Brighton Modelworld 2008 - 15th-17th February

Place discussions about upcoming events here in this thread.

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Simon Windisch
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Post by Simon Windisch »

See here for stats on antweightrobots.com. There's not a huge amount of hits there, but as Pere says, only time will tell.

Simon
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BeligerAnt
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Post by BeligerAnt »

Thanks to everyone that helped out with the stand. There were around 10,000 visitors over the 3 days, despite Friday being very quiet as the schools were not on half term. There were certainly a few serious enquiries, and a lot of people showing a genuine interest even though they were probably unlikely to take part.

DamageBot was useful on Sunday to show people the damage that could be done by the spinners. Thanks to Mr Waller for providing the damage on Saturday!

I think the ?140 price tag of a starter kit put some people off. If we could get the price below ?100 there might be a bigger take-up. However, buying electronic equipment from China to resell in the EU is not straightforward, as it is the IMPORTER (not the manufacturer) that is liable for all CE-marking declarations (EMC, safety, etc), since the CE declaration must be made by a European entity. Personally I wouldn't even consider going there. All other suggestions welcome of course.

I have a feedback form to return to the organisers, so any comments (good or bad) would be welcome.

Pete, I will treat all the batteries to some TLC. I think all the transmitters need a good discharge followed by a nice slow 14hr charge to get back to some sort of normality.
Gary, Team BeligerAnt
josh
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Post by josh »

the actual electronics in my kits are quite a bit less than the final price but it takes a good 6 hours to make each one and i need to make some sort of profit otherwise its not worth doing really...
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BeligerAnt
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Post by BeligerAnt »

I seemed to have gained a 6-way extension lead after the weekend. Any takers? I can deliver it to RRC in March.

Josh, I'm not saying you shouldn't charge for the time you put into making the kit, but if we can somehow get the cost of a kit below ?100 I think we will get a bigger take-up. Several people I spoke to baulked at ?140.
Gary, Team BeligerAnt
josh
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Post by josh »

ok yeh well the price of electronics is 60 pound then materials is about another 15 so unless i made a servo kit i cant really get it low enough and also im useless at modding servos:P btw my kits are with sanyo copies and speed controllers that is why they are more expensive =]
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Simon Windisch
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Post by Simon Windisch »

That 6-way extension is mine Gary, thanks

Simon
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petec
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Post by petec »

I worked out I can drop my price to about ?120 just if I source and use the Zebra radios. For my kits the radio costs at least half of the total, then servos, batteries, chargers etc. As Gary says, there is a price point at ?100 which is psychological but that makes it real for many people.

The other thing I picked up on was people were still scared of how difficult it would be. Now, I deliberately make the kits plug and play - the servos are set and plugged in, the battery is charged and the mixer set, but there is always the fear of the unknown.
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