[Elecraft] Kit Shipping Schedule Theory

[Don Wilhelm]

Lew,

OK, let me say first that that *d**n* spreadsheet is causing more angst 
and assumptions than anything I have seen before.

No need to be baffled, Elecraft is training new people just to get your 
KX3's out as soon as possible - I have seen many new names in the past 
few weeks.  The more people to assemble KX3s and put kits together means 
that whatever your position in line, you will get it as soon as possible 
- the boards for the kits are being aligned and calibrated, so you do 
not have to go through those procedures when you get your KX3 kit.

In addition, the assembly manual was being written and checked out by 
those doing the assembly of production units.  The assembly manual is 
further being checked out by some of the Field Testers who will 
disassemble their factory built pre-production KX3s and re-assemble them 
following the assembly manual.

The boards themselves are built by board manufacturing houses there in 
California, so Elecraft is dealing with fully assembled boards.  The 
board availability is not a problem - but that is only a portion of the 
whole story.

One of the "problems" is that Elecraft is typically quite open about 
what is happening.  Yes, estimates of when the first units will ship can 
slip - many other manufacturer's would remain mute about the internal 
goals and promises, but Elecraft opens much of that information to the 
world.  If you do not understand that a typical product release and ramp 
up to production levels is fraught with trials and unexpected 
situations, then yes, you might think that Elecraft has failed on 
"promises".  Reality is that those were not "promises", but were 
"targets" - and due to the openness that is typical of Elecraft were 
revealed early on, but became not feasible as time marched on.

The difference in price for assembled units and kits is *not* what is 
slowing things down.  It is the rate of creating skills in the new people.

The firmware is quite fluid - that is not a factor in the speed of 
shipping.  The firmware is downloadable, so you can expect that early 
firmware updates will be available frequently.  I recommend that you 
keep your KX3 up to date with the latest firmware once you have your rig 
- it is easy to install with KX3 Utility.

73,
Don W3FPR


On 5/1/2012 6:11 PM, Lew K7GO wrote:
> I'm a bit baffled by the delay.  If the parts are indeed available I would
> expect that Elecraft would be punching out boards/units a hundred at a time
> by now.  My (perhaps incorrect) impression was that that the KX3 was
> primarily composed of surface mount boards populated by pick-and-place
> robots and then wave soldered.  I would expect that the ATU boards are more
> effort to assemble due to the toroids, relays and what not.  Updating
> firmware is straightforward and based on the fact that units are actually
> shipping I have to believe the firmware is in reasonably good shape.
>
> While I realize that the spreadsheet is a less than random statistical
> sample, I expected to see more evidence of a traditional manufacturing
> "hockey-stick ramp" by now.
>
> Further, it is not at all clear to me that Elecraft will make more money
> shipping built units versus kits in the  near term given the order backlog.
> If it takes 15 minutes to get a kit ready to ship versus an hour to build
> and test a unit then there will be four times as much volume at .9 revenue
> ($900/$1000) per unit in the kit.  The ratio will almost always be better
> than .9 since most of us order upgrades and accessories.  Obviously I'm
> making these productivity numbers up for illustration purposes.  The point
> remains that given the current backlog the kits *could* bring more total
> profit to Elecraft in the near term.
>
> --
>