Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: MOTM

I have run out of my stock of the original 1998 Spectrol 149 cermet 100K
linear pots and its RoHS replacement.

In 1998, these pots were black, made in Mexico and cost me $2.94 in 250pc
quantities.

In 2003, Vishay move production to their French company Sfernice due to
RoHS. They changed the design (the bodies are now white). In Jan 2006 I ran
out of the original ones, and placed an order for 2500. The price went up to
$3.96, and Vishay took ∗16 months∗ to deliver. I survived by buying smaller
quantities here and there for ~ $5/pot, and I recall 1 order for 25 that I
paid $7.50ea.

These pots are ∗still∗ available from Mouser (they have over 200 in stock)
but the price is crazy.....over $15ea! (if you don't believe it, search for
594-149-7104). For $15 I can buy a 450MHz ARM processor with 2D graphics
engine, USB, audio codec, and Ethernet used in the Chumby One (see
www.chumby.com for my new toy).

I will now switch over to the BI conductive plastic pot. I have these in
both linear and log. They are grey and are an exact mechanical pc board fit
BUT the shaft is 5mm shorter. This only becomes an issue on 2U wide modules
that use the blue Bourns pots as well. In these cases, I will ship a little
pc board called a 'Pot Chiclet' to allow easy soldering of discrete wires to
the pot. I'll snap photos and post later. I'll also add these to kits as as
addendum.

If you ∗really∗ want to use the Spectrol pots, feel free to spend $60/module
to do so :) I've shipped many assembled 1U modules with the BI pots with no
complaints so far.

Paul S.