So I took the advice from
@420time, and
@blankexpression , contacted Trevor myself with a few of the recent questions, and got a very thoughtful response back. Here's the exchange:
Trevor,
I am a Grasshopper supporter (1 "everything" and 1 standard) and had a few questions regarding your 12/15 update. I recognize that you guys have been working extremely hard on this and appreciate the effort and attention to detail you are putting in to get all this right. Here are my questions:
1) Easy question first. In the photos you posted last night it looked like there is a color difference between the clip and the rest of the back end. Do the photos reflect what you think the shipped version will look like or do you think the final color will be a little more consistent?
2) With the back end looking good (actually it looks great / solid) the obvious question is what's the status of the front end components, especially the heat exchanger and other more critical parts up on that end. You mentioned performing "extensive testing" after the weekend's PCB fiasco, does that mean testing the whole pen presumably using prototype front end parts? (I hope so... you guys are entitled to some downtime) Given there has been less discussion in your updates around the front end, how much complexity is there in the front end components that could potentially be an issue. Recognize its impossible to anticipate all of the ways suppliers can screw up, but any color you have around this would be helpful.
I am a member of the Fuck Combustion forum where we've been talking about the update and would like to post your responses if thats okay. Let me just add that while there are a lot of haters out there, I do appreciate the complexity of what you guys are trying to pull off and am looking forward to seeing you all succeed - both delivering on the Indiegogo campaign and in doing great things beyond that. Good luck on what seems to be the home stretch in getting the first hoppers shipped and hope you all have great holidays too.
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Thanks for contacting me. I try and get to every email so sometimes it takes a bit. First, thanks for the support and kind words of recognition in regards to our efforts. It is truly appreciated. I used your numbering below to address your questions.
1. There currently is a color difference between the clip and the body. This is because we had to use a special alloy, the same one used for the snap ring, ( 17-4 Stainless ) to give the clip adequate strength. At first we attempted a heat treatment, but because of the clip's thin profile there were some issues with deformation. When having to design the new tooling for the clip, we decided to go the safest route possible and use 17-4 Stainless.
Check out this link for some basic info on the alloy.
http://www.specialtysteelsupply.com/17-4ph-stainless-steel.php. The main property we are interested in is the very high yield strength.
We have considered a number of options regarding the color difference, but for now it will have to stay. Once the main Body is in, we will post images so you can see what the difference really looks like.
2. Thanks for taking the time to watch the video of the back end! We are really happy with how it came out mechanically. Extensive testing referred to a few things, but not the full Hopper, as we are waiting on the Body and Front-ends to come in.
First, we tested the mechanical operation of the button. The button has a design very similar to that of a real "click" pen, which extended and retracts the tip. In our case it moves a pin, which completes a circuit in one position and not in the other. Until last week we had only tested all the production parts of this separately, but not together. Once combined, we put it through the paces and checked that it was indeed working correctly. This went extremely well and there were no issues. It's really hard to convey how good this feels after so much time spent in front of a CAD model designing, checking and rechecking the design, clearances and tolerances.
The second part of testing involved the PCBs/electronics. One PCB is housed inside the rear assembly. It controls the on/off operation, temperature-dial-setting, and charging. The other is in front of the battery and it controls the chamber/heater temperature and the LEDs. The first step was to get these PCBs working outside the device, and like we talked about in the update, there were a few problems. Once that was done we assembled the Back-end with the PCB included and connected it to the Front-end PCB to fully test all the functionality. This also went really well and everything including the temp-dial-setting and charging worked as intended.
If you are wondering about actually vapeing during testing we do actually do this too. The difference being that we don't use the old incompatible prototypes, but have a system to adapt from the heater to a "chamber" that is affixed to the glass apparatus we showed a few updates ago. Although I don't think many people were impressed by this device, it actually is very important to be able to objectivly control the draw, so the results can be measured. A vacuum pump, and value allow us to precisely control the flow of air. As you can imagine, just taking a rip does not really give you great data.
Front-end
The Front-end is much more mechanically simple, but also a bit more challenging for the manufactures. The biggest issue with the Front-end is heat management. An all metal device that is designed to vape is a hard thing to do. Notice how almost every other vape is plastic where it contacts your lips? This is because plastic can be a lot hotter before it feels hot/burns you. Metal is a much better conductor of heat making it hard to work with. The prototypes we had at the very start had a good way to solve this problem, but it was very hard to do during mass production. In retrospect it is easy to see this was a big error, and caused a lot of delay.
We worked like crazy to get this right, and came to a design that required some complex manufacturing that was pretty costly. Because of this we had to get it right the first time. We went through an exhaustive list of iterations before submitting the design, as we needed to be sure that it was right. These have been promised to be completed before the 20th and we are very excited.
I apologize for the not so concise email I just got a bit into explaining it and figured since you asked you would appreciate it. I know the delays have been hard to stomach, so thanks for staying interested. We really are trying to get this to you as fast as possible, without compromise turning it into a piece of garbage. Feel free to relay the info, please forgive the typos, there is much still to do!
Thanks again for the support and happy holidays,
Trevor
