MOTM

a) after 100s of hours of listening (OK...each piece several times) decided 
it was a 'photo finish'. No filly to win this time, but a John vs John tie. 
Both entries featured clever use of both the MOTM-730 and the MOTM-700 
'dynamically patch' which is what the module was originally designed to do. 
Another variant is show by Robert Rich's video on the NEWS page of the site. 
So, congrats and maybe I'll have another contest this fall.

b) I am still shipping assembled modules as the primary focus. I have some 
MOTM 2.0 large orders (W&B and Kerry H.among others) shipping this week. I 
am starting to kit up again, I want to have all the kits out by 4th of July 
break. Also shipping Josh H.'s '650, Sam W.'s 4 assembled modules from when 
dinosaurs roamed the Earth and David K.'s borrowed Harvestman module and the 
'730 [the '320s will soon follow]). I had to get power supplies in from 
Allied and then 3M heat shrink went on back order. But I have both 900 & 950 
kit/assembled orders going out this week.

c) As I cut over to the newer BTI pots, I will also use them for the blue 
Bourns pots (so all the shafts are equal length) using the infamous 'Pot 
Chicklet' pc boards. The Spectrol pots have entered the Land of Silly 
Pricing. I did raise the knob prices slightly to reflect Tyco 
rape-and-pillage "let's jack up the price every May 1st because, well....we 
can!" policy. Still trying to understand how a knob, that was originally 
designed in 1968 and in 1998 cost 68 cents is now over $2ea. And to think 
back then I was saying things like "I'll pick this over the Moog Cosmo 
Plastics or Davies knobs because IT'S CHEAPER!"

d) I did the 2008 'corporate books' today. That new Ferrari will have to 
wait :(  Still for now the beat-up Nissan XTerra with the broken tail-light 
and intermittent gas gauge. Just to throw out some numbers: spent ~$5300 on 
postage and ~$65,000 on parts. The prior year I only spent $39,000 on parts. 
A lot of this is increases in wire, sheet metal and '730 tooling. The 
adjusted sales (after payments out, including royalties) was within $2,000 
of last year. So, a 'flat' revenue but a lot more expenses. I shipped fewer 
modules in 2008 and also had revenue impacted by loss of CEM chip sales 
(over the last 10 years, I sold a LOT of them.....sigh......).

So, it's up to me to ship out the backlog and introduce new modules to 
generate revenue. There is not much I can do about the price of parts, in 
fact I just bought $800 of knobs and tomorrow will spend $900 on jacks and 
resistors.

OK, back to the bench. I will ship many orders out the next 3 weeks. Shane 
is soldering '420s now and will start on '410s on Friday.

Paul S.