Memory is a little vague on this but I recall one of the 2 staff already hired was a welder (among other skills). Is it still good news if they have more than 1 welder in a tiny but supposedly state of the art automated factory?

To clarify, what I'm getting at is whether the enormous investment in an inert this or that robotic such and such has turned out dismal. And thus whether they're now falling back to good old fashion hand welding for frames of production bikes.

If so, there are numerous implications particularly for quality consistency and production rate, let alone what happened to all that Kickstarter capital, company finances and viability. Sure it's speculative, but so far there hasn't been absolute confirmation of what was touted since circa mid-2016.

• Set up parts and components in fixtures and load/unload robot weld cell

So your earlier, non-jesting theory in #1075 is correct.

The 2 earlier hires were acquaintances of Peter, one being his teacher, the other I got the impression not a direct acquaintance but possibly through the teacher. So this is the first known job advert for an "outsider".

Reading job ads can provide clues to inner workings of a company and upcoming products. Take for example the very secretive Apple corporation. Independent analysts and websites scour patent filings and job ads to deduce what they're working on..

Hello,

To further add to this eminently interesting discussion, i work in the machine tool industry (lasers specifically) and can tell you that even if the robotic welder is top notch on paper and was sold to Helix as such, there's always a risk that it does not entirely fulfill the requirements it was bought for. This has to do with not everyone being as good as we think at building machines, then there are the over-zealous or downright disingenuous salesmen and the intrinsically flawed machine designs that can simply never exactly give satisfaction. That being said and on a much more positive note, the mere fact that they have shown the welds and are still having a Robotic TIG Welding engineer in the mix means (to me) that they are leveraging at least to some extent their touted awesome production tool.

Then besides having the adequate machine tool, that's only about 60% of the work. A good 40% of the success of a machining step is down to adequate fixturing. And there's often room for improvement there, stiffness, positioning, ergonomy, repeatability....etc. Fixturing is sometimes and art. If your Robotic TIG Welder engineer expert is already busy and/or does not have the honed skills in fixturing, then it makes more than perfect sense to hire a guy to assist him. An experienced jig maker will always be a powerful element of your team. Besides, having two experienced welders, as RobotGuy aptly points out, is the only way to fully appraise how good the output is and troubleshoot when needed.

Hopefully my experience will resonate with someone here.

Oh yes, it resonates !

I so often encountered people thinking that buying a tool will replace knowledge and experience !

It is never the case.

Same for this welding process: the robotic tool will increase productivity, may increase the yield but will never replace the knowledge and the experience of a TIG Welding engineer.

This 'waiting' thread is going to out live me.

What else is there to say?

...that the fat lady weighs about 98 LBS.

She's just got a touch of laryngitis at the moment i think

Well it looks like this thread has run its course.

Thanks for playing, everyone!~

Due to the request of a member, I've decided to go ahead and re open this thread for those of you who are truly following the update.

One request though... Please keep this clean from chatter that does not relate because those who would like to see actual conversation regarding Helix should not have to fish through to find information.

Thank you!

Yay! Thank you =). Those of us who cannot see the updates appreciate any info posted here so we can follow along on the saga.

So to recap, thlast few updates have had some news on finish and logo but have not really provided any insight into progress on production etc..

The update this coming weekend is mooted to be a meatier affair with an update on delivery schedule.

It'd be nice to get the delivery schedule this time. The first announcement that there'd be a delivery schedule was late 2017 I think.

I'm pretty excited to see the optional finish pics (and hopefully pricing), but it will also be really good to finally hear when the bikes are likely to ship. I'm not sure I'll get mine this year now, since I was not an early backer, and they have a thousand or so bikes to make before mine :/

Maybe it's good to not be one of the earliest - if they get feedback, then later iterations can correct for small problems.

Wooaahh, hold on a second! People are talking about bikes being delivered with faults and/or getting them earlier than every one else.
Making assumptions that Helix will actually deliver. Let's look at history. A lot of knowledgeable and "industry/in-the-know" folks have been
burned by many start-ups in the past. Not just on Kickstarter; but even experienced venture capitalists.

I don't have any Helix order. So you may ask why bother posting here at all? I'm concerned about all these people who gave millions and
only got promises. I'm concerned about the people buying Kickstarter pledges; if they're getting all the info available. Will Helix go for a 3rd
round of asking "investors" for pledges/donations?

KS and IGG both make it very clear that you are buying development which may or may not lead to a delivered product. Anyone who ignores that is responsible for their own delusions. I've taken a few small gambles that didn't pay off, one medium size (where the developer stated in writing there was a moneyback guarantee and then screwed everyone). I've got one fairly large one outstanding but I do believe I will eventually get my item; just not on the timetable originally set. Delays, even multiple year delays, are common on crowdfunded items. Could this go the way of the $200 headphones that raised 3 million and blew up, sure. My mentality is to write off the money mentally once I pledge. Then, if and when the product materializes, I am pleasantly surprised. But half the fun is speculating and complaining and sharing angst with other backers, lol. One thing I find fascinating is the secondary market for pledges; could be a whole new marketplace someday for folks selling their backer positions at various times in the development process.

There are quite a few here who 'pre-ordered' in early 2017. Refunds can easily be granted for the pre-order people. So they can easily say, "They're going to get theirs before I get mine," and possibly be more relaxed about it - the exit strategy came built in.