Hi,
It is simply a sign of the things to come and why some parts are going to become harder and harder to find.
Ryco, as an example, have always made filters to fit Mokes/Mini's but the market is slowly diminishing, more go off the road than what gets added. Remember we only hear about the restorations, not the ones pushed to back of the garage and left to rot.
So the total number required in the market is smaller. Many people buy items based purely on price, the cheapest available, This allows the the low quality items to enter the market thus further reducing the total number Ryco can realistically expect to sell.
The big chains like Repco etc aren't going to take up space on a shelf with a couple of Moke/Mini filters that they might sell one or two of in the year when they can put a Ford/Holden that will probably be gone in a week. So volume and thus discounted price is no longer there making the cheaper ones even more attractive to the customer. A few years ago the MOA bought the last 88 Repco branded oil filters from Repco because they no longer wanted to stock them in Victoria.
The chains and the specialist suppliers are then competing with eBay and online stores selling lower quality goods with little fear of customer returns or warranties so further reduce the need for Ryco to produce.
So Repco and the chain have more or less stopped selling them and Ryco probably produce very few of them, and in the case of Air filters for the HS4 that fit nothing else will probably be discontinued soon.
So the irony is that in an effort to save a few dollars by the majority we will all be risking our engines on the ability of the cheaper low quality items to filter air and oil so we can avoid a couple of thousand dollar or more rebuilds.
I am sure our leaders at G20 aren't discussing Oil filters but the general direction of a global economy is to favor the lower cost item thus causing greater expenditure in repair and replacement. There is no money to be made in making quality products in a disposable economy.
Terry
PS. This was written before i read Mr Spottys Post.