Hi There- Its John here.
Shipping Update
We are pretty confident we are in a position to start shipments of the Users Edition Tuesday. I pushed really hard for Friday last week but we have are still waiting for the final two parts to be completed. And amazingly - at least for now - we aren’t waiting for CopperCore ovens. Our process improvements on that front are paying dividends.
- The Utility tubes are having the logo laser scribed on them tomorrow. They will be ready for pick up after lunch. For those of you that were concerned we have removed the www.vestratto.com from the tube. My wife pointed out that the clasp on her Chanel handbag doesn’t have www.chanel.com engraved on it. We have bumped up the magnets to 1/4 inch thick to give enough oomph to really grab and hold onto the herb chamber magnetic disc. The two o-ring cap has been upgraded to a threaded single o-ring version. I understand some caps slipped off when folks pulled the original tubes out of their pockets. Thats fixed. Oh, and the tubes have been drilled to the correct depth. I will NEVER let myself live that one down. Sheesh.
- We are waiting on the final version of the dedicated tool to twist the “intercooler” spirals. I made several spiral intercoolers myself for testing but quickly realized that to get a consistent result we needed some help to build a proper hard tool. I’m stoked that we have made the acquaintance of Tim the “tool and die guy” who will not only get our spirals twisted but has made screen inserters, o-ring slippers and some other cool stuff. We have all the titanium spiral blanks laser cut already so as soon as the tool is done tomorrow we will start twisting.
Who gets shipped first?
There is really only one fair thing to do. The folks who have outstanding pre-orders from the launch are getting their User Edition Anvils first. Its time to expand the population of Anville and get these folks joined into the non-revolution Revolution. After that first shipment the normal rules apply - mostly. We will ship in the order that the original orders were received except for purple heat shields which are coming nearer the end of the week. I hear a collective sigh of relief that the boys will be together until at least the weekend. But then, we here at Vestratto are expecting full payment :) For those of you who haven’t given us your colour preference yet please do so chop chop. If we have not heard from you by the time we are boxing your unit you will be getting another Carbon Black which is our standard colour.
When is the Vestratto store re-opening?
We anticipate by the end of the Founders to Users Edition upgrades we will have solid visibility on our production capacity and will re-open the store. We do NOT have unlimited inventory so we will ONLY be accepting orders against finished goods. I remain adamant that having folks money from the pre-orders, through all of this evolution, has been very uncomfortable. I want to thank you guys again for not pitching tents outside the Factory and stalking us with pitch forks and torches. We have been working hard but I do not plan to put myself in that position again. Folks on the waitlist will get at least a 24 hour head start on general release. If the wait list consumes the available inventory we will not go on to general release. Folks that have shown loyalty to Vestratto will always get priority.
Some Technical Tidbits
The Users Edition are now coming off the line. Not at full speed yet but that’s ramping. The photo shows a magnet, holding a 416 steel slug, hanging off the 416 outer layer. The magnetic outer layer is critical for efficient induction. Every metal can be heated by induction. BUT … if a metal isn’t magnetic it is very, very inefficient. For example, if the outer layer was copper the induction heater would be rendered useless.
Pay close attention to this next technical bit.
Induction heaters work by oscillating an electric current through the coiled wire. That oscillating electric current sets up an oscillating magnetic field inside the coil. Anything put inside the coil will be exposed to that magnetic field - which will - set up an oscillating electric current on the surface of the object - say an Anvil oven. The more magnetic the object in the field the stronger the resulting electric currents on its surface. The INDUCED electricity moving back and forth runs into the internal resistance of the metal. When this induced electric current hits the internal resistance of the 416 steel the by-product is heat - and oh yeah - vapour. Magnetic outer layers are required for efficient induction heating. Take a side-on look at your “induction ready” frypan and you will see the bottom layer is magnetic disc bonded to the base of the pan. There is a reason for that.
Now that the induction ready ovens are in hand the engineers are spinning up their beeny propellors and oiling up their slide rules. Looking forward to sharing some development insights with you as we work through the details of the first Vestratto induction heater. The return to electronics is something I’m looking forward to personally. My roots :) One last point. The 416 stainless looks very gunmetal grey as opposed to the shiny 316 inner layer. I did not polish this band because I think the contrast of the materials looks awesome. I hope you do as well.
Answer to this weeks “Elephant in the Room” question.
Why doesn’t the Anvil Oven have fins?
The glib answer is because I don’t like fins. The real answer is because Anvil implements two thermal breaks to retain - not dissipate - the heat applied to the oven, and I don’t like fins. The first thermal break is located where the stainless steel necks down immediately above the CopperBlock thermal reservoir. The second thermal break is comprised of the conduction impassable air input slots. These two thermal breaks perform three key functions.
- The thermal break technology PROTECTS the o-rings - which themselves are located on a different structure, the airflow valve, from over-heating. The Viton o-rings are good to 250 Celsius but the cooler they are the longer they will last. For those of you who have your Anvils already you will notice that the yellow oxide layer stops abruptly at the airflow slots and the steel above the slots is shiny silver.
- The thermal break technology INSULATES the oven so that it heats faster. You already know the Anvil takes longer to heat and having an air conditioner running while the torch is being applied would be a bit lame.
- The thermal break technology RETAINS the heat in the CopperCore oven so that it is transferred into the incoming convection air stream. Obviously, the more heat energy converted into the convection air stream means a fuller and more efficient extraction.
Closing Remarks
For those of you who are about to receive your first Anvil, We salute you!
We are keen to get your feedback and look forward to providing you with our best solutions to the three most important aspects of any vaporizer. The Vapour, the Vapour, and the Vapour.
Cheers
John