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FWIW, on the topic of U.L. listing, maybe you could have U.L. as a firmware update "channel" (or maybe a filter "UL Only") along side Tech,Major, and Minor. In theory just release the inverter with 1 U.L. firmware. The user can decide if they want to run a non-U.L. firmware at their own risk.
I've definitely considered something along those lines.
Not sure how U.L. would feel about it though.
January 26, 2023
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We've officially canceled the order with the factory. Sean and I certainly don't like that it's come to this--but hey, we're here to provide inverters...not keep endlessly delaying after an empty pipe dream. (Even though it awfully looks similar to that at the current moment.)
- It does work out that we break ties at this point. This means that every single one of the "all original Genetry design" inverters to soon be in the field...will have been assembled by Genetry Solar.
- I've reached back out to the international logistics company we were in contact with a few years ago: time to get our shipping channels in place. The advantage of this company is that they're literally headquartered an hour's drive away--so I can easily bang on doors if need be! They will be able to provide CONSIDERABLY more information on shipping than we ever had from the factory.
- At the moment, the Chinese New Year holiday is still in full swing--meaning that we can't order any of the parts (apart from locally sourced ones like the inverter chassis' and shipping boxes). It's the hardest thing to be doing basically nothing about the problem--but believe me, we'll get on it as soon as the suppliers open back up.
the Chinese new year holiday ends 1/27/2023...
are they ahead of the USA by about 12 hours or what???
keep plugging along and you may get there....
at any rate it is now 1/28/2023 so the Chinese new year is over ..... do they work on Saturdays and Sundays???
just curious
the Chinese new year holiday ends 1/27/2023...
The official dates don't mean much. For example:
- The official holiday starts on January 22nd--but we had suppliers going on break as early as January 15th.
- The official holiday ends on January 29th--yes, one of our suppliers restarts regular production then--but I'm not expecting everyone to be back open again until after February 1st. According to https://chinesenewyear.net/ the celebrations don't end until February 5th.
at any rate it is now 1/28/2023 so the Chinese new year is over ..... do they work on Saturdays and Sundays???
I'm not fully "in tune" with the time shift/time zones (as to which way the offset goes)...but I do know that as far as EST is concerned, they do not work during our Sat-Sun nighttime. They do work EST Sun-Mon nighttime.
sounds like they work if they want and extend the holiday if they so choose...
I was chatting with a company on Alibaba Sunday in the wee hours and one on Saturday at rather odd hours for them,,,, perhaps the chat folks are remote from a computer and the manufacturing workers at other times
before it always seemed that late at night after 8pm was early morning for china....so conversations best late night or wee hours in the morning.
not sure but I think they (China) are 12 plus hours ahead of the central time zone so that would put hem at the end of their day Monday when I chat with them this Sunday morning...
it does say in some places the Chinese new year lasts 2 weeks until February 5th this year, they must pay some to work to collect orders for later shipment???? who knows but I did have an eBay order show with tracking on 1/27 and another on 1/28 from China
have a great Sunday 😎 minus 9 degrees Fahrenheit this morning & partly sunny in South Dakota.....
Have you considered using a Rackmount Server Case?
Another option might be https://sendcutsend.com/
I've got a machine shop and pretty good with Fusion 360. If you need help with your cad files, let me know.
Have you considered using a Rackmount Server Case?
Yes, we have. There are some major design complications involved with that, not the least being cooling/airflow directions.
Another option might be https://sendcutsend.com/
They have a very slick and highly featured website (what, visualizing the bends I inputted in 3D??)
But they cost easily double the local machine shop that Sean has (and I'd like to get the case costs lower than that.)
I would estimate that the SendCutSend quote for the complete GS6 case @ 10pcs qty (as their single piece pricing is horrid!) would exceed $500 per unit. And that $500 price doesn't include a single one of the internal parts necessary to make an inverter...so it doesn't take much business sense to figure that that simply can't work financially.
I *really* don't want to source the cases from China. But if we can't even make a bent-up piece of metal in the States and be competitive in the markets, what does that say for America?
I tried sourcing plain aluminum heatsinks from the States. The bulk extruded material cost is not bad--but any sort of tooling takes the price through the roof. Unfortunately, that means that the basic blocks of aluminum will have to be sourced from China...we just can't afford to source them from the States. Not without doubling or tripling the inverter's sale price--which if we did, nobody would purchase them...and the whole dream falls apart.
Maybe a better case option would be an Electrical Junction Box. Only need basic tools and skills to turn these into great electronic enclosures. These are the most used case for DIY CNC Machine Controllers. Large Hole Saw for fans, Hole Punches for small holes. Airflow managed with 16ga Aluminum sheet.
Heat sinks I might be able to cast in aluminum.
Tooling Bulk Extrusions is just a matter of drilling and tapping holes. All you need is a cheap Drill Press, some templates to locate holes and a Tapping Head or Hand Tapper.
I've got 3 Procunier tapping heads but I still use the follow link for small taps. <10/24.
https://www.grizzly.com/products/grizzly-hand-tapping-machine/g8748
Maybe a better case option would be an Electrical Junction Box. Only need basic tools and skills to turn these into great electronic enclosures. These are the most used case for DIY CNC Machine Controllers. Large Hole Saw for fans, Hole Punches for small holes. Airflow managed with 16ga Aluminum sheet.
Kinda defeats the purpose right there--I could just go quote a case to our exact design specs from China and probably get a really good price.
Heat sinks I might be able to cast in aluminum.
I found a U.S. manufacturer that has a perfect aluminum heatsink profile. And the bulk stock is very reasonably priced.
It's just the drilling, threading, and cutting to length that kills the cat...and as we don't have the in-house equipment right now ($$$), our hands are pretty well tied to China for those. (I've already quoted heatsinks to our specs from China...and got a really good price. But if we could make these in the States for a decent price, I'd rather do that.)
So what if it's made in China. Scratch and dent is covered by Amazon. Have it in 2 days. No Slow Boat . . . 27lbs of Steel and Powder Coated in Light Grey.
If you have a source for Heat Sink Extrusions all you need is a $100 Miter saw and a $80.00 drill press to make them. Add a reverse switch and speed controller ($30.00) to the drill press and you have your tapping head. 3d Print templates for locating the holes or make them out of wood.
You talk about everything being made in China but think drilling and tapping a piece of aluminum is a big deal. It isn't. Drilling holes in a case, no big deal.
Also, building a toroidal winding machine is not difficult. Not sure if the iron core has any special properties. If it's just an iron core then those can be cast local pretty cheap. Scale the example below up and your doing your own transformers which would also give you another product to sell.
Cad files already available. You would need to get Fusion 360 (FREE) and learn it. (STEEP).
So what if it's made in China. Scratch and dent is covered by Amazon. Have it in 2 days. No Slow Boat . . . 27lbs of Steel and Powder Coated in Light Grey.
Well, my goal is to try to get at least PART of the GS inverters made in the States.
One of those ready-made Chinese-produced cases is a very, very poor fit for our needs--yes, it could potentially be done, but now requiring 4-5 axis machining to cut all of the necessary holes. (Square carriage bolt mounts, fan grille openings, fan mounting holes, board mounting holes, etc.)
And if the very poor fit is already made in China--then that completely defeats the goal of trying to get at least SOMETHING made in the States. By that point we might as well then just give up and get our entire case made in China in the first place.
Slow boat is something we can't get away from--the transformers weigh far too much for air shipping to be financially feasible. Think $600+ shipping costs per transformer...
Ready-made stuff is fine for hobbyist one-off prototypes. But scaling something for manufacturing is a completely different ball game.
Scale the example below up
Oh you've got jokes. Seriously now!
A toroidal winding machine of the size necessary for winding GS inverter transformers--will weigh several TONS!
If you have a source for Heat Sink Extrusions all you need is a $100 Miter saw and a $80.00 drill press to make them.
Has to be CNC. Trying to work with PJ's hand-drilled heatsinks is an exercise in frustration, because no 2 pieces are the same.
Not sure if the iron core has any special properties. If it's just an iron core then those can be cast local pretty cheap.
They're not cast...they're circularly laminated, glued together and then heat-treated.
You talk about everything being made in China but think drilling and tapping a piece of aluminum is a big deal. It isn't. Drilling holes in a case, no big deal.
I know it isn't a big deal. We have the technical ability here in the States to do it. Just not economically feasible to be competitive in the market.
Maybe at some point we'll be able to afford to purchase our own equipment and truly have in-house case production. But that isn't right now.
Any options in Mexico? Would be faster ...
If a machine can't do it or the Chinese can't make it for us then I guess it can't be done.
What's the point in even having a thumb if you don't want to use your hands. Oh yeah, the space bar.
You would be surprised how well and how fast fabrication can be done by hand. 4-5 axis machine? Why? You make a template with steel inserts and 1/8" holes. Spot drill all the locations and then go back and drill to size. I guarantee you that I could do 4 fan locations, 8 wire grommet locations and 24 mounting holes in 30 minutes per case in qty/10. Accuracy to .005" easy.
Toroidal machine would weigh tons? Why?
How did this Country get through the Industrial Revolution without 4-5 axis CNC? Jeez, I guess they did it by hand controlled machines that were built by hands. Imagine that.
49 minutes ago, OpenNRG said:How did this Country get through the Industrial Revolution without 4-5 axis CNC? Jeez, I guess they did it by hand controlled machines that were built by hands. Imagine that.
Because we weren't dealing with 0.5mm precision most of the time.
I've free-hand-drilled and free-hand-cut all the heatsinks for the GS12 prototype work. It isn't funny, fast, nor am I very accurate.
All we need to make the cases ourselves is a CNC table (2 axis), a sheet metal brake (most of these end up weighing >1000lbs if they can handle 16 gauge SS), and a Flex-Arm with threading taps in it. Oh, and a place to set all the equipment up.
59 minutes ago, OpenNRG said:4-5 axis machine? Why?
If we used a pre-made box like the one you linked, and had to cut holes on all sides of it. Remember, I'm always thinking future production scale. There's no point in buying equipment that severely limits your future abilities.
50 minutes ago, OpenNRG said:If a machine can't do it or the Chinese can't make it for us then I guess it can't be done.
You're missing the point entirely (but I know what you're saying).
The Chinese can do it. I'm just trying to avoid having them do at least one small simple part if at all possible.
And it can definitely be done by hand in the States, with the appropriate tools (which neither of us have). It's just a matter of cost.
But if we have to purchase equipment in order to produce stuff, we might as well go for a long-term investment that has considerable scale--instead of spending a lot of money (at least in our perspective) on equipment that can't scale very far.
57 minutes ago, OpenNRG said:I guarantee you that I could do 4 fan locations, 8 wire grommet locations and 24 mounting holes in 30 minutes per case in qty/10. Accuracy to .005" easy.
yeah, that's only a part of the picture.
Try over a hundred THREADED holes per inverter (SS case + aluminum heatsinks included) in 4 different sizes. Bit harder to do that in 30 minutes.
AND...that's with you already having the proper equipment to make the job easier. I don't even own a drill press--and I have absolutely no idea where you think you can find one for $80. I've been checking Craigslist and other sites for one for personal use for several years now...and I haven't seen a half-decent one for under $300 used.
50 minutes ago, OpenNRG said:Toroidal machine would weigh tons? Why?
It has to be able to sling around a 100lb core without buckling or having to be run on the moon (there are some advantages to 1/6th gravity).
It'll probably need a 2' diameter winding ring. Plus a spool handling ability of several hundred pounds of wire (as per the bulk wire spools).
If the machine doesn't outweigh the materials by several times, it's going to be very unstable/unsafe.
Any commercially available machine that's big enough to handle these cores weighs several thousand pounds. Reinventing the wheel would cost considerably more in R&D costs alone (not counting time) than just buying a used machine (which go for 5 figures--we've looked).