How You Can Spot And Avoid Counterfeit Fasteners

When you run a facility where you might need to use a large number of fasteners, one of the problems you might run into is how to make sure that the cost of getting such fasteners is reduced. There are many options you can try out, including working with different contractors to find out which one offers more value for money as well as negotiating with them and even buying online.
However, in your quest to get low cost fasteners, you may end up being enticed by ones that are counterfeit. The market is currently flooded with a large number of counterfeit fasteners which are very cheap but which offer little to no quality at all. To ensure that you don’t waste money, you may need to acquire a few basic skills that you can use to identify the counterfeit ones. Some of these include:

Paying attention to the quality of the workmanship

When you are assessing the suitability of fasteners from a particular vendor, you will need to ask for a few samples that you can use for quality assessment. Usually, counterfeit products are very cheap mainly because they are made cheaply. Some of the physical features you should be looking out for in such fasteners include threads that are not evenly spaced, heads that look roughhewn and fastener lengths that are not consistent for all fasteners. In a few cases, you may even notice that their color is a bit off compared to the real deal.

Their price may be much lower than you expect

One of the most obvious signs of counterfeit products is that their prices may be ridiculously low. For instance, you may come across titanium hex nuts or titanium hex head cap screws that cost as much as their steel equivalents. However, it is known that titanium is a very expensive metal, and is hard to find. When you find ones that claim to be made of titanium and cost unbelievably low for no good reason, you should assume that they are counterfeit.

 

They break easily

Before you can buy fasteners in bulk, you are usually encouraged to buy a few samples for testing. When you do this, you will notice that a large number of the counterfeit fasteners will easily break. This is usually on account of poor workmanship during manufacture, as well as the fact that they may have many impurities that make them weak.
These are just some of the features you may need to look out for when shopping for fasteners. Once you realize that you may be dealing with counterfeit fasteners, you will definitely need to be more careful with the vendor. Some of the things you ought to do include thoroughly assessing their products before purchasing from them.
However, you can get rid of the stress of dealing with counterfeit products by simply buying your fasteners from an established vendor. The fact that they sell high quality products at reasonable prices usually makes them very well known, so you are likely to find it easy to identify and work with such a vendor.