In reply to tjin:
So how exactly do they check that the items are compliant? Open mould items are usually sold to multiple companies with different logos lasered on. This way the CE marking is done by the supply company, they are responsible for all aspects of the design, material procurement, part manufacture, part assembly and quality control. This should include material testing, dimensional checks, visual finish checks, possibly but not always proofloading, often to around 50% or rated strength, and batch testing to destruction. Provided you control all aspects of this adequately you should see a high success rate of compliant assemblies. CE testing/rating occurs on a single very small sample batch of product sent to an external lab every time the product requires retesting which is periodic. In between these external test which may be years apart, or whenever the design or manufacture process is changed, the manufacturer applies the CE mark to its product and must provide a testing protocol to show compliance. QC and CE are unrelated in as much as the QC tests are conducted in house - CE is external. The batch tests which you are citing have nothing to do with CE, they are to do with the ongoing protocol adopted by each individual company, and they alone are responsible for that testing regime. Unless LACD (or any other manufacturer buying from a 3rd party) specifies precisely what they want, the minimum will be done - testing is expensive and time consuming - the less scrupulous chinese partners will not necessarily stick to what they say they are sticking to unless you are on them like rash. What’s more, unless you are doing your own testing you could receive batches of non compliant product which is visually exactly the same as compliant, and which the average punter would be very very hard pressed to spot. If you get a situation where someone at the chinese end innocently makes a minor change to manufacture or material process, thinking it will make no difference but in reality it makes a major difference, the blowback will be to the “face company” not the manufacturing partner. Sorry, but having had conversations with people at LACD stands, personally I would not have the confidence to categorically state that they know exactly what they are procuring, or that they have a back up QC system. You might have confidence, and you crack on, personally I won’t go near them. It might all be fantastic, just telling you my personal impression of the people I met...
