Hi Irwin, We are also concerned about the impact of the COVID-19 virus on the shipping and supply chains we use for parts used in all of our products, including the K4. While managing the supply chain and quickly finding alternate parts when they go obsolete or when shortages pop up has been a normal part of our production planning process for years, it has certainly become more challenging as this situation quickly evolves.
We've been tracking and compensating for this on the K4 for some time. While we manufacture our radios, amps etc. here in California, the electronic components used by us and almost all other U.S. manufacturers come from both the U.S. and from suppliers all around the world. (Many are not even manufactured in the U.S.) We've been careful to source many of the major K4 items, like the flat screen display used in the K4, from other countries than China. The biggest area of concern recently has been with the passive components (resistors, caps etc) used on all of our designs. Even when purchased from U.S. suppliers, many of these parts may come from China and other offshore sources. We also have built up inventory on many critical K4 parts here (including Knobs etc.) but of course, as noted by others, it only takes a single critical part delay in the future to hold things up. We plan with alternate suppliers when possible, but even then we have to periodically scramble to source new parts for production. Fun, eh? In any case, so far we have not encountered any major show stoppers, though even prior to the current COVID scare began seeing delivery delays increasing. We'll have a much better picture on how this will impact the K4 as major component deliveries arrive at the factory over the coming weeks. Fortunately, we are busy both getting all aspects of production started and we are also working in engineering every day to add cool new features to the K4. Not much time to sleep at Elecraft these days. Time for more coffee.. 73, Eric *elecraft.com <http://elecraft.com>* On Thu, Mar 5, 2020 at 5:14 AM Irwin Darack <idar...@gmail.com> wrote: > I am curious to know if the reduction in manufacturing in China, do to the > COVID-19 virus, is having an affect on the ability of Elecraft to obtain > parts? The area of China that is the epicenter is a major manufacturer of > electronic components. > > Irwin KD3TB > > > > On Wed, Mar 4, 2020 at 6:11 PM Rick Miller - N1RM <n...@arrl.net> wrote: > > > Very clever post. > > > > When they announced the last delay, there was a statement that there > would > > be more frequent updates. Perhaps, if nothing else, this thread will > > provide motivation for another update. Since many of us are "investors" > in > > the K4, it seems reasonable to ask. > > > > 73 and hope your twitter remains under control! > > Rick > > N1RM > > > > > > > > -- > > Sent from: http://elecraft.365791.n2.nabble.com/ > > ______________________________________________________________ > > Elecraft mailing list > > Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft > > Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm > > Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net > > > > This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net > > Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html > > Message delivered to idar...@gmail.com > > > -- > Irwin KD3TB > ______________________________________________________________ > Elecraft mailing list > Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft > Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm > Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net > > This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net > Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html > Message delivered to eric.swa...@elecraft.com > ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
