You do realize it's a snorkel right? These have had the same basic design for over 80 years now and been used on almost every 4x4 ever produced. They may "design" the mold, but the snorkel inherently isn't just one persons idea so there's no real theft. It's kind of like wheels, numerous manufacturers make almost identical wheels as each other. It's Charmin suing Walmart for copying their toilet paper

Not everybody is American and due to the economy in America, not everybody has $300-500 to spend on a snorkel kit. That's not cheap when the average income is around $2500/month. If everybody was rich and felt that a piece of plastic was worth that money, there'd be no market for cheaper alternatives. This is industry and business and has been for 100's of years now Personally, I think AEV stuff is generally over priced compared to other retailers. They heavily market their product and spend a ton of money on marketing so in return they have a huge market share for offroad products. I'm sure they can stand to loose a few thousand dollars here and there on products that most likely carry very little intellectual property rights.

 

do it!!!!

O|||||||o

 

Agree with this

 

SPOT ON

 

While with law enforcement (federal), working for the Montana Department of Corrections and on a number of jobs in shrink prevention I got to hear almost the exact same excuses from people to excuse their bad behavior and thievery.

Like:
A. Well if they didn't charge so much for it I wouldn’t have to steal it.
B. They have enough money so my stealing this won't hurt them.
C. They probably stole the idea from someone else anyway so I am just paying them back for that.
D. Always a favorite: Everything really belongs to everyone anyway so I am not really stealing. (Here is the trick this one--take something of theirs and see how fast that story changes.)

Counterfeiting Costs US Businesses $200 Billion Annually - If you think this is a victimless crime: 1. You are an idiot. 2. When a company losses it profits what do you think happens to the employees? 3. AND you wonder what happened to those great paying US manufacturing jobs???

There is good news though....not too many in this thread will ever have to worry about anything “intellectual” being stolen from them.

Lucky for the company in question (and all the sponsors on this site) that there are more honest people with a decent level of integrity to support them.


Oh...and just to be clear, buying stolen good is pretty much the same in my book.

 

Hmm. I saw the show "How it's Made" where they showed a company in TN making fireworks. (Arial bombs). I'm guessing that in the future, if I'm buying fireworks for a display, I'd better make sure they were made in China, so as not to support theft of intellectual property.

I think this is a stretch to call this particular case a theft, unless we could examine the patent AEV holds, or maybe patents on certain parts of it.

I'd like to see if AEV was even able to get a patent on their snorkel. I'll bet not.

Having said that, it is easy to see the quality control is better with AEV. I haven't found anyone complaining about their fit or finish, while I have seen a few with the Chinese snorkel. I've also seen bunches of happy customers, too.

Funny, I hear all this stuff about buy American, but what ever happened to the part about free market competition? People always leave that out, and it is as American as apple pie. Clearly, AEV is holding their own, and then some, and they've got some clear advantages. Let the market place decide. I buy American if it is competitive both in quality and price. It would be unhealthy for American Industry to do it any other way. It keeps them lean and mean.

If the Chinese companies have violated any patents, then all this huge government we've been paying for should damn well do something about it.

I'm leaning toward the AEV for my Jeep, but the more I see of the Chinese product, the more intrigued I am. For one thing, I wish AEV still made the Gen 1. I don't need 4" diameter. 3 is fine for the 3.8. Also, why the larger diameter? It still looks like it is feeding through the same size hole at the air box. The quality on the AEV looks great, but they are way overpriced for what it is and for what it is made of. If they sold it for even $250, it would probably wipe the Chinese version from my mind.

Anyone know where I can get a Gen 1 AEV for a reasonable price?

 

Here ya go....right from AEV's own FAQ: "We took a bit of Jeep Heritage when designing the AEV Heat Reduction Hood and AEV Snorkel. The early M38A1 came with a small knock out panel in the side of the hood for a deep water fording kit that was used is some theaters of war. We took design inspiration from that and decided to have a notch in the hood and to run the snorkel body down the outside of the vehicle."

Now, here's the part that appears to be patented: The dust prefilter. AEV doesn't hold it, though. Sy-Klone International does.

Didn't I see someone talking somewhere about AEV being and R & D company? Maybe so with some of their products, but not so much with this one. Unless you call tweaking R & D. They took an off the shelf idea and tweaked it, albeit very nicely, for the JK.

Relax, though. The more I read, the more interested I become in the AEV. That cyclonic dust filter appears to be highly effective. I also like the idea of having real instructions, written with good grammar and spelling.

I'm just having intestinal discomfort with paying and extra $260 bucks for it. That's right, the Ebay snorkel can be had for just over $100 shipped. Hell, you could buy a spare and still be over $150 ahead, just in case it isn't as rugged.

Shit. I'm starting to talk myself into that Chinese snorkel. Geesh this is tough.

 

Check this out:

Sy-Klone International: Series 9000: How It Works

Pretty ingenious, yet simple design. This by itself might sway me to the AEV. Crap. Another $125!

 

More interesting info right from AEV's website. This was the only customer review of their snorkel:

"Pretty easy install besides I had to modify my air box and snorkel for them to fit together right."

 

Lmao. That's funny! I've had both snorkels, both on 2010 JKU's no problems with either of them. Measure twice cut once.

Sent from my obama monitoring device