It’s another month, another production update!
Notes on customer service times
First off, I just wanted to mention that the last couple of months have been pretty busy on the customer service and support side of things, especially as we were coming down from our busy winter season, which meant that response times were a bit longer than usual. I’m happy to share that we did bring on another support person to our team with a lot of hands on experience being a former customer, which means we now have five full time staff for customer support, plus, some of our engineers and product management team also involved in the customer service and resource development.
We’ve now caught up on tickets and replying back on our typical timely manner.
With the AltMill 4×8, ATC, and a bunch of other stuff going through our pipeline, we anticipate our demand for support to continue to grow, so if you’re interested in joining our customer service team, feel free to share with us here: www.sienci.com/work
AltMill 4×8
We have been full swing on AltMill 4×8 production, with a bunch of stations now set up for assembly of the new machines. However, we have been delayed a few weeks, and current first machine shipping date is set at April 10th April 17th. Due to some components being off tolerance and needing rework, we are putting extra effort to make sure that the first batch of machines don’t have early stage issues. Some things that are being addressed include:
- Pitch error on the racks
- Tooth profile tolerances on the pinons
- Gearbox backlash
On the bright side, we have ordered enough extra parts so that even with a higher than typical number of QA rejects, we are able to fill a substantial number of the first batch. We are also working on remaking parts to ensure that we can complete the rest of the production batch. We are building and assembling as much as we can as we work through the process in the meantime.
We are also now in production of batch 2, bringing additional considerations and QA processes to reduce potential issues and delays.
In other news, the engineers and marketing team have been working on putting together the full assembly resources and videos over the last few weeks, getting ready to post once the machines start shipping.
LongMill MK3
A lot of work/progress so far with the LongMill MK3, with most of the work done around general testing and reliability.
We have now completed a round of rigidity testing to compare between the LongMill MK3, LongMill MK2, and the AltMill. Check out the results on our blog. (TL;DR) = the LongMill MK3 is between 65-80% more rigid than the LongMill MK2, signifying a big jump in performance.
In other news, we continue to work on the development and production of the LongMill MK3. We have now ordered the majority of the components needed, with the exception of controllers and power supplies which are still in development. Based on current timelines, we expect to open up pre-orders mid-May, and start shipping in and around July.
In other news, we’re clearing out of the last set of LongMill MK2.5s . We have around 50 of the 30×30 and 50 of the 48×30 in stock, so if you are looking to get one of those machines, they’ll probably still be available for the next few weeks before we sell out.
SLB-EXT V2 and SLB-LITE
We have made a few key decisions around the SLB family of controllers. First, naming:
SLB-EXT V2: The new successor to the original SLB-EXT currently used on the AltMill. The SLB-EXT V2 is designed specifically for the AltMill and power handling of 48V.
SLB-LITE: Designed specifically for 24V architecture of the LongMill.
Our first prototype boards have been produced! We will go through initial flashing and testing of the new board over the next few weeks in April, and make revisions as needed before going into production.
Additionally, new molded cable samples have been made with a nominal width of 7mm, over our current nylon sheath design with a width of 10-12mm. Why did we unify all of the cables into one mold? Because:
- Simplifies wire management
- Makes wiring of the machine during the assembly process more intuitive
- Allows more space in the drag chain for additional cables and accessories
Auto Tool Changer
The ATC production is now in full swing as we get prepared to ship out existing orders. We have set up production stations to start with assembly and we are building our first units now.
Unfortunately we are continuing to work on a few straggling details in preparation for shipping, and we expect that we will begin shipping in the third week of April. Some outstanding tasks include:
- Completion of the resources and installation guides
- Completion of the new firmware testing
Otherwise the completion of the hardware production and assembly for the first batch of ATCs are scheduled to complete on April 10th April 17th, in tandem with the 4x8s.
I’m also excited to share that we’ve also implemented a new station with the ATC to machine some aluminum parts in house. We’re expecting to slowly integrate more parts over time that we can machine in house to give us an opportunity to stress test our machines and products, as well as give us more production flexibility or adjust designs more quickly as needed.
