Yet another case of rebranding and cheapness

[Yolk]

Below is a photo of a Vesubio soldering gun,it's a very popular brand in argentina that goes back as 1980 i believe.
Also below is a photo of a weller soldering iron.
I know that things like these happen everywhere,but i dont believe that it's fair for the consumer,buying something that bears the brand of "made in argentina" yet it's using the same case as weller. (they're probably both supplied from china anyway)

What are you thoughts?

Edit: Bonus track-someone with a d650 fetch me a picture without the case,i'll get a D3 and tear it apart so we can compare.

[CatalinaWOW]

Not necessarily dishonest.  Weller could have licensed the design.  Even sold them the shell parts since the mold would be one of the expensive bits to starting production.  Add a locally sourced transformer core, coil, tip holder and power cord (all parts that require relatively little and low cost tooling) and you are down to arguing about the trigger/switch which as you say is probably source from China for both the US and Argentine version.

[ferdieCX]

Already in 1968, you could buy Vesubio soldering guns from Eneka in Uruguay and Argentina.
The shell was made of bakelite.

[CatalinaWOW]

As I remember, Weller irons were made with Bakelite at roughly that era.  I know that their newer ones are no longer Bakelite, presumably some thermoset plastic.

Without going through huge volumes of records (which may have been destroyed in the intervening 50+ years) or finding someone who was there and willing to talk we will probably never know whether this was a licensing deal or just plain rip off copying.

[ferdieCX]

The Weller and Vesubio soldering guns made from Bakelite look like twins.
Interesting is, that in the 60's you could buy in Uruguay Vesubio and Wen soldering guns, but I don't remember to have seen Weller.
In 1954, Weller sued Wen for patent infringement.
Anyway, a soldering gun was at that time out of the economic reach of a 10 year old kid.

[chickenHeadKnob]

I have a  low end weller station dating from the 1984 or so. You know the pale blue standard ones you see everywhere in Canada, or at least used to . On the back it  is marked Cooper tools Canada and I always assumed Cooper tools was building them under license for the Canadian market but it turns out Cooper tools is only the immediate parent company. The holding company is APEX tool group:

From wikipedia -"Apex Tool Group is an American supplier of hand tools and power tools. It was formed as a joint venture of Cooper Industries and Danaher by the merger of Cooper Tools and Danaher's Tools and Components segment. In October 2012 Danaher and Cooper sold Apex to Bain Capital for about $1.6 billion.[1] Apex is headquartered in Sparks, Maryland, and has over 20 factories globally including the United States, Canada, Mexico, Germany, China, and South America. "

So Vesubio might be an official brand for the local market, ie it could be just as official as weller. Cooper bought the weller brand name in 1970's.