[Elecraft] K3 Shipping Status Update - Sept. 18, 2007

[Eric Swartz - WA6HHQ Elecraft]

We are heading down the final K3 production stretch, and we can finally 
see the finish line.

We received all of the first production run K3 painted and silk-screened 
enclosure sheet metal late Friday. This was one of our major concerns 
since the vendor was late, and if a part is bad it can take several 
weeks to fabricate replacements. Fortunately all of the sheet metal 
looked excellent following our incoming inspection. :-)

We have received initial shipments of the higher accuracy TCXOs, so 
those of you who ordered this upgrade will receive them with your K3.

As mentioned before, our other major parts problem has been the wound 
toroids. We received another major shipment from the vendor this week 
which filled in a number of missing toroid values, but there are still 
several values outstanding. While they are promising to get these to us 
in the next week, we are not relying on that.  We have started an 'all 
hands on-deck' toroid winding operation in Aptos as an insurance policy 
to cover our initial K3 shipments. We ordered and received the raw 
toroids and wire last week and we are in the process of winding each 
missing value. Both our production team and anyone else in our Aptos HQ 
who has time available is winding toroids. (Even Lisa is becoming a 
toroid winding expert.  Ask her how her fingers feel..) Our goal is to 
get enough sets of the missing toroids wound and tinned so that our pc 
board stuffing sub-contractor can get initial quantities the four board 
types that need these values wave soldered late this week and early 
next.  This should cover us in case the remaining toroids arrive a week 
or two late from the vendor.

The only new parts surprise we had was when we discovered that the 
relays we had received for the KBPF3 option had the wrong coil voltage. 
Fortunately this was caught  before the boards were soldered. They were 
exchanged for the correct value and the new ones should be here in 
several days.

Wayne and Lyle are focused on final testing of the K3's firmware and DSP 
code with our Field Testers. They are doing a great job of beating up 
the K3 and making sure it is as solid as possible. Wayne is also working 
with out team on the release version of the K3 operating manual. We hope 
to have it posted in the next 7-10 days.

We are testing the assembled PC boards as they arrive and everything is 
beginning to feel like it is converging. Key sub assemblies for the 
built version of the K3 are getting built and tested, awaiting the final 
boards mentioned above. For a while it seemed like new parts supplier 
problems were cropping up faster than we were solving them. That trend 
has now sharply reversed.

So whats the bottom line? Wayne and I discussed the schedule and our 
open issues today. While we both felt that we may start shipping in two 
weeks, we agreed we should add a week to that and conservatively set the 
official K3 first ship date for Monday Oct 8th. That gives us some 
additional safety margin for any last minute issues. (Plus we can work 
the weekend getting the first units ready to ship! :-)  We understand 
the frustration is creates each time the schedule slips and we want to 
avoid another last minute delay.

Every one of us appreciates the patience you have shown while waiting 
for the K3. We're doing our best to make the wait worth while, and to 
get a quality product out the door to you as soon as possible. We're 
optimistic that we are on track and we will keep posting weekly status 
updates between now and Oct 8th to keep everyone aware of how everything 
is going.

73,
Eric, WA6HHQ 
and Wayne, N6KR

-- 

_..._