Integrity

Steve K9ZW

http://www.bouvetdx.org/acom-flex-doc/ From Ralph K0IR: "ACOM, FlexRadio Systems, and SKY SAT/4O3A put aside personal gain and competition and worked together to help the Bouvet Island DXpedition be a better experience for you the DX’ers. These are truly quality people." Enough said. Well done. 73 Steve K9ZW

Steve K9ZW

I wish I could divert the "likes" to go right to the FlexRadio Team and Ranko 4o3a, as they showed their true character thus deserve the "likes."

Well done guys!

73

Steve K9ZW

Clay N9IO

Steve,

Like you I know and am friends with a few of the Bouvet ops.
They as well as the Flex, 4O3A and Acom guys will always have my respect.
The common denominator I see is that all of this is done for the love of amateur radio, period.
Any ham worth his/her salt respects that comradely passion.
These guys will always have my support!

WB0O

Steve, I agree that this is was the right thing to do.  I am however, a bit disappointed to find out about a parts and delivery problem on the new Flex Amplifiers on the DX World Website (and not here).  

When a customer puts down a $1000 deposit,  that is a commitment to Flex to help them determine the production demand.  I believe Flex should reciprocate, and keep those committed customers informed along the way.

I am 100% confident that Ranko's and Gerald's teams are working extremely hard to ensure that they get out the best product possible - and that is why I and others are loyal Flex customers.

I just would like to see more update information "pushed" out by Flex, instead of us customers trying to "pull" it from Flex, and this site only serving as a Q&A board.

Clay N9IO

I know what you are saying but I see Flex in a "**** if you do, **** if you don't" situation partly due to this very Community site, people can be brutal and yet Gerald and crew are working their collective tails off to deliver.  I think we have too much access to them but that is the premise of this community site.

Still, credit where credit is due, as I said above.  Hats off, they will ALWAYS have my respect.

Steve K9ZW

@WB0O - Time to reread the press release?  Without a Bouvet pre-ship test & collection date, and final ship date being given,  I was unable to make any interpolation about whether shipments to end users would be adversely affected.

As we're not due any shipments, there was nothing to report.

IMHO it would be very unwise to ship off on a DX Expedition dependent on newly developed equipment without an extensive shake-down and trial period.  I mean, if I go out hunting on a significant trip, I never go depending on a brand new rifle bought right before the hunt - and that is with established products. 

Like Bouvet taking some of the new amps, I would take the new rifle along, but most likely would hunt with a trustworthy rifle I've lived with. 

Or as they say here - you might fly touch-n-goes with a new airplane engine, but sure as **** don't head across Lake Michigan until you have enough hours on it to trust it.

As for FRS pushing contingency scenarios to the community, in this case a scenario that might or might not even happen, but that they are worried about leaving a world class DXpedition hung out if maybe the parts arrive late or have any issues along the way, I think we can basically forget about that. 

When something factual affects the schedule, then they have something to speak to those of us with deposits placed. 

But as for the usual manufacturing worries, I think not.

As always YMMV, as I'm just one voice saying how I would do the same things the same way.

73

Steve K9ZW

Chris DL5NAM

.... a) Parts availability for production of the FlexRadio amplifiers may be a problem.

Ria

Understand that most of these major top 10 DXpeditions are 3 years (sometimes more) in planning. It is also monumentally difficult to get everything together. Not to mention very expensive. Failure is simply not an option. Many things were changed up and shored up to leave little to no room for failure. They even changed the ship from Braveheart to another.

Parts availability is one thing, but 4O3A/Sky Sat also has a brand new amp, that is largely untested in the field. It is best that they also have some time tested and proven ones from Acom so they don't lose everything (hundreds of thousands of dollars in costs) should the amps they bring decide to not work. The model chosen is the Acom 1500 which is a manual tune amp. Manual tune = less prone to failure. 

However, they are still bringing along a few of the Power Genius XL amps. They also have amps designed and built by 4O3A/Sky Sat for 2m EME, as publicly announced. 

They will still have Flex 6000 series exciters, and I am very excited by the team's use of the Flex 6000 platform for a major DXpedition.

They have top notch ops... the team reads like an "all star" list of ham radio DXpeditioners:

https://www.bouvetdx.org/our-team/

So I think the team made a very good decision by not relying solely on a brand new product. They will however get the chance to showcase it to the world for this DXpedition. 

I can't wait, even though I don't need Bouvet for an ATNO... I still need many band fills.

Ria

Steve K9ZW

Exactly

FlexRadio Systems and SKY SAT were concerned that:  a.) Parts availability for production of the FlexRadio amplifiers MAY be a problem.

This statement applies to the advanced Bouvet production, and was never generalized to overall production being impacted.

Guys, this is all called "Confirmation Bias" where many of us read the exact same words but get a self-imposed impression that differs. 

Because of biases towards optimism or pessimism we end up flavoring the words with stuff that was never actually said.

Now the statement did say that if they diverted so many amps from their first production run that some us would have to wait longer to get our amps. 

Makes it sound like the initial production is pretty well committed to end users.  Pretty cool there!

73

Steve K9ZW

 

Clay N9IO

I totally need Bouvet.  Can't wait!

WB0O

Flex reads our comments -  Great update on the Power Genius XL sent out by Gerald today.   It will be worth the wait, this new amplifier is going to be great.

Burch - K4QXX

Where is this updated posted from Gerald?

WB0O

I will take the liberty of pasting Gerald's note here: 

Dear Power Genius XL Customers,

 

Thank you so much for your pre-order of the exciting new Power Genius XL 2 kW amplifier! We wanted to take a moment to update you as to the status of delivery.

 

Last month I was able to visit the engineering team and manufacturing facilities in Montenegro of our partner SKY SAT (4O3A). I am happy to report that the final design looks great and the amplifiers are progressing very well toward production. Since we first announced Power Genius XL, a number of improvements have been made to the final design including:

• Free Tuner Genius S with all orders placed by December 31, 2017
• Larger front panel touch display
• Custom die cast aluminum front and back panels
• Vapor phase heat sink for maximum cooling efficiency

Final components for the first production run are scheduled to arrive by mid August. We expect to receive the first 10 pre-production units off the production line in September for final check out. Assuming all goes well with testing those units, we anticipate the first shipments will go out the door to customers in October.  

 

The first production run is sold out and we are nearing a sell out of the second production run. We hope to smooth out component availability by the third production run so that we are able to have continuous manufacturing flow from that point. A number of critical components have extended industry wide lead times so we are working to assure that we have enough components in the pipeline to satisfy demand.

 

As we approach the actual start of shipments we will begin reaching out to those who have been waiting the longest. We expect that it will take us a few months to make it through the substantial backlog as we have almost sold out of the second production run already. When we contact you we will provide you with the opportunity to modify your order as needed as well as submit any remaining payments.

Burch - K4QXX

Was this sent in an email?  I have a pre-order for the amp but didn't receive this.  Thanks for posting.

Steve K9ZW

Came from Matt via Constant Contact (which always means check your spam filters) about 9:40 AM with a misleading Subject "FlexRadio Systems - Maestro Update."

73

Steve K9ZW

Burch - K4QXX

You hit the nail on the head.  It was indeed in my spam filter. 

Logan KE7AZ

Kudos to all. My 6500 drives an Acom 1010 and it is a solid performer. (I have too many houses nearby to use anymore power.) I have no doubt that the 1500 will do well and my next amp is going to be a Acom 600S that will go with my 6600.  All of the sponsors involved deserve our support.