Buying a machine from a Chinese factory is not difficult. Buying one from the wrong factory, or on the wrong terms, is expensive in ways that only show up six months later.
We supply these machines ourselves, so treat the following as the checklist we would want a customer to hold us to, rather than an impartial guide to the market. It is still the list worth working through before you send a deposit.
1. Factory or reseller
This is the first thing to establish, and it is not always obvious. Plenty of trading companies present themselves as manufacturers, and some are good at it.
What actually settles the question:
- Business licence scope. In China, a company’s licence states its registered business scope. Manufacturing is listed separately from trading. Ask for the licence and read that field, not the company name.
- Machine serial numbers. Ask what format they use and where the plate sits on the machine. A factory knows this without looking it up.
- Ask for a specific technical answer. Not the catalogue figure — something the catalogue does not cover. What is the pass schedule for your material? What happens to line speed if inlet strength goes above the stated ceiling? A factory engineer answers. A reseller forwards your email.
- Video call with the workshop behind them. Not a staged photo. Ask them to walk to a machine and show you the control cabinet.
A reseller is not automatically a bad choice. Some are well organised, hold stock, and support export documentation better than a small factory does. What matters is that you know which one you are dealing with, because it changes what you can ask for and what you should expect to pay.
2. The specification in writing
The single most common source of dispute is a specification that both sides believed was clear. “Standard configuration” means different things in different factories. There is a worked example of a full specification for drawing machines if you want to see what the list should look like in practice.
Have the quotation state, at minimum:
- Model and machine serial or production number
- Inlet and outlet diameter range, both stated
- Material the machine is set up for, and the inlet strength limit
- Number of dies and the pass schedule
- Motor power for each motor, not one combined figure
- Voltage, phase, and frequency
- Control system make and model
- Take-up and pay-off equipment included, with capacity
- What is excluded — dies, tooling, foundation bolts, commissioning
Voltage is the one that causes the most trouble. A machine built for 380 V / 50 Hz will not run on 440 V / 60 Hz without changing motors and drives. Settle it before production starts, not after the machine lands.
3. What your Incoterm covers
FOB and CIF are the two terms most used for machinery shipped from China, and they transfer risk at different points.
| Term | Seller’s cost and risk ends | Who arranges freight | Who insures |
|---|---|---|---|
| FOB named port of shipment | When goods are loaded on board the vessel | Buyer | Buyer |
| CIF named port of destination | Risk passes when goods are on board, but seller pays freight and insurance to destination port | Seller | Seller, to a minimum level |
The point people miss with CIF is that risk passes at the port of shipment, not at destination. If the machine is damaged in transit, you are claiming on the insurance policy, not asking the seller to replace it. Under standard CIF terms the default cover is the minimum level, which may not be enough for a machine of this value. If you want broader cover, negotiate it explicitly and expect to pay for it.
For machinery, FOB is often the cleaner choice if you have a freight forwarder you already work with. CIF is simpler if you do not, but check what the insurance actually covers.
4. Payment schedule
The usual structure is a deposit with the order and the balance before shipment. Thirty percent deposit and seventy percent before shipment is common. What matters more than the percentages is what triggers each payment.
- Deposit — after the specification is confirmed in writing, not before
- Balance — after you have seen inspection evidence, not just after the machine is built
If you are asked for full payment up front, that is worth questioning. If you are asked for payment to a personal account rather than a company account, stop and verify. The account name should match the company on the contract and the licence.
5. Inspection before shipment
Once a machine is crated and loaded, resolving a problem costs far more than catching it in the workshop. There are two practical ways to handle this.
Third-party inspection. Companies such as SGS, Bureau Veritas and Intertek provide pre-shipment inspection in China. You can specify what the inspector checks. For machinery, the useful scope is usually dimensional verification against the specification, a function test under power, photography of the machine serial plate and control cabinet, and confirmation of the included accessories against the packing list.
Video inspection with the machine running. Cheaper and often more useful for machinery than a paperwork check. Ask for the machine running under load, the control panel visible, the dies in place, and the serial plate readable. Watch whether the wire runs cleanly and whether the operator has to intervene.
Whichever you choose, do it before the balance payment and before the container is sealed.
6. Documentation
Missing documents become your problem at the destination port, and some of them cannot be produced retroactively.
- Commercial invoice and packing list — must match the goods exactly
- Bill of lading — check consignee details before the vessel sails
- Certificate of origin — needed for preferential duty rates in many markets
- CE marking and declaration — required for EU import, and increasingly asked for elsewhere
- Test reports — if your market or your customer requires them
- Operation and maintenance manual — in a language your operators read, with the electrical schematic
The manual point gets skipped often. A manual in English is not much use if your maintenance team reads Vietnamese or Arabic. Ask for the schematic separately too, because that is the document your electrician will need and it is the one most often missing.
7. After arrival
Before you buy, know the answers to these:
- Who provides installation and commissioning, and at what cost?
- Are spare parts available, for how long after the model is discontinued, and at what lead time?
- Which parts are consumable and what do they cost per year in normal operation?
- What is the warranty period, what does it cover, and what does it exclude?
- Who do you contact when a problem occurs, and in what time zone?
A supplier who cannot answer the consumable cost question has probably not thought about the machine running in your plant for the next ten years. On drawing machines specifically, die life drives that cost, and die condition is also the first thing to check when wire starts breaking.
A short version
If you only have time to check five things: verify the business licence scope, get the full specification in writing including voltage and excluded items, understand where risk transfers under your Incoterm, inspect before the balance is paid, and confirm the spare parts situation in writing.
None of that is unusual to ask for. A factory used to export business expects all of it. If a supplier pushes back on any of these requests, you have learned something useful.
If you want to compare a quotation against this list, or check whether a specification covers everything your line will need, send it to us and we will go through it.
