Armadillo Designs Aluminum Hardtop

[SierraBronco]

Lunch time thoughts: Setting aside the emotional appeals and conjecture for now, the facts are best confirmed by the TEXAS FABRICATION COMPANY home page where the parent/partner company, states:

Everything You Need Under One Roof​

We have all the tools, equipment and experience needed to cut, bend, weld, powder coat [Emphasis added], 3D print and more all under one roof.​

We offer a full suite of services & continually invest in a wide variety of the latest, most powerful equipment to grow our partners ideas into successful companies. Warehouse or outsourced manufacturer fulfillment, even on demand order fulfillment. [Emphasis added]​

The above was cited back in post number 395 by @mcinfantry. It is well established that the fulfillment company is in control of all the processes; including the 2-3 week QC and packaging.

It appears that Armadillo already has everything they need to grow: a brand identity, web presence, product to sell, order system, book of business, fulfilment system, and a path forward to start producing a product versus individually commissioned pieces.

Team Armadillo has previously modified their terms in response to the comments here. Perhaps they will do so now in a more meaningful way that indicates they are invested in the business and their customers by sharing the risk more equally, or at all.

The Armadillo Tops are by all appearances functional, attractive and desirable, if not unavailable due to extended delivery times. However, if you can stomach the time, the personal decision is more properly stated in terms of value: Do you have 6-8 months and $8,500.00 to risk?

If it’s any consolation that’s about how much you’ll spend on fully custom wheels. Actually truly custom to your specs, not just some cutting of the wheel face on blanks. A bargain in comparison!

Sponsored

 

[mcinfantry]

Lunch time thoughts: Setting aside the emotional appeals and conjecture for now, the facts are best confirmed by the TEXAS FABRICATION COMPANY home page where the parent/partner company, states:

Everything You Need Under One Roof​

We have all the tools, equipment and experience needed to cut, bend, weld, powder coat [Emphasis added], 3D print and more all under one roof.​

We offer a full suite of services & continually invest in a wide variety of the latest, most powerful equipment to grow our partners ideas into successful companies. Warehouse or outsourced manufacturer fulfillment, even on demand order fulfillment. [Emphasis added]​

The above was cited back in post number 395 by @mcinfantry. It is well established that the fulfillment company is in control of all the processes; including the 2-3 week QC and packaging.

It appears that Armadillo already has everything they need to grow: a brand identity, web presence, product to sell, order system, book of business, fulfilment system, and a path forward to start producing a product versus individually commissioned pieces.

Team Armadillo has previously modified their terms in response to the comments here. Perhaps they will do so now in a more meaningful way that indicates they are invested in the business and their customers by sharing the risk more equally, or at all.

The Armadillo Tops are by all appearances functional, attractive and desirable, if not unavailable due to extended delivery times. However, if you can stomach the time, the personal decision is more properly stated in terms of value: Do you have 6-8 months and $8,500.00 to risk?

I love the armadillo top for what it is by looks and design. Thats the truth. should my top fail, and armadillo didn’t have 8-16 month delay i may be interested. Its not the money, its the uncertainty for me.

i just dont see how its sustainable to get the last top done. 2-3 years has consumed capital. How much? Idk. But it has. Idk why i think ‘off to powder coat‘ is such an involved process.

Who is the powder coateR” its not done under the same umbrella?

i contacted the few powder coaters near archtype to verify capacity and turnaround. I even spent the time digging and found the same one he used. 1-3 days MAX. Maximum turn around. For a singular custimer with a dimensionally similar item dropping it off. So i couldnt understand how B2B would be WEEKS. (Hint: it wasn’t)

and where i live its not weeks delay. Of course near Baton Rouge we have a LOT of industrial businesses so the demand and supply exist.

 

[DUSTYcazOREGON]

The Armadillo top is what I have been waiting for. I love my Bronco and my 2 door MIC so far has held together...but I suspect it will eventually fail. I plan to keep my Bronco and want a top I no longer have to "worry" about.
I have been in contact with questions to Armadillo, all answered.
The question is when I will order (they had $500.00 off the liner at Christmas, darn....missed it).
In reading the comments above, it sounds like when you order, you must pay in full (and shipping cost is $900.00). With other vendors that close their doors with paid for unfulfilled orders...that is always a risk.
IMO, they should change their policy to half down when ordered, balance when shipped. If they are concerned about cancellations, maybe a 10% cancellation fee. Shelling out $8K or so, all up front, waiting months for delivery, can be risky.
Just a comment and no reflection against Armadillo. I wish them a huge future with their company.

 

[userdude]

I love the armadillo top for what it is by looks and design. Thats the truth. should my top fail, and armadillo didn’t have 8-16 month delay i may be interested. Its not the money, its the uncertainty for me.

i just dont see how its sustainable to get the last top done. 2-3 years has consumed capital. How much? Idk. But it has. Idk why i think ‘off to powder coat‘ is such an involved process.

Who is the powder coateR” its not done under the same umbrella?

i contacted the few powder coaters near archtype to verify capacity and turnaround. I even spent the time digging and found the same one he used. 1-3 days MAX. Maximum turn around. For a singular custimer with a dimensionally similar item dropping it off. So i couldnt understand how B2B would be WEEKS. (Hint: it wasn’t)

and where i live its not weeks delay. Of course near Baton Rouge we have a LOT of industrial businesses so the demand and supply exist.

Getting my bumpers/rock rails/full under armor powdercoated at a place nearby took nearly two weeks. I asked why and he said he had a lot of work ahead of me and I had a lot of pieces. I don't know if in Texas there's a lot of stuff getting powdercoated, and not saying it makes sense in Armadillo's case, but that timeframe at least for me (C2B) doesn't seem too off. And they definitely had a lot of stuff in the lot while I was there.

 

[Chritaka]

I would also agree to hang in there gang, but then again, I have my top. Full disclosure: It took 1 year 3 months and 8 days to receive my top. I was one of the early early people who signed up during development. My original email from them, while discussing this top said if I ordered by "date" I could have it by Christmas. That was in October of that year.

Armadillo is a small company trying to grow. The same people doing the tops are the same ones trying to go to events and market them. As they get more tops out, they will receive that, (lol for free) and more movement towards more people perhaps wanting their tops. This will increase revenue and allow them to hire more people to help get things moving along quickly.

One bottleneck in the system is the powder people. It would seem they send it out to a company for that, which they have no control over just how things are sorted there. Also, you have QC. So how many times has something not met the QC standard? Looking at threads on B6G there are other much larger companies pushing tops out and the QC has not been up to snuff. Threads of people complaining about things coming apart and the top failing is not good for business as well. So you have this quandary: deliver a quality product that is slow to the consumer, or quick to deliver a non-quality product that will need to be addressed later. Which would you prefer?

The Armadillo top is one hell of a product.. It delivered on all the points that were made about it. It came very well packaged, installed without major issues, and as of today, has not failed in any way. Yes, my top is still new, but I have put it through the wringer as best as I can here is S. FL. It has been through several washes, hand, and machine. Several rain storms, (this is S. FL) and no leaks, no problems. It's been on trails, it has been on obstacles, on the roads, and no issues.

So I guess it does come down to a personal decision. Do you want to wait on a top that so far, has not had any reported issues once delivered, but is taking longer than promised for delivery, or do you buy a top that gets delivered on time, or close to it, but has failures a month or so in that need to be addressed and in some cases, are not.

In the end, it will always be your decision and yours alone.

So the difference is several of you signed up during the prototype and preorder phase, knowing the risk, potential delays and choosing to take that risk. I waited until the prototyping was done and production was underway, with feasible delivery times.

I watched from the start and was one of the first ones posting about and sharing info in their top. I was in contact with Fabian early on and talked to him about posting here and being a sponsor, but the cost was too steep. I waited until all prototyping was complete and they were spinning up production. I wanted to minimize my risk as much as possible, given the fiasco with ADV, in parallel I also got on the list for Turn. Once Armadillo went into production, and I had multiple conversations with Fabian about production and delivery, I cancelled my Turn order…

I was promised reasonable delivery times given the early production phase. These have slid nearly 3 months. When you go into production, 90% of these issues should be ironed out already, especially after a couple years of R&D. This is not reasonable at this point.

 

[mcinfantry]

So the difference is several of you signed up during the prototype and preorder phase, knowing the risk, potential delays and choosing to take that risk. I waited until the prototyping was done and production was underway, with feasible delivery times.

I watched from the start and was one of the first ones posting about and sharing info in their top. I was in contact with Fabian early on and talked to him about posting here and being a sponsor, but the cost was too steep. I waited until all prototyping was complete and they were spinning up production. I wanted to minimize my risk as much as possible, given the fiasco with ADV, in parallel I also got on the list for Turn. Once Armadillo went into production, and I had multiple conversations with Fabian about production and delivery, I cancelled my Turn order…

I was promised reasonable delivery times given the early production phase. These have slid nearly 3 months. When you go into production, 90% of these issues should be ironed out already, especially after a couple years of R&D. This is not reasonable at this point.

Maybe archetype went broke from the sponsorship.

hear me out. He spent all the pre sales money on the sponsorship only to run out of capitaL

so
archetype 0
armadillo 1

 

[Chritaka]

Maybe archetype went broke from the sponsorship.

hear me out. He spent all the pre sales money on the sponsorship only to run out of capitaL

so
archetype 0
armadillo 1

I’m talking about the ADV Fiberglass hardtop… I never mentioned Archetype. My point about being a vendor/sponsor was so they could market and represent themselves on threads like this. Regardless, that point really isn’t relevant to their extended R&D and current slip in production deliverable timelines ….

 

[DUSTYcazOREGON]

So the difference is several of you signed up during the prototype and preorder phase, knowing the risk, potential delays and choosing to take that risk. I waited until the prototyping was done and production was underway, with feasible delivery times.

I watched from the start and was one of the first ones posting about and sharing info in their top. I was in contact with Fabian early on and talked to him about posting here and being a sponsor, but the cost was too steep. I waited until all prototyping was complete and they were spinning up production. I wanted to minimize my risk as much as possible, given the fiasco with ADV, in parallel I also got on the list for Turn. Once Armadillo went into production, and I had multiple conversations with Fabian about production and delivery, I cancelled my Turn order…

I was promised reasonable delivery times given the early production phase. These have slid nearly 3 months. When you go into production, 90% of these issues should be ironed out already, especially after a couple years of R&D. This is not reasonable at this point.

When did you place your order and when did you receive it (if you have)? Thanks!

 

[Chritaka]

So the difference is several of you signed up during the prototype and preorder phase, knowing the risk, potential delays and choosing to take that risk. I waited until the prototyping was done and production was underway, with feasible delivery times.

I watched from the start and was one of the first ones posting about and sharing info in their top. I was in contact with Fabian early on and talked to him about posting here and being a sponsor, but the cost was too steep. I waited until all prototyping was complete and they were spinning up production. I wanted to minimize my risk as much as possible, given the fiasco with ADV, in parallel I also got on the list for Turn. Once Armadillo went into production, and I had multiple conversations with Fabian about production and delivery, I cancelled my Turn order…

I was promised reasonable delivery times given the early production phase. These have slid nearly 3 months. When you go into production, 90% of these issues should be ironed out already, especially after a couple years of R&D. This is not reasonable at this point.

I heard back from Fabian. It is going to powder next week, takes 3 weeks to turn the top, 1-2 weeks for assembly and QC. We are scheduling the install for the last week in Feb.

I explained some of the conversation and concerns going back and forth in this thread. He responded:

“I can assure you we definitely do not have a Ponzi scheme going on. Unlike other companies, we do all of our manufacturing in-house. We did have a slight pause in production a few months back, which caused everything to be pushed back. We received feedback from our welders that certain areas were difficult to access on the hardtops, so we had to change a few files for the following batches. The order of operation was also studied and corrected, and we reorganized the shop for a better flow process throughout. We also hired about 6 new employees over the course of the past few months and studied where we had downfalls in production and corrected those by adding another welder, blenders on hand, and skilled help to move overall production faster. It's definitely been a learning curve over the past few months, but we have been doing our best to keep up with demand and get orders out as soon as possible.”

I suggested that, in addition to their brief social media updates, that they directly email these types of comms to their customers for transparency and to help keep frustrations down. Most would be understanding given all things considered and it would go a long way.

 

[Chritaka]

When did you place your order and when did you receive it (if you have)? Thanks!

It’s earlier in the thread, order 298 on July 10.

 

[El Diablo]

@Chritaka Thanks for sharing this info. This is good news and it matches the timing for my slantback if I am in the same batch.

 

[DUSTYcazOREGON]

It’s earlier in the thread, order 298 on July 10.

Have you received yours yet?
I am placing my order tomorrow.
Thanks

 

[broadicustomworks]

I heard back from Fabian. It is going to powder next week, takes 3 weeks to turn the top, 1-2 weeks for assembly and QC. We are scheduling the install for the last week in Feb.

I explained some of the conversation and concerns going back and forth in this thread. He responded:

“I can assure you we definitely do not have a Ponzi scheme going on. Unlike other companies, we do all of our manufacturing in-house. We did have a slight pause in production a few months back, which caused everything to be pushed back. We received feedback from our welders that certain areas were difficult to access on the hardtops, so we had to change a few files for the following batches. The order of operation was also studied and corrected, and we reorganized the shop for a better flow process throughout. We also hired about 6 new employees over the course of the past few months and studied where we had downfalls in production and corrected those by adding another welder, blenders on hand, and skilled help to move overall production faster. It's definitely been a learning curve over the past few months, but we have been doing our best to keep up with demand and get orders out as soon as possible.”

I suggested that, in addition to their brief social media updates, that they directly email these types of comms to their customers for transparency and to help keep frustrations down. Most would be understanding given all things considered and it would go a long way.

I don't have a dog in this fight other than sitting on the sidelines and an "almost ordered one" status.
This is one of the most reasonable and telling (and downright believable) posts discussing their predicament in this whole thread. Especially the quoted part from Fabian.
Anyone who has worked in starting up a production line (or even a production facility from an empty building with some 480 power available and a lot of empty concrete floor) can relate.
I have done both in my years. And it is a monumental task that takes months longer and more cash over what you budgeted and adds at least 30-50% more of both for unknowns. NOTHING works in the "best case scenario" ideas you started with.

These guys started with an idea and a dream.
Neither had any real experience in hiring, managing, HR, benefits and risk management, or production lines and/or work flow.
So they had to self-teach pretty quickly and find flaws in the system, work around those flaws.
Personally I think those words from Fabian are dead-on hard truth, FWIW.

As far as it in-house powdercoating at the other company in the same building, that's always a subjective situation. People can claim (and not saying this is true here) the capacity to powdercoat, but all they have is a $500 setup from Eastwood and a commercial-sized house-style oven to do a wheel at a time or something similar in size, one at a time.
A PC operation large enough to do these parts is not a light investment. SO I am guessing and pretty confident that whoever around them with the investment in a facility that can handle these sized and volume of parts is probably busier than the "smaller guys". They have to be to recoup the cost in their investment. The conditions to do a (repeatable) quality job in powdercoating anything larger than a filing cabinet is quite strict and is quite expensive. Even down to mandating what kind of deodorant the workers in that booth can wear due to contamination potential. I know because I've done it.
Anyway, FWIW, there are my 2 cents' worth.
Still out here wishing I had pulled the trigger most days on ordering one when the time was right.
Congrats on those of you who did and will!

 

[Chritaka]

Have you received yours yet?
I am placing my order tomorrow.
Thanks

Read the post right before the one you replied to…#644

 

[DUSTYcazOREGON]

Well I ordered my Armadillo top today.
I hope for a June-July delivery.
I went with the gull wing doors without glass, added the outside molle to those doors. Black top and I will have the molle powder coated in cyber orange....should look really cool that grated cyber orange standing off the black and add some more width to the entire top.
I will post photos when it arrives and is installed.
Thanks to everyone for the advice, comments and photos.

KEEP THOSE PHOTOS OF YOUR NEW TOPS COMING!

Sponsored