How we can deal with parts high prices?

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#83
batteryman said:
It's you who are confused. I am speaking as a small business seller.

There are no import duties levied by most countries on goods from the UK to the EU and elsewhere. (Governments collect both vat & duties, the latter are not the same as the fee charged to collect the vat & duties)

DDU vat (or sales tax - name varies with country) is collected in the recipients country along with a collection fee and usually by the courier service on behalf of their government.

So as small business I cannot opt to use DDP which would save the buyer the collection fee, and delays at the border, hence my exports have suffered.

Also, if I wanted to be able to collect the exports vat, I would have to have vat number for the EU countries I ship to and then have the paperwork and red tape every month to send the vat to the relevant governments. Best thing I ever did was to deregister for UK vat and keep sales below the threshold even if it cost some exports.
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OK, yes that's a pain. You should have stayed in the EU! 😎

Jan
 
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#84
Lee Knatta said:
Will be illegal. 😀 Because it is bad for the climate, or whatever reason they just make up. 😆

My crystal ball tells me that semiconductors will get expensive once the China / Taiwan conflict is starting.
Do you remember the semiconductor shortage not too long ago? While it was temporary in nature, governments suddenly spent a ton of taxpayers money to subsidize semiconductor plants in the US and EU - for a temporary issue that resolves on its own prior to any of those plants being finished. It is just a matter of time until this crisis unfolds - all on its own of course, just like any other crisis.
Unfortunately, my crystal ball does not tell me when this will happen. However, now is a good time to stock up with semiconductors, isn't it?
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My crystal ball told me it was time to stock up on semiconductors five years ago. Figure out what yiure going to need over the next 20 years, and buy it all up front. Don’t blame me or anyone else when you can’t get driver or VAS transistors anymore, or have to keep redesigning around new packages every year that have no thermal mass and you can’t see anymore. The next ones will be smiller and smaller. Even if all the world conflicts don’t interrupt things.

Of course mining for parts will become illegal. It may as well be now, considering how scarce things we designed around in the old days are getting. Remember what a “goldmine” all the surplus houses used to be 30 years ago? It’s gone today. What does still exist is horribly overpriced. New from Mouser or Antek tends to be cheaper, rather than the other way around. Of course that applies to what you can still get. 30 years ago I would NEVER pay $100 for a transformer, even a 1000 watter. Now it’s considered a good deal and you gladly pay it because the alternatives are astronomical. Heat sinks? ****. Good thing I have a lifetime supply, (four 27 gallon plastic crates full - I just moved them to the new shop) because there are no more unless you get them custom made $$$$$$. When they pass all the laws, they’ll end up raiding my place and put me under the jail.

I do miss the big $3 soup can capacitors, but today’s snap-ins are actually better in terms of size, weight, ESR and even lifetime. New design is transitioning to them as my stash from Tanner’s runs out.
 
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#85
wg_ski said:
Don’t blame me or anyone else when you can’t get driver or VAS transistors anymore, or have to keep redesigning around new packages every year that have no thermal mass and you can’t see anymore.
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I get by just fine using KSA1381E, KSC3503D, TTA004B-Q, TTC004B-Q, MJE15032G, MJE15033G, 2SA1943N, 2SC5200N, NJW32181G, NJW1302G.
I have those numbers etched in my brain now.
For me those parts are a day away from Mouser's shelves, having no delivery charge to my door step, life is good compared to the past.
Nothing to complain about, imagine that 🙂
Oh, I wrenched my side getting out of the tub this morning, getting old is no fun. A couple of extra vap hits is in order 🙂 One for Scottt W. who said I was polluting my lungs a few years ago.
wg_ski said:
Good thing I have a lifetime supply, (four 27 gallon plastic crates full - I just moved them to the new shop)
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I hope you manage to use up your inventory, not straining your back and not have to keep moving it.
 
#86
Prices I think are still very reasonable. What has happened is anything with more "stuff" is more expensive. You can still get a signal tran in quantity for pennies. But something with more stuff (tranny for example with copper, power tran's with more silicon/metal) have gone up. But so has the stuff, copper etc. And stuff is what goes into these things. But signal trans have almost nothing in them, so price is still about the process. And they are very good at the process. I'm still amazed how they do it. I picked up a lot of ksc1845's and so there was complete info on them in the box. They were diffused in Japan and then sent to I think Malaysia for assembly/test. 5c ea for a worldwide trip. I've started playing with the new raspberry pico uController. On a board it is 4 dollars. And just the part it is 80c. For 80c you are getting a few million transistors and all the engineering that went with it to design it. Part of that of course is they will likely sell a billion of them diluting the engineering cost down, but given the mask set for it probably costs 10M, even a billion means the mask cost was a penny, or more than 1% of that 80c. But back to stuff. Part of the push to SMD is stuff I think. Those tinned leads cost a fraction of a cent. SMD removes them. A thru hole resistor has more body material than an SMD. Again more stuff. The board size for thru hole is bigger, more stuff. I'm still pretty delighted as a hobbyist. If I compare what electronics cost today(even in actual dollars, not inflated ones) vs when I grew up, amazing. But I was paying radio shack prices back then.
 
#87
rsavas said:
I get by just fine using KSA1381E, KSC3503D, TTA004B-Q, TTC004B-Q, MJE15032G, MJE15033G, 2SA1943N, 2SC5200N, NJW32181G, NJW1302G.
I have those numbers etched in my brain now.
For me those parts are a day away from Mouser's shelves, having no delivery charge to my door step, life is good compared to the past.
Nothing to complain about, imagine that 🙂
Oh, I wrenched my side getting out of the tub this morning, getting old is no fun. A couple of extra vap hits is in order 🙂 One for Scottt W. who said I was polluting my lungs a few years ago.

I hope you manage to use up your inventory, not straining your back and not have to keep moving it.
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I hope I still have some inventory left when I pass on. That means I didn’t run out.
Dont count on the KSA1381 to always be there. In 20 years it WON’T. And you’ll be wanting to bash some bean counter’s brain in over it too.
 
#88
wg_ski said:
Dont count on the KSA1381 to always be there. In 20 years it WON’T.
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Do you read crystal balls too?
When KSA1381 status is put on "life time buy" then I resort to your methods, that is if, I want too and are able too continue using them.
When that day happens, its the death of the class "AB" amplifier imo.
Until such time the more we use of them, the more reason for them to keep producing them.
I am trying to do my part, as I have got to the point to buying 100 at a time now.
Just came out with a new amplifier pcb for the old PIoneer SX-1250, AWH-048-A0. Imagine that, a new design assembly for a receiver sold in 1978.

Are you stocking up on NE5534A too" I am not, I do not design phono amplifiers and if I did I'd use a jfet IPS

Anyways we are getting off topic, I do not think prices for electronic parts are getting too expensive, compared to food or fuel or everything else for that matter.
 

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#91
In England in the 1980s and 90s I took the train and bought vinyl albums and electronic components without really worrying much about the cost.

Now I can't afford the train, or new vinyl, and for components - well, I now seem to select components I can buy for reasonable money on eBay, avoiding posh stuff that will be faked (such as 7805 chips -doh!-), and reuse wire and whatever else I can.

So the hobby has changed, but to an extent I try to design around it. We all do to an extent - using motor start capacitors etc, it's all good 🙂
 
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