Hi all, newbie here! Hopefully have this in the correct subforum!

I run a (small) ice cream business, making ice cream rolls using cold plates from a manufacturer in China (yep, I know what you're thinking, cheap parts and will break easily!).

To get an idea of what the unit does, have a google of ice cream rolls. I don't want to link to the machines themselves on Alibaba, as it'll look like I'm advertising! Essentially its a refrigeration unit which cools a cold plate down to about -20 centigrade.

I knew similar people had issues with their machines breaking down, I believe most of them had leaking refrigerant. A know one company had 20 machines break down the day they arrived! 3 more companies in London had their machines break at some point. I wanted to try and avoid this, and assumed making it explicitly clear to the manufacturer that I didn't want this to happen to me would be enough! I requested an upgraded compressor and bigger fan condenser unit would be enough too.

You guessed it, my machine has broken down too! After only using it less than a dozen times!

I know the machine gets a bit of a bashing about as it gets transported to locations, so it moves around a bit and sits in a back of a van. I also know that China is synonymous with cheaply built stuff.

Unfortunately there is honestly no one in the UK, or Europe for that matter, who build these machines! So I'm stuck with buying from China at the moment.

Do any of you have any suggestions about what I can ask the manufacturer to do to hopefully avoid this happening more often? Such us, are the Chinese known for avoiding using good parts in specific areas (not just the whole machine!), such as joint, gauges or whatever?

I know I'm taking a risk buying from there, but with nowhere else to buy from at the moment, I have no choice. I want to do my best to reduce risk the most, and giving specific instructions is the best I can do for now I believe!

Thanks for any help, appreciate it!