What I have found both personally and from watching others, is that when you by cheap junk, you often end up spending more in the long run than if you had bought something nice in the first place.
That’s because the cheap junk breaks, and so you either have to buy another one and you have just spent twice as much for a cheap junk piece of something as in the first place, or you learn your lesson and spend more after all, instead of spending more initially and not having the aggravation of having to buy something twice.
I burned through through two cheap sewing machines in two years and decided that I could spend yet more money again on another piece of crap and still have nothing to show for it, or just splurge and buy something nice.
I went with a Pfaff, in the days when you could still find them, and that machine has paid for itself many times over and is about 40 years old and still going strong.
Oh, I agree 100%. In the case of this printer, the entry level into the 3D world for a good printer was much higher than I was willing to pay. Of course, I DID pay for it by getting it cheap, but I also got the learning curve by necessity, which I expect will be valuable in the long run.
I just didn’t want to spend $600 for something that was a bit better, but...I might have no aptitude for it. Like buying a really nice guitar, only to find out the instrument isn’t a good fit for you and you never use it.
I always get good quality when I can in the normal course of things, and have been blessed to have enough money to buy up and cover my lack of knowledge of things. I have a buddy who has reservoir of common sense (something that seems to run dry on me occasionally) and a stubbornness to not over pay. There have been many times I have piggybacked on his work and choice to avoid putting in the effort that he did, and I think he is pleased when I do that. I haven’t often been wrong in that course of action, so that is worthwhile.
Growing up, my father had tons of tools, but...they were all the cheap variety. The screwdrivers you buy a five pack of at K-Mart, that kind of thing.
I wondered aloud to my brother the other night on that, musing on why someone like my dad who clearly knew what quality was and was able to do almost any task, almost aways purchased lower quality for cheaper.
He said it was because my dad knew that his kids would not treat his tools well, leave them in places he wouldn’t find them, break off the tips or round the screw drivers, and so on.
My dad has been gone some twenty years now, and I felt a sharp pang of sad regret at the memory of my dad walking around one early spring morning in our backyard. I saw him through the window as he slowly paced the yard. The snow had only recently melted, and it was his first close view of it since the fall, and I assumed he was checking the condition.
As he slowly paced, eyes to to the ground, his hands on his hips, I saw him suddenly stop and stiffen. He bent slowly, and with a thumb and a forefinger, retrieved a rust encased pair of pliers from the damp grass.
He didn’t really move, just brought them up to eye level and gazed at them.
I had left them out last autumn when I had been trying to fix my bike.
It made me feel sad, that I could have been one of us responsible for his attitude that robbed him of the joy of using a fine tool. Now, as I get older, I am at the stage where if I don’t put something back right where it came from in a good state, I won’t be able to find it without much cussing and thinking someone else is responsible (even if I can also readily accept it was probably my carelessness.
In a house of two people...:)
“ is that when you by cheap junk, you often end up spending more in the long run than if you had bought something nice in the first place.”
“Buy once. Cry once.” Lurkers Granddad.
L