The slow moving parts like our water pumps will be made in China regardless of where you buy it. Not enough volume for a company here to make them. The motorcraft one from the dealer will likely be the same garbage the auto parts stores carry.
This is the unfortunate situation in many instances across the board. And not just with our old trucks either...The slow moving parts like our water pumps will be made in China regardless of where you buy it. Not enough volume for a company here to make them. The motorcraft one from the dealer will likely be the same garbage the auto parts stores carry.
O'Reilly's does seem to be getting better. I learned how to wand armatures so that we could rebuild alternators and starters back in tech school in the 70s. I don't have the facilities to do that now, so I found a really good local Rebuilder. He does lots of marine and heavy equipment applications. He's a bit more expensive and it certainly not an overnight turnaround but the stuff that he puts out, puts out more than stock and is better than new...Yeah what I've found with NAPA over the last 5 years or so is that they are no longer the best quality "box store" stuff. Overall they probably are but have a lot more things that are just as crappy as others. While at the same time Orielly has stepped up their game and carries a lot more quality stuff than they used to.
But parts these days are hit and miss...I ended up learning how to rebuild my own alternators because of box store rebuilds. A lifetime warranty is only so good when you replace the damn thing 3 times in a year and end up late for work or whatever because of it.
I still prefer NAPA and use them for most things.

Haven't had one fail yet... but haven't put enough time/miles on the various engines to have a good long testing period.Only a year or two? That doesn't sound like a ringing endorsement![]()