(16-Aug-2015, 17:12)rwjr44 Wrote: When you are done with all of your modifications, please estimate what a factory built Devialet would cost with them incorporated.
It would be silly-cheap since they're buying em en-masse and have to use 'some' fastener so their only increases would be the slight percentage from a standard to a specialty fastener... pennies on the dollar. The one H-U-G-E big-ticket item is the thermal pads. While I paid over 10X what I could've bought the OEM blue for I'm sure if someone brought Alpha-Cool wheelbarrows of cash to trade for their thermal pads they'd get downright cheap... maybe on the order of 20-30% more than Devialet pays for the blue pads now. Then there's places where things would be dramatically less $ than OEM. Take a standard IEC inlet instead of a PEM filter. It won't be a F'tech of course! All told I would guess their cost-of-goods might increase by single digit percentages if they incorporated this on EVERY unit that goes out the door. But you also have to factor in they're making these at far less than half of their suggested retail pricing scheme. Probably less then 35%. I personally believe they are out-of-pocket near or less than 30% of what a 200 sells for on the unit. I don't find fault with that number in any way. They're out huge amounts in tooling, marketing, design, engineering and tens of millions of dollars upside down in debt. They NEED to make money or they'll go away very quickly and we'll all be left holding a bag.
And while doing these mods on every 200 might add 2-3% ($60-$70) per unit they could easily absorb it but my bet is they won't. Tho I don't see them offering a special edition for something like this either. I believe they'd either do ALL of em this way or none and that they'd NEVER admit the idea came from outside Devialet and I understand why. Arrogance is served straight-faced at this particular little French hi-fi bistro.
*UPDATE*
Couple things I thought of overnight that didn't make it into this post yesterday. Anodizing is roughly 20% the cost of 4 layer chrome plating required on aluminum and avoids the necessary hand-polishing required of chrome which reduce costs further and significantly. However the WBT binding posts need to be added on but not at the prices 'we' pay. WBT is a large company set up to offer both wholesale and OEM pricing tiers to manufacturers. S'why you see them on so many high-end speakers as delivered from their manufacturer. Convection cooling inlets could already be handled via the footer and optical ports. Clear bezel viewing ports could be replaced by die-cut SS mesh for less cost than acrylic viewing windows w/screen-printed annular rings and typography. The robots have to drill outlets at the front... a near one-minute/one tool machining operation for Devialet. Near as I can tell these last few add-on items are likely a near 'wash' price-wise and don't significantly add or lower above costs but needed to be mentioned in this thread. All things considered I still see this as raising Devialet's costs at/near $60-$70 per unit on the 120, 200 and 400 machines if incorporated at the production level and included on every machine.
Statements in my posts are opinion only, not to be construed as fact. Any projects I engage in are at my own risk! Their outcome cannot be assured and may result in success, small/no change or catastrophic failure. I encourage no one rely on anything I say or do as gospel and to realize your mileage may vary!
