If there is enough interest, I would organize another group buy at the 50pc price, assuming Ardusimple were willing to do it the same with via a group promo code.
Gauging interest here, please respond with your order amounts.
If @Jhmach were willing to lend their experience/contacts on the matter, that would be appreciated. From the thread Micro F9P group buy it looks like it went well enough.
I’m in for 6 micros + ANN-MBs, at least, perhaps 10.
Current tally from comments below or DMs: 39 to 43
Looks like we’ve broken our 50 mark, I’m going to get the ball rolling on this and let everyone know how to get their purchases registered under the discount.
I will message Tanya and let her know that Ian is handling this group buy. I will be a good idea to post on the Telegram International group and others to get the word out that you are organizing a group buy on the Discourse. Might post the link there also. As long as everyone sends an email to you with the number of each product they plan to order, It should be fairly painless. I normally don’t start a buy until I have around 60 Micros just to have a little cushion in case someone isn’t able to order what they committed to.
Update
I have emailed Tanya about your plans.
Please email me at jakehunterd@gmail.com and I will get you any additional information.
I’ll update as we get more people, it could be a while. We should get a contact from the previous group buy organizer to get a promo code that will hold the purchase until there’s a full 50. If you want them faster you’ll have to pay full price.
Edit:
I have emailed Marc to inform him that in the future we will not contact Ardusimple with AOG questions.
If we can do this, they are willing to get the pricing back to full discount.
For all new members, Please read and study the Wiki before getting started. Thank You.
I can imagine a lot of the short circuit damaged Micros were in fact where the Voltage regulators had been placed backwards by JLCPCB, if so very disappointing that anyone would try to claim a replacement.
I have a damaged micro on my window sill to remind me to always check voltages before mounting components on the PCB.
It’s a wonder why a Micro costs more than a standard in the first instance!?
I have only been able to think of two reasons why they would cost more. There was probably a lot more care and consideration in the design of the micros to bring the size down and the second is simply because people buying the micros are doing so because they need a smaller size so they figure they can charge more.
As for the backwards regulators I was wondering if we could place some dummy components around the regulators so they simply won’t fit if placed the wrong way. Just to encourage JLC to fail them in QC if there actually is any or to notice it during assembly.
Some of the time the backwards regulators were substitute parts, where items were out of stock, chosen by the individual. That had reversed pin outs to the original part in the BOM.
These were placed by JLCPCB to match the footprint, so not in all instances are they to blame.
I posed that question to Ardusimple. Their response was that, once the Micro becomes more popular and they are selling the quantities that they sell in the standard, that prices will be the same for either.
I don’t know if it would be a good idea. But maybe I could see if I could be a distributor for ardusimple. I could probably ship them out for the distributor price plus my costs. It wouldn’t be as cheap as the regular group buy but it would be better then $11 off and I could probably sell them at the discounted price year round. If I did do that I would still have to get 50 people as I don’t just have $12k to spend on random projects.
Would be easier if people switched to the Standard AIO, which is not much bigger than a Micro in reality.
Even at the full cost for a Micro it’s still great value for the performance and you don’t get much Greenstar or Trimble hardware for the same price, you’d be lucky to get half a power lead!
It looks like for 50 F9P micros and antennas it would be about $320 CAD per unit to get shipped to me. Then the only other cost would be the packaging and the time it takes to pack them up and stop by the post office. I am already going to be selling a bunch of other cheap radios and BNO085 modules that I am assembling and shipping out soon so it wouldn’t be a huge deal to do the first 50 F9P’s. That is providing I pack and ship out all 50 at once.
I would be helpful for the future, to integrate a protection circuit (diode, electronic fuse…) for micro sockets on the pcb’s to ensure this assembly problem.
first, I want to thank all give input to this group in form of work like coding or organization etc.
Reading the replay of Ardusimple makes me really angry: there are guy frying their modules and then be so cheeky and ask Ardusimple to replace them for free!!!
Here is what really happened as I can see: they got a board from JLC where a different voltage regulator was placed due to not available original one. These had a different pinout so the board didn’t work as it should. Not to blame JLC, they did as ordered. I don’t want to analyze who is responsible but at the very end IT IS THE ONE THAT PRESSES THE POWER BUTTON. So, at many places you are told to measure the voltage before putting components on.
And now the community should pay the price and get less discount?
To all the once that get their fried F9P micro replayed for free: Be a man that stands for his work, even it is not full of glory and ask Ardusimple for a bill.
Greetings from Germany
Matthias Hammer MTZ8302
AgOpenGPS since 2017
PS: The different kind of fried modules on my windowsill remind me of being more accurate the next time. I all paid them myself. This is my opinion, not discussed with the other developers.
I have an email into Ardusimple to see if that’s the last word on the matter. It’s disappointing to see people not own their mistakes and use a DMM for what it’s there for.
I too have let out the magical smoke, I was even dumb enough once to think it wasn’t my fault and talked to the manufacturer about it, and backed down immediately when they made it clear it was my stupidity that borked it. Like @MTZ8302 , those modules are in a trophy case to remind me to check 5 times, not zero.
If Ardusimple is sticking to their guns, I’ll just get my modules at full price now so I can get on with it. $11/pc isn’t worth the trouble.
One thing about the regulators is a lot of time it actually is JLC’s fault, or maybe a bit for the development team depending how you look at it. I ordered 20 micro boards with the specified regulator and 4 out of 20 had regulators improperly placed. I checked the voltages before I stuck anything on so I didn’t damage anything but I did lose the one board. This is because the micro has 2 separate sets of pads under the same footprint and JLC stuck them in the wrong set. So it appeared at first glance that everything was right when it really isn’t. One could say it was the develops fault for not making it idiot proof but I don’t think it is their fault but it probably should be changed in the next version to prevent this from happening.
But I really do understand how ardusimple is kinda pissed at us. We were supposed to just order a bunch of units and then leave them alone but instead they had to deal with a bunch of damaged units.
