Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Greg on June 7, 2012 at 3:28am

My order for a non-assembled APM2 was placed on the 28th May (247xx) By my calculations (from previous order posts) they were up to 22923 on the day I placed my order. Based on data trending it looks like 80+ APM2 orders get processed per business day. Of course this varies somewhat. However, by best estimate my non-assembled APM2 will ship on the 26th June some 4 weeks from when I placed my order. This is provided 3DR do not run out of stock before then.

The web site stated 1-2 weeks for the non-assembled APM2. Also the stock number showed considerable items in stock when I placed my order (currently 44 left in stock). I ordered the non-assembled version without GPS thinking the order would go out quicker. Looking at the order numbers from recent posts I am guessing it could be a month or more now to see my APM2.

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Permalink Reply by Leigh Green on June 12, 2012 at 8:20pm

I ordered APM2 fully assembled 2 weeks ago - and understand they are working hard to fullfil orders...But have also sent them 2 emails to find out what is going on with the order as far as ETA goes and whether I can add an Ardustation to the order - which NEVER seems to have any ATMEGA128s in stock and therefore NEVER shippable...But so far I have had ABSOLUTELY no response from 3dRobotics...By the way they have already sucked my $400+ for the entire order.

I would just at least like a "Hi thanks for your enquiry, shipment should be expected in X weeks, yes you can add to order..." Or even an auto responder on email would be good to let you know they even received it!

Cheers

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3D RoboticsPermalink Reply by Chris Anderson on June 12, 2012 at 9:22pm

Leigh: The product listing says it will ship in 2-4 weeks after ordering; it's not possible to give you a personal update on your individual board. Did you not get a confirmation email when your order was placed?

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Permalink Reply by Leigh Green on June 12, 2012 at 10:11pm

Understandable - my initial query with them was regarding ETA before looking at the Twitter feed to see updates, and I am estimating End of June - that is fine as I did also get confirmation email (although presumably this is 100% automated.) - my mention of the autoresponder was with reference to sending an email to sales(at)3drobotics - i.e. it almost looks like an unmonitored address...

As mentioned I wanted to add an Arudstation to the Order for when it eventually ships, but as Stock is ALWAYS zero of the ATMegas for the Ardustation you cannot add it, so wanted an Email confirmation to find out if it will ever be stocked, and if it would be possible to reserve order that item to go into my Pending Order  - otherwise if it eventually comes in after my initial ordrer is already shipped I pay $54 for the unit and another Int'l shipping price just for 1 item, when the preference would be to have ALL items shipped at once.

I have no real gripes with 3D - I think the product is stand-out and can't wait to get it...just trying to minimise time and shipping costs where possible

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Permalink Reply by Luke on June 12, 2012 at 9:57pm

FYI I ordered an APM2 assembled on 5/9 and it shipped today. I'm actually rather glad it took the full four weeks of the posted estimated time, because I'm hopeful I'll be getting the new board revision with the better diode and other design tweaks that started being added last/this week.

I think your best bet for getting a sense for ETA is to watch the twitter feed where shipped order numbers are occasionally posted. I'm guessing they do fairly small production runs, have to do final assembly by hand, put them through full bench burn-in and testing, and then deal with non-functional units; so trying to get an accurate ship date is likely going to be a guess with a healthy margin of error.

Bummer you've not even gotten a courtesy reply so far though. FWIW I've had several email exchanges that were fairly prompt, if not always immediate.

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Permalink Reply by Greg on June 13, 2012 at 4:10am

Even though I have calculated the expected delivery time I am not hopeful of getting my order anytime soon.  I have emailed 3DR and there was a response referring me to the 1-2 week time for the non-assembled APM2.  Of course I ordered my non-assembled APM2 back on the 28th of May so its beyond 2 weeks now.  Looking at the order queue it is a very serial process.  Even if you order an in stock item not requiring assembly, your order is stuck in the same queue with the assembled APM's which are taking longer to build e.g up to 4 weeks.  I am not too concerned as the latest code will be well tested by the time I get my order.  Interesting enough the main web site page claims same day delivery for in stock items.  I have other parts in my order so knowing murphy these will be out of stock by the time the APM2 non-assemlbled product ships.

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Permalink Reply by Leigh Green on June 13, 2012 at 6:02am

Greg,

I'm not privy to their their internal process, but in general retail stock levels (in particularly those that show to the public) - usually take into consideration Order commitments, backorders, etc.  the general expectation would be that even if the initially ordered "other parts" would have been held for you, but in waiting for the APM build they would have shipped with someone else's order, which just means that by the time your APM is built you will get some of the next shipment of those other items in.  My best guess would be that the APM is the longest lead time on ALL stock items for 3DR and everything else is only a couple of days away, whether internally manufactured or externally stocked.  It's always easier to push out the delivery date of a Oldercustomer rather than a customer that has just walked into the shop...How many times have you gone into a shop and asked for something and the sales person will say "Well we were holding this for someone", or "This was on order for someone but they weren't expecting it until next week..." You get the goods and they re-order for the original customer.

Although for me it does beg the question why the Ardustation Never seems to have stock of the ATMEGA with bootloader - especially when they are stocking some similar items which have the ATMega in them, but obviously they are not getting down to the nitty gritty and dissasembling full items just to fulfill other stock items.

If I had to put any further bets on I would guess the intention to bring back stock for some of these other items stems around the 3DR wish to catch up on production first, whether it's round the clock, or hiring a second pair of Chinese lady man-hands as Bruce Simpson likes to call them.  So people...Everyone who has already ordered...hang tight...your APM is coming...for anyone yet to order...hold off a few weeks until we've all got our orders...then proceed at will...Kidding of course...:)

I can tell you one thing for sure the stores website has been so hammered recently...it's slowing to a crawl every time I log in to check twitter feed (I'm guessing there are another 1200 people doing exactly the same every hour or so...) - My order is 25026 and they were at 23810 14hrs ago.

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Permalink Reply by Bob Wilkinson on June 25, 2012 at 7:17pm

Production seems to have slowed down quite a bit over the last week... It's driving me crazy because they stopped right before getting to my order number.  I placed my order 6 weeks ago as of today :(

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Permalink Reply by Leigh Green on June 25, 2012 at 11:06pm

yeah I Know what you mean, I think they stopped when they went to the Sparkfun Exhibition where someone Won something or other, and someone shook hands with this person and that, and so and so said a funny joke and thingy-ma-bob laughed...and it was a good day had by all...:)

"No Beer, No APM make Homer a Something Something..."

And then when you start reading the first tweet after that it is an update on more out the Door and you think...woohoo they have started again...only to find out it is a measly 84 done...:(

 

Myorder was only 2nd June...but the date just passed for the Average timing as per trends would be expecting...this has now blown out to Mid July I think...so mine should be 6 weeks total...I HOPE...In the meantime I bought myself a Local version of the ATMEga 2560 - it is fully programmable with the Ardu code from diydrones, so have been having some fun in Mission Planner and tweaking the programming, just familiarising myself with commands and so on.  I highly recommend it, a I will also be using this as a seperate atmega256 system for many other projects, perhaps even as another onbord ATMega for other functions.

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Permalink Reply by Sam Steeb on June 26, 2012 at 12:31am

Almost bought up one in the FS section.... having two couldn't be a bad thing.

Thought I could kill some time design a new quad, but after too many designs I now have two that I like. And no board in sight. I'm sure  I'm gonna have a killer time with it when it arrives. Gonna have to break in the latest design with something else though. 

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Permalink Reply by Leigh Green on June 26, 2012 at 5:31pm

Me too...I'm a good 80% through a full scale UAV and figured since it's going to be weeks for mine to ship I'd slow down a little, and last night with nothing to do I saw a hunk of foam about 2ft x 3ft...Out came the foam cutter, sliced it into a triangle, and a couple of hours later I've got a B2 flying wing ready to put gear into for an FPV.

Now I'm spying the big bag of Underfloor insulation I bought for $68AUD and figure since their is 10 bats in there I might just end up with 10 more flying wings at least before my APM ships...I might push myself as a challenge to do it...haha

I'm going to shield the ATmega256 I bought, get a magnetomoter, gps, and see how far along I can develop my own similar APM just for fun.  have I said "Can't wait" for APM to arrive though...

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Permalink Reply by Bob Wilkinson on June 26, 2012 at 5:13pm

Mine shipped today!
:)

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