ADV Production Modular Hardtop!

[BigBlue7]

No refund request, as I want the damn top. I believe once they deliver it will be worth it....but stop delivering to youtubers (that most likely didn't pay a dime) and start delivering to customers who prepaid....in full.....a loooong ass time ago!

You have no leverage because they have your money.

For the people that have given this company $7,000 for two years, I hope you are getting about $700 credited refunded to you for the accumulated interest you missed out on.

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[CTwaterfowler]

I don't know what's worse. The trolls that haven't spent a dime and just want to stir the pot or the "day 1 order" saying ADV stole their money.

They have been very upfront with offering a refund. If you are unhappy with the wait, request a refund. Please request a refund, that moves my order up. Am I frustrated? Yeah. I'm not going to lose my mind over it. If the pain outweighs the reward, I'll request my refund. Right now, this looks like the most promising top out of all those available or soon to be available.

The only mistake they've made is continually updating shipping to next month, next month, etc... Once they realized this they stopped with those types of updates. Now they are in a pickle because people are demanding updates. They give an update and people complain about the update. If you want an update, call them. Go to their website and chat.

Supply chain issues are still real. All the big manufactures are still having issues sourcing some parts. And until you have all the parts to assemble a bunch of tops, other quality issues may not be visible. It's very likely this is what happened. Fixing that process takes time.

As far as all the money up front, that's makes complete sense with a new product. If they would have taken orders with $100 deposit, they would have had 10 times the orders they did. And then when they were produced and ready to be shipped most of those orders would have been canceled, because they didn't have the money to pay for it at the time. Then they would be in financial trouble with a ton of tops and no buyers. Ford had a ton of orders with $100 deposit. The dealerships I'm familiar with had a ton of those orders later canceled or didn't take delivery because they couldn't get financing or realized how much it actually cost.

As far as shipping the tops in May when they were not quite right. This forum alone has shown that would be a mistake. People would be up in arms that they waited 2 years for a top and it's garbage.

Oh, and you'll get your interest on your deposit when the price goes up. That's your investment. That's the main reason most people did the preorder before anyone saw a production top or saw any deliveries. The amount you saved from when the price went up. Some investments are good some are not. We're still waiting to see how this one turns out.

Now I'll grab my popcorn and continue to watch people lose their minds.

Outstanding commentary.
Couldn't agree with you more.

 

[pakrat]

I don't know what's worse. The trolls that haven't spent a dime and just want to stir the pot or the "day 1 order" saying ADV stole their money.

They have been very upfront with offering a refund. If you are unhappy with the wait, request a refund. Please request a refund, that moves my order up. Am I frustrated? Yeah. I'm not going to lose my mind over it. If the pain outweighs the reward, I'll request my refund. Right now, this looks like the most promising top out of all those available or soon to be available.

The only mistake they've made is continually updating shipping to next month, next month, etc... Once they realized this they stopped with those types of updates. Now they are in a pickle because people are demanding updates. They give an update and people complain about the update. If you want an update, call them. Go to their website and chat.

Supply chain issues are still real. All the big manufactures are still having issues sourcing some parts. And until you have all the parts to assemble a bunch of tops, other quality issues may not be visible. It's very likely this is what happened. Fixing that process takes time.

As far as all the money up front, that's makes complete sense with a new product. If they would have taken orders with $100 deposit, they would have had 10 times the orders they did. And then when they were produced and ready to be shipped most of those orders would have been canceled, because they didn't have the money to pay for it at the time. Then they would be in financial trouble with a ton of tops and no buyers. Ford had a ton of orders with $100 deposit. The dealerships I'm familiar with had a ton of those orders later canceled or didn't take delivery because they couldn't get financing or realized how much it actually cost.

As far as shipping the tops in May when they were not quite right. This forum alone has shown that would be a mistake. People would be up in arms that they waited 2 years for a top and it's garbage.

Oh, and you'll get your interest on your deposit when the price goes up. That's your investment. That's the main reason most people did the preorder before anyone saw a production top or saw any deliveries. The amount you saved from when the price went up. Some investments are good some are not. We're still waiting to see how this one turns out.

Now I'll grab my popcorn and continue to watch people lose their minds.

You've got the jist of it and I mostly agree but you miss some nuance. 1.) We were told the "the rubber gasket was the final component" and was finally secured back in April yet that supply chain keeps getting mentioned. 2.) Don't believe anyone thought $100 deposit was applicable. A non-refundable 10%, 15%, even 25% would have been more appropriate knowing the timeframe this would take (hind sight is 20:20 of course) but nobody intended to finance the project for two years especially when all outward appearances make it look like this is not priority one at the shop. 3.) The "final assembly" bit is not a joke anymore it has become an insult to the customers and themselves. You could teach an 8th grade auto shop class to assemble something like this (rubber gaskets, sticking on headliner, screwing on brackets) with this amount of time. The customer will be doing half the assembly when they receive it presumably to save in shipping costs. Manufacturing I'll give you but they are not assembling engines or transmissions or ECUs. 4.) They won't be selling too many tops if they raise the cost when they are already priced above the coemption. Heck Ursa Minor is offering their camper top for $7250 with a $100 refundable reservation fee to get in the production queue.

Unfortunately I feel exactly the same as I did this time last year with about as much communication and information. The only new info between since then has not been good either (problems in manufacturing?!) otherwise it is deja vu all over again almost every month. How something that is needed, promising, has proper aesthetics, built so much excitement, and appeared to be so far ahead of the competition could be derailed by simply shitty communication with fully payed customers is beyond me. If someone can explain why not one top has shipped to a paying customer now that they have figured out the QC issues and supply chain issues I'm all ears. If final assembly takes this long then if you are not a D1 orderer you have an eternity to wait.

 

[broncobase1]

You have no leverage because they have your money.

For the people that have given this company $7,000 for two years, I hope you are getting about $700 credited refunded to you for the accumulated interest you missed out on.

How do you come up with $700? The interest rate for most of the last two years has been like 0.02%

I do not believe they will ever ship a single unit. They took everyones money upfront and gave a delivery of q4 2022 and kept dragging it out faster and farther saying they were waiting for one thing each time. I ended up cancelling my order and going with Anderson Composites because they have a superior part and are actually shipping product. I almost think adv fiberglass needs to be reported to the BBB @ADV Fiberglass

Honestly if they gave you a refund what is there to report? It was your choice to give them money up front, same for all of us. I'm glad you are happy with your Anderson, but how could you possibly know which one is a superior product? Many of us are staying with ADV because we think it looks like the best product, but only time will tell. ADV also has a great reputation, which is why I was willing to pay up front.

 

[broncobase1]

You've got the jist of it and I mostly agree but you miss some nuance. 1.) We were told the "the rubber gasket was the final component" and was finally secured back in April yet that supply chain keeps getting mentioned. 2.) Don't believe anyone thought $100 deposit was applicable. A non-refundable 10%, 15%, even 25% would have been more appropriate knowing the timeframe this would take (hind sight is 20:20 of course) but nobody intended to finance the project for two years especially when all outward appearances make it look like this is not priority one at the shop. 3.) The "final assembly" bit is not a joke anymore it has become an insult to the customers and themselves. You could teach an 8th grade auto shop class to assemble something like this (rubber gaskets, sticking on headliner, screwing on brackets) with this amount of time. The customer will be doing half the assembly when they receive it presumably to save in shipping costs. Manufacturing I'll give you but they are not assembling engines or transmissions or ECUs. 4.) They won't be selling too many tops if they raise the cost when they are already priced above the coemption. Heck Ursa Minor is offering their camper top for $7250 with a $100 refundable reservation fee to get in the production queue.

Unfortunately I feel exactly the same as I did this time last year with about as much communication and information. The only new info between since then has not been good either (problems in manufacturing?!) otherwise it is deja vu all over again almost every month. How something that is needed, promising, has proper aesthetics, built so much excitement, and appeared to be so far ahead of the competition could be derailed by simply shitty communication with fully payed customers is beyond me. If someone can explain why not one top has shipped to a paying customer now that they have figured out the QC issues and supply chain issues I'm all ears. If final assembly takes this long then if you are not a D1 orderer you have an eternity to wait.

I ordered in July, and have inquired directly with ADV about once a month. They have never said anything about supply chain to me, just that they have quality and production issues to work out.

 

[Fishwrinkle]

Lol I think their reputation is no longer good. Has anyone just popped into their shop for a shake down? If I gave full price and local I’d be there picketing and slandering their name. Don’t even have the balls to be honest.

 

[Kjbeggs]

I ordered in July, and have inquired directly with ADV about once a month. They have never said anything about supply chain to me, just that they have quality and production issues to work out.

July 2023?
I believe all the supply constraints had been (reportedly) resolved by that point.
The "Rubber has landed" email was sent on on Star Wars day, 2023

 

[BigBlue7]

How do you come up with $700? The interest rate for most of the last two years has been like 0.02%

My ROI on my 401k and some of my mutual funds over the last 2 years is about 11%

 

[NatureMan]

How do you come up with $700? The interest rate for most of the last two years has been like 0.02%

Honestly if they gave you a refund what is there to report? It was your choice to give them money up front, same for all of us. I'm glad you are happy with your Anderson, but how could you possibly know which one is a superior product? Many of us are staying with ADV because we think it looks like the best product, but only time will tell. ADV also has a great reputation, which is why I was willing to pay up front.

Online bank accounts are over 4% and you can get CDs and treasury bills for over 5%. Those are guaranteed returns.

 

[pakrat]

I ordered in July, and have inquired directly with ADV about once a month. They have never said anything about supply chain to me, just that they have quality and production issues to work out.

Just replying to someone else.

I wouldn't have lasted this long if I didn't think it was going to happen. It's just that non of it makes sense unless they had to literally scrap all of the tops they had manufactured that were shown laying around in one of the earlier videos. That still doesn't explain why these can't start trickling out as they are produced. They are not Ford with some assembly line that needs to be ramped up to speed or something. Start shipping in the order placed even if it is only one per week. Shit, maybe they do need to focus on one task at a time due to labor and space. Maybe they have to mold a bunch of tops when they are set-up for that and then set-up for foam injection and then assembly. If that is the case they should be treating customers right and molding the first three months of orders and getting those done. Rinse and repeat. It would be BS at this point to people who ordered very early and financed this on good faith, for them to try and mold every order at once and then move on to the next step. Everyone's order ships within a few weeks of each other?! That would be F'd up IMO. Someone who orders a year after a D1 order gets theirs within a few weeks of the D1 orderer, good for them I suppose but still F'd. Total speculation...sorry.

We can only speculate what the hold-up is at this point and that is the problem. Unfortunately we all have to draw a line when we will throw in the towel. W/O at least one D1 order getting shipped (anybody's that is a paying customer) by the end of the month or so that will most likely be my line.

 

[Cased]

They mentioned in the last reply that they had to get new tooling for the foam injection .
That tells me the foam wasn’t getting placed in the top as well as they wanted , could have been gaps or hard spots or bulges.
As a retired Toolmaker I would one of be the guys making a lot of overtime right now making tooling for a somewhat one off fixture . Not to mention the formula it takes to get everything to set during and once out of the fixture or press.

I’m not happy it has taken so long but will ride it out and hopefully be rewarded with a top notch product

 

[indio22]

Just replying to someone else.

I wouldn't have lasted this long if I didn't think it was going to happen. It's just that non of it makes sense unless they had to literally scrap all of the tops they had manufactured that were shown laying around in one of the earlier videos. That still doesn't explain why these can't start trickling out as they are produced. They are not Ford with some assembly line that needs to be ramped up to speed or something. Start shipping in the order placed even if it is only one per week. Shit, maybe they do need to focus on one task at a time due to labor and space. Maybe they have to mold a bunch of tops when they are set-up for that and then set-up for foam injection and then assembly. If that is the case they should be treating customers right and molding the first three months of orders and getting those done. Rinse and repeat. It would be BS at this point to people who ordered very early and financed this on good faith, for them to try and mold every order at once and then move on to the next step. Everyone's order ships within a few weeks of each other?! That would be F'd up IMO. Someone who orders a year after a D1 order gets theirs within a few weeks of the D1 orderer, good for them I suppose but still F'd. Total speculation...sorry.

We can only speculate what the hold-up is at this point and that is the problem. Unfortunately we all have to draw a line when we will throw in the towel. W/O at least one D1 order getting shipped (anybody's that is a paying customer) by the end of the month or so that will most likely be my line.

My money is on the sandwich panel construction as the main sticking point. A quick browse through ADV products, indicates single wall body panels. The Bronco double wall foam core hardtop panels seem an outlier.

The hardtop has got to last years/decades into the future, without outer walls and inner core materials losing adhesion or otherwise being compromised. Even a multinational company such as Webasto, which openly lauded their expertise in honeycomb core panel construction, has had issues with the sandwich manufacturing.

My bet is ADV found foam core construction more difficult than expected, and understandably they don't want to put out a product that might later have some failure, hence delay in availability to customers.

 

[Ninjak]

Well, I hope it all works out. As I said before, sometimes the truth in things will go a lot further than not saying anything.

As for me, I just pulled the trigger on the Armadillo Aluminum top. So I'll start a thread on it when it comes time to put it on.

 

[Fishwrinkle]

Did you go with the slant or square back? Gull wing doors?

 

[Kjbeggs]

They mentioned in the last reply that they had to get new tooling for the foam injection .
That tells me the foam wasn’t getting placed in the top as well as they wanted , could have been gaps or hard spots or bulges.
As a retired Toolmaker I would one of be the guys making a lot of overtime right now making tooling for a somewhat one off fixture . Not to mention the formula it takes to get everything to set during and once out of the fixture or press.

I’m not happy it has taken so long but will ride it out and hopefully be rewarded with a top notch product

I still don't understand why any issues with the foam injection process were not discovered/rectified months ago while they were "waiting for the rubber".
To me, "final assembly" means all the panels are complete and just waiting to have the gaskets/glass installed.

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