Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

VFS Inclino, Imperio, Origo News ??

Status
Not open for further replies.
Just received my repaired Impero/Inclino kit. First tests are very encouraging. Everything that didn't work before seems to work now, wired as well as wireless. :smile:

Only thing I'm still a bit irritated by is the standby noise of the motor. It sounds like it's running all the time, even when the gear is not moving. Is this normal?
 
As Curt writes. We're in the process of trying to figure out what's wrong with my unit. I've sent him a video that shows the problem and hopefully he'll be able to come up with solutions for the problems I'm having.
 
I'm too pissed off about this new posting of housing setbacks to right a big post, first i bloody heard of it. Please someone direct me to where i missed that i am gonna have to wait yet many more untold months until some legal problem in Asia is sorted? Or have i misunderstood?
 
Curt here's a simple question. Am I going to receive my unit by January 10? If not, I am cancelling my order. Please let me know ASAP.

Shotaro Rowland Kirishima
 
Wow.......
I actually forgot i had $5000+ sitting in $USD in Viewfactors account.....wonder how much interest it has accumulated over the last 18 months......? actually thats about a billion $AUD........:smiley: well that was when i paid for it.......!?
Hold on.....! I think our dollar is near parity right now with the US peso.......so as of today i have no VF FF system and im down another $1500 on top of my $5000.......what to do...?
Stay or Go.....???
 
I am with Paul on this one. I am fast approaching the end of my business year and would love to invest that money in something that is going to make me money. When I put my money down I thought I was buying a product, not investing in a company. If I was investing I would have liked to know that and gotten some sort of business plan and a time line of return on investment like any other venture. I feel this has been a little misrepresented to us as customers (we basically have paid the for development of this product) and have been tricked into being investors (with someone else taking all the return of investment when this is successful). I really just need to know if this problem with the housings is the last bump and I'm going to have something in my hand in the new year to make money with or should I "invest" in another company that is actually going to send me a product? I "bought" this product to make money with it, not help a tinkerer (I say this with all respect, I love building stuff for my camera and lights too) make cool stuff.
 
Not to belabor the (price) point...

Not to belabor the (price) point...

Preston, Bartech and Cmotion all make well regarded wireless FIZ rigs, any of which can be purchased off the shelf quickly and easily - assuming you don't mind the price. ViewFactor saw an opportunity to create a business that could sell competitive rigs for less and still have a decent margin. Many of us liked the price to prospective performance/feature set ratio (not to mention having had things turn out pretty well with RED fresh in many of our minds).

As the saying goes, there is no free lunch. The fact that many of us became defacto investors and have had to endure delays seems like par for the course to me. Curt took on a challenge, we got on board looking for a bargain and now we are all suffering the pain of a much longer wait than anticipated.

Its human nature to be frustrated by this situation, but with the possible exception of Pawel I think its safe to say no one is more frustrated by this than Curt. From my point of view, he has shown incredible fortitude and kept his sh*t together quite well all things considered. Here on this open forum I want to wish him and his family a Happy Holiday.

Cheers - #19
 
thanks for updating at least curt....

to sum it up for people not wanting to sift through hundreds of posts...

It appears curt has all the parts required, but the housings were not made to spec, and he is having to machine each one by hand to tolerence...and whoever he had do it in Asia also does not want to release the die(or mold) for the housings so he can have a proper US based manufacturere do it.Also it appears there are 70+plus units out there with 8 or so complaints out of the 70.


if I'm wrong feel free to correct but that seems to be the current situation.

I myself will wait a little longer, but please keep the updates coming....when you go silent it starts to fell like a cut-n-run situation...also when dates are made for updates, it would be best to keep those dates as well
I sympathize though...souds like you'll get some grey hairs out of this.

Merry Christmas...and a rapid high volume production New Year
 
Blair S. Paulsen said:
Preston, Bartech and Cmotion all make well regarded wireless FIZ rigs, any of which can be purchased off the shelf quickly and easily - assuming you don't mind the price. ViewFactor saw an opportunity to create a business that could sell competitive rigs for less and still have a decent margin. Many of us liked the price to prospective performance/feature set ratio (not to mention having had things turn out pretty well with RED fresh in many of our minds).

As the saying goes, there is no free lunch. The fact that many of us became defacto investors and have had to endure delays seems like par for the course to me. Curt took on a challenge, we got on board looking for a bargain and now we are all suffering the pain of a much longer wait than anticipated.

Its human nature to be frustrated by this situation, but with the possible exception of Pawel I think its safe to say no one is more frustrated by this than Curt. From my point of view, he has shown incredible fortitude and kept his sh*t together quite well all things considered. Here on this open forum I want to wish him and his family a Happy Holiday.

Cheers - #19
Click to expand...



Compulsory disagreeing message here.
Steam.
Repeat.

(P.S. well said Blair)
 
I thought long and hard before posting this, very aware that it may create a herd mentality or exacerbate an existing one. But it needs to be said.

Mike Harrington said:
it starts to fell like a cut-n-run situation...
Click to expand...

What do you mean "start to feel"?

CVB clearly stated in post#2646 that bankruptcy/liquidation is a very real possibility in 2010 if 1) he doesn't quickly develop a new revenue stream and/or 2) he gets swamped with refund requests.

CVB said:
Either we diversify and get more products to market that we can make quickly and with minimal effort or the odds of us closing our doors sometime next year are significantly increased.
Click to expand...

He is basically saying that, although he is at the end of the road in terms of product development, he is also at the end of the road financially and may not have the financial capacity to complete it. (Always darkest before the dawn, eh?) The subtext is both clear and loud in that post: a sense of desperation and foreshadowing of an end nobody wants.

My guess is that, given that he has stopped taking FF orders, developing new revenue is really the determinative factor of whether he will close, and the issue of whether its a trickle or a flood of refund requests in the next few weeks will only speed up the closing date, absent a quick source of funds. In short, if we swamp him with refund requests, he will run out of time to find new funds, but he will have to close eventually anyway if he doesn't find a new way to make money (quickly and with large margins).

Not saying that CVB will cut and run because he is a smarmy businessman, but if there is no income and a lot of expenses, then bankruptcy is forced upon you.

I also interpret CVB's postings to say that, in order to get more housings (which are very expensive and time-consuming to make using a CNC rather than with the existing molds stuck in China), he needs more money, which has to come from new revenue streams. If he doesn't get that new money, when he is out of the existing inventory of housings (his post said he had 25 of the initial 100 good ones remaining), then nobody will be getting any FF units when those 25 run out. So, not only does he need additional money to make the housings, but he's going to need to focus on selling other products in order to get the money to make the housings, which of course means more delays for the FF.

CVB, tell me if I have misinterpreted your postings.

Since you have effectively made us de facto investors/creditors in VF. Let's get practical here. If I was an investor or a creditor, I would be performing my due diligence and, at a minimum, would be asking the following questions:

What kind of assets do you have to secure the approximately $400K to $800K that I am estimating your customers have paid-in for the FF system if in fact you do close? Who else do you owe?

How much operating capital do you have relative to the monthly rent and utilities (i.e., how long can you last without new revenue)?

How much do you need to manufacture the next batch of housings necessary to fulfill the existing orders?

Can you make that outlay with existing cash or will you have to borrow?

If you have to borrow, what efforts have you made to seek out loans and what are the results?

If you can use existing cash, how does diverting that cash to housing production change the timeline noted above (i.e., how long before you run out of cash needed to pay the rent/utilities)?

I sense the frustration in your posts and I believe in you and your product (which finally appears to be almost finished), but I think we need some practical straight-up answers that we can mull over during the holidays.

And will anybody who has some of the 70 units out there please post some pix and some feedback?

Cheers to the Viewfactor Team, and Happy ____ (whatever it is that you all celebrate).
 
I didn't pre-order, so this isn't my fight, but I gotta say...

I find it entertaining that people who could have asked for a refund at any time feel that they are somehow entitled to pry into VF's internal business affairs, by nature of having an unshipped order. It seems clear that you should either ask for a refund, or continue to wait for VF to deal with the latest production issues. Requesting regular updates? Fair. Rabble-rousing in this forum? Not going to get units shipped any faster.

For everyone's sake, I hope things finally start going right for VF in 2010!

Tim
 
The real unfortunate thing about this whole ordeal is that Curt keeps us giving us false hopes... I would have cancelled ages ago if I really knew that it would take this long... I mean, 6 months delay is acceptable but not 18 months (or longer). When I ordered, I had no idea that this product was just a concept. On their web page, it clearly stated that the product was ready to ship in 3 weeks. I'm not gonna get into details but they had all these excuses that lead me to believe that the product was almost ready... I mean, I asked for a refund this summer but changed my mind when they announced that the product is finally ready and that the backorder shipment will be finished by November. Then comes this housing problem... If this isn't called a SCAM, what is?

I want to believe in your product but man...you are really pushing it.
 
Tim Morten said:
Rabble-rousing in this forum? Not going to get units shipped any faster.
Click to expand...

but those kind of posts let others know what to expect from certain businesses. I wouldn't purchase from VF knowing what I know now. Granted there are benefits taking risks with a company or believing in them from the start. In this case, we see the results.
 
CVB said:
The first 30 orders we sent out were all over the place in terms of order numbers. Several of the orders we shipped were three motor kits. I mentioned this a couple months ago... http://reduser.net/forum/showpost.php?p=476786&postcount=2380 You will receive your order within the next couple weeks Curran.

]

Would be handy to put a list together to let people know when they will be receiving their sets, based on their serial number and time of order. Seems a bit strange that you have made a muddle of it all and released 70 units not in the correct order!

Would be nice if you could let me know when I would expect to receive mine, and if you don't know when you would be able to refund my money.

I understand if you chose to ignore this post, but an answer would be great, as you have not answered any of email for the past few months.

Z

P.S. Merry Christmas
Click to expand...
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top