Thanks for the post, @pxl_jockey .
Warning! Warning! Warning! Much wordiness below!
> "please take your time & get it right."
No disagreement. I have every intention of getting this right - that's always been my goal. And although I am eager to bring this device to market, I'm not going to release it before I believe it's ready.
Just to reiterate: I am a one-man band for the devices I'm making - developer, tester, support engineer, etc. I say that so that one may set appropriate expectations.
> do you have a plan to ensure that you feel confident in standing behind them?
I expect these heaters to be functional and reliable, as I expect anyone buying one to demand the same. And I expect this board to hand me my head if they aren't! I will not sell these unless and until I am confident that they will work and last.
Also, I have personal standards for quality and for workmanship. I've held off releasing a portable device until I can make one that meets my own high standards. Frankly, if someone were already making the devices I want, I wouldn't be trying to make my own. Unfortunately, no one is making these devices as I think they could be made, so I'm endeavoring to do that. Which is a long way of saying that I care about the quality of my heaters to an almost unhealthy degree, lol. If I just wanted to make a buck, I would have rushed one of my earlier, more derivative designs to market. My goals are a bit loftier, in that I want to build devices I actually want to own myself.
When I eventually put my heaters up for sale, they will come with a clearly stated limited warranty that will spell out what I am offering in terms of post-sale support. I will be very clear about it before I sell any units. I'm still working out the specifics of what that warranty will be, and to evaluate my devices correctly I need prototypes that are close to the final versions. There will be more to come on this topic before these go on sale.
> Do you have test protocol or benchmarks for units before they go out into the wild?
Yes. I will be testing each unit for complete functionality before it goes out, and I have benchmarks for performance - I know how long it should take to heat a DV, and approximately how hot the heater's components should/should not get during use. The charging circuit could use some basic testing, too, though it's an off-the-shelf circuit and not one I plan on modifying.
There are a number of things I don't know yet for both upcoming portable devices, including how safe these heaters will be to use and carry around, how these units will handle and shed heat when used in the real world, if they need additional venting, if they are fragile, etc. In many regards they are still making the jump from designs to real world devices.
Now, having said all of that, I want to pause for a moment of clarity: This is not a dialysis pump or the next iPhone. The purpose of the device is to heat a metal tube so you can get high, and to do this my heaters need to work reliably and not catch fire. Those are achievable goals and I intend to deliver on them.
I am a very firm believer in Voltaire's famous statement, "The perfect is the enemy of the good". I want these devices to be very, very good, but I will tell you all straight up that I do not have enough time in my life to make them perfect. They are going to be as good and as safe as I can make them - certainly on par with (and likely much better than) the other Dynavap-specific IH devices being sold now, but I am not Consumer Reports or Underwriter's Laboratories, and I am not subjecting these to that level of testing. I will be making these in my workshop, which occupies about half of our garage - no clean room, no bunny suits, and every day is casual Friday.
I am currently waiting on final candidate circuit boards for the Mother Fluxer, and a newly rearranged PCB design for the Deluxe for which I have a lot of hope. Once I have the PCBs I can build out prototype devices that I think will be very close to their final form, and do some formal testing (such as it is), and some ad hoc testing, which will probably be more revealing. The testing phase will last as long as it takes me to feel confident that the devices I've made work as I expect them to. I am eager to get these into the hands of other people and get some real world feedback on their use.
Anyway, those are my plans.
Stay tuned, and thanks in advance for your feedback and comments.
Last edited:
watching this evolve with great interest. Holding off on othe IH options for this one... I hope to god you're going to ship internationally.
)