Things get pretty busy over here. Especially right before big shipments. Today, for instance, we are preparing nearly 100 PROcedes for shipment. This is no easy task. In fact, the events that led up to this day started nearly one month ago! So as an excuse not to help the boys out with programming and testing (it’s cold outside!), I’ll just tell you guys all about it.
Dec. 10 2008– Placed an order for 100 PROcede boards. This involves a quick phone call to the PBC manufacturer who then tells me that the holidays are coming up and everyone is trying to get last minute orders placed. So it turns out that instead of taking the usual 4 days to get manufactured, it takes 5 days. Life goes on.
Dec. 22, 2008– The finished PCB boards are picked up and delivered to the assembly house. It’s here where all the components are soldered on to the boards. All this work is done by massively expensive pick-and-pull machines. They operate with incredible speed and precision. Within hours, the entire run is finished. If there is any truth to the Terminator movies (ie, machines will take over the world), we will be in very big trouble.
Dec. 23, 2008– The finished PROcedes are picked up and delivered to us for basic programming. It’s here were we (or specifically, our brilliant programmer) does the first round of testing. Once the test firmware and test maps are loaded on to each unit, they are tested on a bench to ensure that all the inputs are working. During this test, we feed a 2.5 volt signal from all the analog outputs into the analog inputs. And a 50%DC signal from all the digital outputs into all the digital inputs. Then we look all all the inputs to make sure that all the signals are present and accounted for. Out of 100 units, we may find 1 or 2 that aren’t behaving like it should. These are run through the programming process again. If they still have a problem, they are tossed and/or reassembled. The programming and testing process takes approximately 8 minutes per unit. So multiply by 100 and you get 800 minutes or just over 13 hours. During the Christmas holidays, this may turn into 20 hours. It’s hard to say “no” to egg nog.
Dec 29, 2008– Our extruded enclosures, which get cut in 100kg lots, get anodized. This process sometimes takes 2 days. Sometimes it takes 5 days. But when everyone is gearing up for New Years celebration, it can take a lot longer. In this particular case, it took 7 days. I hope everyone holds to their New Years resolutions and puts our jobs first in their priority list. Or else…
Dec 30, 2008– If there is ever a time to develop/test new maps, it’s now. The girlfriend is in LA. All the guys at work are at home with their family. The roads are completely empty. And I’m sure the cops are still in the Christmas spirit. A few dozen 140mph blasts later, the new maps are born! For the next few days, I’ll continue testing at various boost levels and with a variety of user adjustment settings.
Jan 5, 2009– These new maps are posted up on our download site: http://www.vishnutuningforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=990 Pretty nice way of making sure all our customers have access to the latest and greatest maps. Testing/improving never ends!
Jan 13, 2009– All the parts needed for the Plug and Play harnesses finally arrive. Took a little longer than expected. But at least we have enough parts to last us another 6 months. The harness assembly process is no joke. We do not set in cubicles making these ourselves. Instead, we outsource production to a very well-respected electrical harness building company in Silicon Valley. It doesn’t hurt that the owner of the company is a BMW enthusiast. ’It’s a small world after all’ isn’t just a song.
Jan 21, 2009– 100 spanking new PnP harness are finally done. The whole process took about a week and involved no less than 7 harness makers. 4 for manufacturing and 3 for final testing. Each and every one of the harness are tested in a rig to ensure that all connections are solid and continuous. With all these checks in place, it makes senses why our harness failure rate is less than 1%. Ever wonder why competitors push Pin-out harnesses instead of Plug and Play harnesses? Yes, it takes more time, resources and money to build them. Not only does it make the job much easier on the customer, it also makes the whole process a lot safer and glitch-free. It’s worth it. Pin-out harness are soooo 2007.
Next Blog Installment: Final assembly, map loading and in-car testing. Bring popcorn. Or maybe a nice couch to nap on.
