Been in manufacturing for 30 years ... I don't see a long term sustainable business model at those prices.
Under pricing your product has sunk a lot of ships
(Topic ID: 325781)
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Quoted from dpadam450:I have a cost of goods + labor calculated. These are built very inexpensively.
I admire your skill and determination, not a hater, just looking at it with a critical eye.
Are all your R&D costs calculated and accounted for in the costs of the machines?
The true cost of a machine for it's manufacturer far surpasses just the BOM for a "real business".
If you sell these, don't you need to get UL Certification?
If your goal is to make this a real company, the price point is going to be a struggle, if you want to make a few machines a year in your basement then it may be do able. But even then, it seem like a lot of work for very little money.
Quoted from bdw85:I'm not sure I understand all the negativity. The man isn't asking for money up front, yet people are acting as if he's pulling a JPOP already. Don't put too much weight on how the alpha build looks - about 95% of all prototype products look that way. Let the man finish the project and let the production machines speak for themselves.
dpadam450 - let me know if you need someone to do design reviews/DFM checks for PCBAs and/or firmware/software testing. I'm happy to donate some engineering time to the project.
No negativity, at least on my part - just critical questions as I have owned a manufacturing business for 20+ years
I give him props for what he has accomplished, very impressive but I still think there are valid questions that can be asked
Quoted from Haymaker:Some people around here think anything other than heaping mound after mound of praise onto somebody is being negative. I don't get it.
This 100%
OP seems very open to some constructive criticism .... as he should be if he wants to succeed
Nobody starting a business is going to do well if everyone around them just pats them on the back
Quoted from Wolfmarsh:Nice to see this stuff continuing to progress. I think we've met at SFGE a couple of times.
Regarding some of the conversation about UL listing, it certainly isn't required, but there's an awful lot of insurance (especially commercial) that won't cover any incidents surrounding non-UL listed equipment. That kinda depends on who your target market is though. As you mentioned some people don't care that other manufacturers don't have UL listings on their games. It matters for me personally though.
You are probably ahead of me, but if you haven't, I'd recommend really digging in on the electrical engineering side in order to make sure you have protections and other things in place to prevent issues like coils locking on, fires, shorts, safe grounding on all metal parts, etc...
Have you done any measured tests to compare impact strength, transit time and other variables with your coils versus standard ones? Very curious about those.
Good points ...
Extreme case, but what's the liability without UL listing if your game catches fire and burns down someone's house?
Hope you have a large umbrella policy - Business insurance, one of the many overhead costs that need to be included in the cost of a product.
Quoted from dpadam450:Will be back to do a video update on the many comments/topics. Much easier to converse than type. Just a quick link. Here is UL's website.
https://productiq.ulprospector.com/en/search
"Stern Pinball", "Jersey Jack" show up. Homepin, Spooky, American Pinball, Multimorphic, Pinball Brothers. Unless doing business under different names (Spooky is registered as Spooky under Secretary of State in WI), then not too many companies are UL. Doesn't mean I'm super lax on electrical standards and ignorant of testing. Will message anyone that thinks they can help in a specific task I have ahead.
I guess as long as you are carrying product liability insurance
3 months later
Quoted from BeachPickle:I’ve seen some older games in tournaments with aftermarket roms that put a spin counter up on the displays.
I could be mistaken, but I believe deadpool keeps track of your spin count, and after you reach a certain number it gives you disco multiball.
Very fun and cool idea.
IMDN also keeps track of it for Super Spinners but don't think there is an actual display of how many
Quoted from dpadam450:"Had a highest spin to date and gave a special if your rips ended in certain numbers"
"but don't think there is an actual display of how many "
Nice. So many games that you never get to see or hear of and likely something done before. Only issue I have is it's not on the playfield, which is what I thought was a cool idea, because the spinner just spins with no true feedback or goals on it.
I see in some other threads about pop bumpers not being in any new machines which is another feature I just don't care for much. I think Maiden is the only one that I like because its a skill to shoot it through the bumpers and detrimental if not. Cactus Canyon I sat for a full 10 seconds in the bumper madness. I'm thinking if I ever do use them, they would be redesigned to be 1/2 the circumference and not take up as much space. I have an idea whether it works or not, to have like 10 of these mini bumpers in a spot and when you hit one, they go below the playfield. Cirqus Voltaire style popup pop-bumper. Then it creates a challenge to get them all down like the old breakout atari game.
Rick & Morty is another unique use of pop bumpers
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