Componenets from ebay, so cheap, is there a catch ?

[ItsMike]

Hello everyone,

I noticed that ebay has very cheap electrical components for sale with free shipping.
Most of the prices there are at least twice as cheap than in real shops in my country.

Is there a catch ?
Or should I just order up those 300 resistors for 1$ ?

 

[cobra1]

I get 100 resistors for 50p from rapid so i guess its not a million miles from an accurate pricing, for a $ id say risk it

 

[DerStrom8]

Just don't forget that roughly 10 percent of them will probably be duds.

 

[colin55]

Just don't forget that roughly 10 percent of them will probably be duds.

Moderated Off Topic

Every transaction on eBay is guaranteed and if a supplier gets a few bad reports, he is finished.

Everthing is first quality and I have bought hundreds of things on eBay without a single hitch.

Moderated Off Topic

 

[DerStrom8]

Moderated Off Topic

Every transaction on eBay is guaranteed and if a supplier gets a few bad reports, he is finished.

Everthing is first quality and I have bought hundreds of things on eBay without a single hitch.

Moderated Off Topic

When buying and selling in bulk, you always need to expect the worst. Perhaps saying "probably" wasn't the right word--What I should have said is that up to 10 percent of them could be duds. As I said, always expect the worst. Just keep this in mind.
Der Strom

 

[saturation]

I don't think you can stereotype all eBayers as the same type of parts quality.

Consider supplier who sells items as surplus or company liquidators. Even with that however, without a clear way to trace the supply chain, you risk buying counterfeit parts. The worse that can happen is the part doesn't work, but potentially worse is that it works for a while but they are from factory quality rejects, and these items are either substandard specifications or other defects so they fail prematurely or do not live up to the spec sheet.

One safe way to buy outside the supply chain is to actually retest the part for its supposed specifications. You needn't check every specification, but you could check its tolerances, frequency response, etc., and assume if it passes key functions, they it probably has the others too. If you buy what appears to be the same brand, not a mix of different makers, you can actually destructively test a few samples to see if it lives up the the maximum rating.

 

[colin55]

Every item via PayPal provdes a money-back guarantee.

 

[ElectroMaster]

I haven't bought any components off ebay yet but I have bought some cat5e (network) cable. It was very cheap and I thought that because there is a clear standard of cable thickness (24 awg) strands of wire. However, I was wrong and it turned out to have only 26 AWG thickness which is thinner. Performance is degraded and I have to buy new stuff.

I believe it's quite common for for manufactures to make wires thinner to save costs this could be the case with resistors and other electrical components.

 

[Dr_Doggy]

you get what you pay for, usually if it s discount its not as good, ie a stereo off ebay could have it all just like a panasonic, but you will find the quality just not the same/ buttons arnt as good, may break or just not press/ or the station info will show in greek

then again sometimes cheap limited circuits fit the bill better than a state of art one....

 

[tcmtech]

I buy parts of eBay all the time and so far I have yet to come across any really bad stuff. Much of the bulk items are from surplus warehouses and other places that deal in common items but at vast quantities so for them to end up with a few million odds and ends that came from some place is rather common. If the part has a common manufactruing name its probibly just surplus from who knows what that was being built at some time.

I have a friend who deals in surplus manufacturing scrap and its common to see him end up with what would be a $100,000 or more worth of new over stock items for next to nothing. Once he got about 25 tons of new metric fasteners, nuts, bolts, screws etc,in every size and shape imaginable for around $150 a ton. The market value of that was around $1,000,000 but he put it all into scrap iron since finding an immediate market and someone to hand sort it was not worth his time. None of it was junk rather it was just bins and bins of unsorted production over run that all got dumped into random piles and eventually sold for scrap metal.

 

[kiriakos-gr]

Hello everyone,

I noticed that ebay has very cheap electrical components for sale with free shipping.
Most of the prices there are at least twice as cheap than in real shops in my country.

Is there a catch ?
Or should I just order up those 300 resistors for 1$ ?

Yes and it is, and it is called as China.

There is no chance to find DALE resistors in China, and so yes the catch is that for very generic parts they are the source.
But from another point of view, its not logical to stock electronic parts this days.

Why getting 300 identical resistors? because they cost less ? that's the major catch.
Never buy more than of what you actually need.

Ebay and paypal , do not care about the cheated buyers, they make more money from the listings, and up to a point they favor mostly the sellers than the buyers,
and do not be confused by the word sellers .... seller = the large fish, and not the poor guy who will sell a used remote control.

When ever I had to fight as cheated buyer against of a large fish, paypal = ebay was in favor of the big fish.

 

[EmeraldW]

We have picked up some cheap parts from Ebay when we find a good deal. So far I haven't had any issues but I mostly stick with bulk items that I use the most like LEDs, connectors, and sockets. ICs I find a better deal or worth the extra money just to order from state side suppliers such as Digikey.

More expensive items such as meters are usually not worth the savings. We picked up a multimeter that normally runs about $30 for $5 but it lasted about five days. You usually also have to deal with crazy long shipping times.

 

[4pyros]

Many of the ICs and electrolytic caps are counterfeit! Read about "bad caps" and "counterfeit chips".

 

[transistor495]

Few months ago I made a post about an Integrated Circuit that I bought from local shop which has nothing inside!!..A nice looking marked part with just plastic inside and glued legs . Those comes from nearby country and how much headache it gave me on a repair process, absolutely I wouldn't be interested to recall anymore.

If it's really cheap then there's a chance to get such things even if sold in ebay..that kind of sellers perhaps not worried on their rating?

I could almost think and choose right things on ebay and till now I've a nice experience and I've got some pretty nice deals too. Good and bad are everywhere. No question.

 

[squishy36]

A wise man said it long ago: "You pays your money and you takes your chances".

 

[ItsMike]

Electronic parts cost a fortune here in Israel.
There are only small shops that sell them, and they easily charge about 1-1.5$ for a 555 timer or a 7805 voltage regulator which are VERY basic and cheap items.

Also, I can't order from digikey or farnell since the shipping is about 50$.

 

[DerStrom8]

RadioShack sells 555 timers for $1.69 each. Ridiculously expensive :|

 

[sasarchiver]

i get most of my components from ebay. no catch. i get 100 RGB flashing leds for under £5 with free posting,or 100 3mm white/blue leds for £2.71 free p&p. but from hongkong so u wait abt 2-3weeeks but worth it. i have thousands of leds lol no hitches so far.

 

[sasarchiver]

kinda like maplin, there expensive, especially for LEDs, 80p for 1 lol i only go if i need a part asap.

 

[Mr RB]

I've heard when China get a bad manufacturing batch that doesn't meet spec or won't satisfy their proper customers they unload it on ebay in bags of 50 or 100 etc to the hobby crowd. I don't buy bulk components on ebay only the occasional single item so I'm not sure how true it is.

I have seen China ebay items mis-labeled in the advertising to make the item look better than it is, like using the specs from a model above (and photo) on the ebay ad for a lesser model.