Everyone Has Favourites, Right?
My AliExpress Top 24 Fave Stores
I know I've been absent from the blogs for a week or two - things have been hectic, won't bore you with details but stressful and time-consuming. I've missed pouring my dribblings out to you all. And I'm not out of the woods yet but I'm finding slowly that I have a few moments here and there where I can sit and think again. So I thought I might list my top 24 stores on AliExpress with a short explanation of them and what I look for in a store there. Lots of links!
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UPDATE: See foot of post, got a 90sec vid up.
What Is AliExpress?
Blowed if I know how to exactly describe AliExpress, but here's my best try: Imagine a website for a single seller - AnyCubic, Creality3D, McMaster Carr. It's nothing like that... Imagine a store like Banggood - and it's nothing like that, either. The closest things I can think of are MadeInChina or Ebay. Similar to them, it's a low oversight Ebay for Asian small stores.
Sellers can apparently be anyone at all, from someone with a van full of parts that they're hawking on street corners, all the way to BigTreeTech and Creality. All very like Ebay so far, actually. So let's settle on that, it's a Chinese Ebay. By the way, MadeInChina is a more commercial-focused similar site, like AliBaba - which is AliExpress' parent site - so that's as good as I can make my evaluation of the actual site.
I've had my share of bad experiences there, but I also have those on Ebay and Banggood and Amazon, too. (Oh and there's a thing - AliExpress has some of the niceties of Amazon but not quite so much buyer protection...)
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Why Use AliExpress?
If you're like me, money's a bit tight most of the time. I realise that influencers are in a very different situation to me (and probably you as well) in that A) they have a large disposable income, if they're any good, and B) if they're any good, they got to that point by being able to complete projects and evaluations in a timely manner - and that means they'll rarely use these slower and less reliable suppliers.
Me, I've found that the money I've generally saved on items has been huge. I'm talking about avoiding local store margins of 20% - 150% over AE prices. The few times I've been at a loss, the sellers agreed to pay back the base cost of the items and left me bearing only the (usually tiny) shipping costs.
For instance, I ordered a set of PCB drill bits with a common shank size, invaluable if you want to quickly change bits when making PCBs and so, I considered the $5.30 price plus $1.27 shipping to be worth it.
The bits hadn't arrived in eight weeks, well past the expected delivery date, so I raised a dispute and sat back. The seller came back with "Tracking number {number here} is shown has arrive in your country, please contact them on {phone number here} and find out." So I punched the number into the local postal delivery's site and came up blank. Wrote back to them and said that here's the link to the local parcel tracking and nothing is indicated, therefore the bits were still in China, if indeed they'd ever been sent.
I suggested they send another set and if the first set turned up I'd be honest enough to pay for it also, as drill bits are a consumable and I'd be quite happy to have a spare set. (And it's quite true - when our local parcel post misdelivered an $80 shipment from Banggood a few years ago, they kindly resent the order, which arrived in a few weeks - and then the original order also turned up after what had apparently been an around-the-world trip. I contacted Banggood and made arrangements to pay the cancelled order. I rely on their service, they should be able to rely on my honesty.)
So How Do I Tell?
Anyhow - this seller got back to me and refunded the $5.30 cost price which lets me know they didn't actually HAVE any sets of drill bits and make their money by not sending items and keeping the delivery fees. THAT'S how you tell. Well, one way, anyway.
Another good way to tell the stores that are dodgy is the feedback. I know some of them get their friends and family to all "order" items, leave glowing feedback, and then silently cancel the transaction. A classic was this store that had 20 product lines they were selling, had only 6 sales across their entire line, but a 99% rating and 30-ish feedbacks. They think we can't do the maths . . .
And that's another thing - sellers with less than 100 product lines are generally those people with the vans and a ton of "friends" or purchased reviews. Against that, balance the 3D printer companies - they sometimes only have 15 lines of printers and 30 lines of spare parts, but they're okay.
Also check how long they've been on AE - sometimes you're lucky and find a seller that's only been there less than a year but is honest and quality and ends up becoming a superstar store. But generally I let other people try them and if they're still there after two years then I'll investigate them for use as a resource.
Lastly. That leaves thousands (literally) of stores that I know nothing about and can't offer advice about. They're on a case-by-case basis, apply the simple rules above, make up your own mind, and buy at your own risk. All I can say is that over the years I've spent hundreds (of my painstakingly scrimped money) at Banggood and AliExpress and only been out of pocket a few tens of dollars.
A Few More Words Of Wisdom
A few of the stores here sell refurbished and secondhand gear. They're usually very up front about it, and so I got a ~$15 high speed high volume server fan for $4, no postage, and it's in use as a dust extraction system and printer enclosure auxiliary cooling fan. (I'll do a piece on this system in a few months when I get it all finished - it's not a presentable project yet. It allows me to extract solder and plastic welding fumes from the work area, also acts as the extraction route for the printer cabinet, and will also do the CNC machine when I finally get that done.) It's so good (and LOUD! But they do say these are loud fans because of their intended use) that I'm getting two more, one as a spare and the other as another auxiliary extraction system. (The CNC...)
Also there are stepper motors that'll drive a full sized commercial CNC router motion system, spindles, and so forth that are shown as "reconditioned" or "refurbished" and if I ever have the chance to make a real CNC I'll definitely start with something like that before spending tens of thousands on new hardware. That's just a fact of life for me, always mind the pennies to the point of miserly behaviour...
The Stores I Use Most
So here are the first 24 (the only 24, actually) stores in my Favourites list on AliExpress:
- ZHUHAI Store
This store has extrusions, motion system components, stepper motors and driver modules, linear track lead screws ball screws vee slot wheel carriages you name it they have it and the price will make ANY local Maker store cry. They're also quite prompt with delivery and I can't fault the quality. - maccurat Official
Store
What Zhuhai don't have, maccurat does. Even more hardware, belts, pulleys, stepper motor mounts ready to install, hot ends and extruders, glass bed clips, filament dry storage - I could spend thousands here and have a van of my own to sell from... And like the above store, always punctual and decent quality. - ICs Store
As the name suggests, chips, also microcontroller boards, voltage converters, - I could list more but you get the idea - I have a heap of voltage converters, level shifters, all working and in use. Also good with delivery times. - ACELEX Official
Store
ACELEX attracted my attention because they have panel mount PWM motor speed controllers and similar modules, DIY USB cable plugs and sockets, lasers, tools, solder, wire - a cornucopia of Maker parts. Not too shoddy at all... - YUNSHUO Official
Store
Optical smooth motion rods, block and pillow bearings, linear bearings, and a whole lot more motion and mechanical parts, aviation connectors, some T-track parts. Delivers in reasonable times. - GlobalPower Co.,
LT Store
18650 batteries, other LiIon LiFePo and other chemistries batteries, holders, connectors, chargers, I've got a lot of batteries from here. - Holyhah Store
Holy Hah, Batman! Main reason for this store is that they sell Niimbot thermal printers and I have one that I use for labelling and guerilla QR code campaigns. They also sell rolls of labels for the printer including the weatherproof ones and cable "tag" labels. The Niimbot D110 printer I have is excellent, Bluetooth to the phone and I can pretty much do on the spot stocktaking / labelling. - Guangyi0016 Store
Electromechanical stuff, strain gauges etc. Peltier cooling. Nixie style glow tubes, Tesla coil parts. Wholesome goodness for Makers - NIIMBOT Online
Store
My printer plus a dozen relatives, label tapes, stocktake scanner / labellers, photo printers. - HoHou Store
More labelling stuff - Niimbot included. For a while, it was hard to get the 30mm waterproof labels so I had a few suppliers. - power2019 Store
Batteries supercapacitors coin cells clips for batteries and coin cells - can never have too much power for projects! - SuperModel Store
Gears drive trains heatshrink switches food grade silicon tubing small drone motors connectors including aviation connectors - I find things here all the time. - Aideepen
Direct Store
More motor controller, thermostat, and various panel mount and open circuit board modules, USB power analyzers, that kind of stuff. - Cloudray-Motor
Store
It's a stepper motor central, with a great range of motors and drivers, pulleys, and - everything for stepper motors. They sometimes have good package deals. - BigTreeTech Official Store
I got my SKR Mini E3 V3 here and now the companion touch LCD and they have some nice printers and bits. So far I'm liking them, lots. - NEARCAM Store
Nearcam's here for the RGBLEDs and lighting stuff in general, I still get a bit gee whizzed by blingy blinky lights. I got a raft of WSsomething addressable LEDs here and they got here fast. - Electrical
Kingdom
This store has industrial connectors and parts like inductive switches, linear actuators, gas lifts, VFDs, cable management spiral wrap, pumps motor drives and all sorts of fun stuff. They also have sub-D connectors which I bought three of (thinking the price was for a pair) and finished up with 30 pairs. Oops. They were so inexpensive I was sure the price had to be for one, not for ten... - HYONGC Hongbang
Motor Store
Another stepper motor store but has a load of more specialised CNC parts, motion controllers, pendants, limit switches, a few desktop laser engravers/cutters and so forth. - CREALITY 3D
Printer Global Store
They may actually BE Creality3D, they have all the printers and so forth. - Funssor Official
Store
More Maker hardware like extrusions and frame kits and all the usual stuff you might want for 3D FFF (FDM) printing. - pandahall
Official Store
Craft supplies. What? I like craft stuff, my wife loves it, and they have CRAFT TOOLS like pliers and snips and so forth. Well worth favouriting. - XXXXXX Store
Parts for gaming controllers, PCB mount connectors, a LOT of different types of everything. - satisfyelectronics
Store
Loads more modules and parts and even laser transfer photo resist for making PCBs. - Ancufy Store
More printer love, loads of parts for your machine, beds, printing surfaces, fans (FANS!!!) and - well, a lot of stock.
(Why 24?) Because that's how many I can list before having to click the "Load more stores" link, and I'm lazy. Also the 24 are constantly changing as my needs change. Some are kept just because I want to be able to find them again in six months or a year. And a lot have been preserved as links in a notepad file.
That's by no means an exhaustive list, nor is it any kind of special endorsement, nor are any of them solicited reviews. They're all just stores that sell the parts I'm using right now and who've proven that they can supply reliably and consistently. And they may be a good start for you if, like me, you're tired of an automatic "homie tax" of 200% being applied by a local reseller just because they got an even better price than you did (because they buy in bulk) and now have the parts close to hand.
Yeah. In Australia, we seem to get this a lot. Buy a ton of 50c parts for 30c in bulk, get them shipped over in a combined shipping deal for almost zero cost, put them online for $2 plus P&P, and charge a flat $10 P&P within Australia fee because our internal postal service are a monopoly and not afraid to use that advantage to squeeze more $$$$$$$$$$$$ out of people.
By comparison: I can get that part in a combined shipping order for $1, the combined shipping percentage will add maybe 50c-$1. That makes a $2 part vs a $12 part here in Aus.
And I'm still doing most of that purchasing out of my pension, but you can help me make articles like this one and projects like the CNC and the dozen or so 3D models I've uploaded to various sites for free.
UPDATE: Got a video up of that screaming fan up, showing part 1 of 3 of the (still printing) housing.
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