Offical Blog: When In Panic, Fear Or Doubt ...

[Awakening]

As with most news posts, we have good and not so good news.

It seems like the last couple of months there have been almost no good news. I kinda want my money back.

No good news like in "new cases" "os snippets" "everything works!"

Last months have been a wave of only good news imo with only 1 bit of bad news and that is delay.

Honestly I don't believe its really been good news. Sure the Chinese company have provided us with cases that have failed the OP teams expectations but I hardly consider this something to be deemed as good news. "Yes more delays =]". I don't know about the rest of you but I don't really believe that this company has ever been completely honest with the OP team. Think about it, as if it takes over 160 days to create a decent case. I bet they hardly even work on this mould, but they like to recieve credit on how they are working extra long to make sure its right, and by the time it reaches the OP team, its instantly rejected.
I'll admit the software quality is good news but the fact that everything works is nothing really to celebrate considering thats what you would expect.
I think people are getting to lenient here and its like people have no expectations and would class anything as good news.

A company that only orders the minimum requirement will hardly get priority. The factory might also not be used to this kind of precission or complexity.

 

[strider_mt2k]

I cannot bear to watch yet I cannot look away.

I'm just hoping that there is a shiny toy at the end of this crazy train wre...er, ride.

-or at least a T-Shirt with a lollipop on it.

-or some sort of sympathy card.

 

[Paradox]

so the 15th until the new test cases are done.. then another week to ship them to mweston, then we have to hope and pray they are perfect, if not we could be looking at more test cases and so on.. will it ever end?

I gotta say though this chinese company seems really terrible..

 

[droneb]

XD you people havent seen the worst.

ive dealt with one that made plastic tile extrusion, well the deal is that they sent out a sample pretty good and they received the green lite

when the machine arrived we found out that the piece sent (since they wouldt send out a 3mts x .6m piece) the only good piece was one out of ten and
only the cutted piece was the good one.

so i must say OPT must be very carefull on how they work out the green lite, they must state perfectly by written that only pieces between n constraints like the sample can be accepted.

this is a common issue so be careful People. we dont want the samples to be the only ones shipped out good.

 

[Vlynndar]

I think people are getting to lenient here and its like people have no expectations and would class anything as good news.

I try to keep no expectations, and I'm doing pretty well.
That way it's easy to see news as good news, and makes it fun to check here. This is a happy place.

Oh, and my releasedate guesses go this way: the first was around the 23rd of Januari, 'cause it would be funny if it arrived/shipped two months after my ordering. The next guess would be the middle of April, as I have a sibling with a birthday then.

Not based on any fact at all :lol:

 

[Awakening]

It would be nice if mine arrived on Feb 12 since that's my birthday

 

[gibberish]

i dont think the chinese company will ever get it right. op will cut their losses and employ an american firm to make the cases instead.
i dont think we'll see finished pandoras until summer is finished - by which time im fairly sure something better will be available.

this chinese firm are taking the piss. its been about 4 months since the cases were supposed to have been finished. they are laughing at the op team.

 

[droneb]

i dont think the chinese company will ever get it right. op will cut their losses and employ an american firm to make the cases instead.
i dont think we'll see finished pandoras until summer is finished - by which time im fairly sure something better will be available.

this chinese firm are taking the piss. its been about 4 months since the cases were supposed to have been finished. they are laughing at the op team.

chinese Co. are very capable, the issue is that they always want to bite as much as possible from 1 shot.

and most of the nowadays electronics do come from there so its not about quality but about $$$
EDIT: and comunications.

 

[EvilDragon]

i dont think the chinese company will ever get it right. op will cut their losses and employ an american firm to make the cases instead.
i dont think we'll see finished pandoras until summer is finished - by which time im fairly sure something better will be available.

this chinese firm are taking the piss. its been about 4 months since the cases were supposed to have been finished. they are laughing at the op team.

Errmm... and how do you explain that the latest case we got is fine from the mechanical side and only cosmetic changes are left?

 

[hobbyman II]

I do think the Chinese firm are dragging their feet, and I do think they should have made the cases here in the UK (or any Western nation), I am not impressed, :angry: Craig said that making the cases here in the UK was more expensive, but it sure as hell would have been faster, and how much more expensive? a few pennies a unit? surely we could have lived with the Pandora costing 10p more than it does (or even £1 more than does) as long as we actually got the thing in a decent time-frame, I'm normally optimistic, but this is getting to the point where it is dragging on too long, if you sent the CAD files to some UK firm the cases could be made before the Chinese get going at this rate (then you could use the Chinese cases on batch 2 when they finally arrive).

I wonder how much the case costs as a percentage of the Pandoras total price, it would be interesting to see what could be found as an alternative, I see some firms claim 99.3% surety on delivery times and ISO quality, something the Chinese obviously don't.

 

[mali]

I might repeat myself, but still: Moot. Looking backwards won't gain anything

 

[droneb]

I do think the Chinese firm are dragging their feet, and I do think they should have made the cases here in the UK (or any Western nation), I am not impressed, :angry: Craig said that making the cases here in the UK was more expensive, but it sure as hell would have been faster, and how much more expensive? a few pennies a unit? surely we could have lived with the Pandora costing 10p more than it does (or even £1 more than does) as long as we actually got the thing in a decent time-frame, I'm normally optimistic, but this is getting to the point where it is dragging on too long, if you sent the CAD files to some UK firm the cases could be made before the Chinese get going at this rate (then you could use the Chinese cases on batch 2 when they finally arrive).

I wonder how much the case costs as a percentage of the Pandoras total price, it would be interesting to see what could be found as an alternative, I see some firms claim 99.3% surety on delivery times and ISO quality, something the Chinese obviously don't.

IIRC the moulding in UK would have costed nerly 1000% the chinese value so it is not a matter of few pounds.
and still you have to get tests and so.

@ED

i believe mostly because the team got Test versions so most of the smears go off on a real MP batch with actual materials(less recovered/peelets).
but off course you cant get green light on one off those if you dont have a nice test case.

XD its a double deadlock.

 

[EvilDragon]

I do think the Chinese firm are dragging their feet, and I do think they should have made the cases here in the UK (or any Western nation), I am not impressed, :angry: Craig said that making the cases here in the UK was more expensive, but it sure as hell would have been faster, and how much more expensive? a few pennies a unit?

It wasn't a few pence per unit. It was WAY more. AFAIR it was about 100.000 USD more to create a mould.

 

[Dead1nside]

... guys it being a Chinese firm doesn't have much to do it. They just have over-estimated how long things'll take and even then have to backtrack on what they say, that's just as a factory, could happen anywhere but at least they're getting there now and hopefully those next cases will be okay.

 

[WizardStan]

I do think the Chinese firm are dragging their feet, and I do think they should have made the cases here in the UK (or any Western nation), I am not impressed, :angry: Craig said that making the cases here in the UK was more expensive, but it sure as hell would have been faster, and how much more expensive? a few pennies a unit? surely we could have lived with the Pandora costing 10p more than it does (or even £1 more than does) as long as we actually got the thing in a decent time-frame, I'm normally optimistic, but this is getting to the point where it is dragging on too long, if you sent the CAD files to some UK firm the cases could be made before the Chinese get going at this rate (then you could use the Chinese cases on batch 2 when they finally arrive).

Hindsight is 20/20. It's easy to see where things weren't right after they've already gone wrong. This company they're dealing with is obviously not treating OP with the professionalism they deserve, but I don't think there was anything OP could have done differently without being able to see the future. That's why I've stressed paying attention and locating the problems this time (which has been accused of trying to place blame as if it were a negative thing) so that they don't get caught up next time when they need to remake the mould. If that means finding a different company, so be it, though it may not necessarily or even possible.

 

[thingie1234]

I do think the Chinese firm are dragging their feet, and I do think they should have made the cases here in the UK (or any Western nation), I am not impressed, :angry: Craig said that making the cases here in the UK was more expensive, but it sure as hell would have been faster, and how much more expensive? a few pennies a unit?

I think our experience with the mold manufacturer and their general incompetence should put their recent email in doubt, and that's part of the problem.

Which is more likely:

A) A mold company who's been paid in full, all they're going to get (as in "Any more modifications they make are going to cost them" if I'm remembering the staff comment correctly), has taken their own initiative to go out, buy examples from the market, compare them to the Pandora, and is now spending another two weeks on making the finish of the mold better out of the goodness of their hearts,

OR.

B) a mold company who's failed over and over and over again to deliver ran into some problem and went "CRAP. This case still isn't working right. What can we tell them to give us a little more time..."


I fully expect an email from the factory somewhere from the 12th-14th saying "Our FDM machine broke down, and once we get the part, we'll ship you new cases on the 27th. Sorry." because they still won't have gotten their act even a little bit together.



I love the Pandora, I check pandora press twice a day, I read craigix, mweston, and ED's posts on the board every day, so I know what's going on, and the SOLE fuckup in in the last three months has been that damn case mold company. You say that the mold would have cost 10x as much to get it done properly - I would say you could be selling through batch two now if the mold company had been even slightly competent.


And the worst part is, there is no leverage to get them to do it right. You'd said that the mold company was paid in full, so what leverage do you have to make them work any faster, to not drop you for a larger client, to actually get their job done?
There is none. They'll get it done, when they feel like it, and we will all wait, because that's all we can do.

As far as I can tell, that case manufacturer's incompetence needs to be publicized, or at least threatened to be publicized, so that they will either get off their thumbs and GET IT DONE, or never get work from hobbyist communities again (which are surprisingly profitable for smaller molders like them).

 

[mali]

Getting worked up won't solve the problem.

 

[Beepo]

true, only waiting will - we're good at that....

 

[MiniSinisterMinister]

It wasn't a few pence per unit. It was WAY more. AFAIR it was about 100.000 USD more to create a mould.

I would have gladly paid my proportion ($25) of the $100.000 if this had speeded things up significantly. $25 is just two pizzas and and two drinks at a cheap Italian restaurant here in Germany.

 

[Awakening]

In hindsight I would also have paid $25 if that would have given me a Pandora 2-3 months earlier. Especially if I could have brought it with me on my trip to Germany in October. But who knew that it would take the Chinese company so much longer then the initial 45 days?