sure there's fake everything out there in the bicycling world

Wasn't there a fake Ritchey saddle on here a while back?

Article in today's WSJ about guitar string maker(USA) that spends much of it's time chasing down Chinese counter fit knock offs all over the world. What do you think? The Chinese only make fake guitar strings and not knock off bike parts.

The answer is of course...yes. There's counterfeit everything. It's so pervasive, Assos has a page on their site to assist customers in determining if a bib is counterfeit or not.

oh dear. i just got a richey seatpost, fork and headset.

dont forget those fake zipp carbon handle bar about a year back

If you are getting parts from Hong Kong or China for cheap prices odds are they are knockoffs. The Chinese have truly mastered the art of knocking off products, right down to the packaging. It's more common with high end parts like King headsets, Woods hubs, DA parts etc. In my experience most of the parts are still pretty good quality, but not as good as the real mccoy.

Why in the world would anyone fake a Ritchey saddle? I mean...you make fake poop because it's funny....

I think they should make fake Huffys

I'm thinking pcad's now-legendary busted crank must have been a cheap Chinese knockoff. No other plausible explanation for that.

I know right?

of course there is, his legs are so strong they SNAPPED the cranks while mashing (while in the saddle) and caused a tsunami in malaysia.

I remember reading something about fake Ritchey parts (stem and post). I'm not sure, but I think it had something to do with why BD can afford bikes with nice components and Ritchey parts for cheap.

Scenario: A factory in asia makes 7,500 handlebars on an order for Ritchey and spells the name wrong on every last one of them.

What happens to those 'off-spec' bars? Even if the factory attempts to throw them out?

If they go on sale, are they 'fakes'?

You tell me.

If there are no counterfeit bike parts then that would make bikes just about the only industry that isn't experiencing counterfeit parts. If your parts source is reputable then they probably use a reputable importer/wholesaler your chances of getting fakes is dramatically reduced (because they're likely buying direct from the company). If you buy from the interwebz from folks with no reputation you could get a fake.

No, they aren't fakes. They make no claim to being Ritchey parts . They just infringe on Ritchey's design which one would reasonably assume is protected. Therefore they shouldn't be legally sold in the US. (Unless Ritchey decides to sell them in a discount as "slightly defective" or something).

If they can fake a Rolex, right down to the details and engraving on the mechanism (and they do), faking bicycle components is no big deal. Easy stuff.

Our company produces cutting-edge waste-to-energy equipment. Dozens of patents. Huge, complex, expensive equipment -- our smallest machine requires a one-acre building to house it. And we could sell $10 million worth of equipment into China in a heartbeat -- just make a phone call. But we refuse all offers from China. Why? Because we know that, the minute our engineering drawings or a piece of equipment makes it into the country, there will be people at work duplicating our machines. And, at a minimum wage of $3 per day (which many companies violate by paying even less) and free of the kinds of labor, health care, safety and environmental regs that American companies have to deal with, they can produce stuff a whole lot cheaper than anyone else.

Fake carbon forks were always a concern for me and have yet to try and score that crazy good deal on an EC90 or Alpha-Q for fear of knock-off breakage.

Oddly enough (stupidly enough, that is) I would trust an obvious ripoff than a knockoff

OTOH, (obvious-answer trivia question here) -- Does anyone know how Toyota and Nissan got their starts?

They both did knock-offs of British cars. Initially, even including the badges.