Outstanding Service in Electronics

[VK3DRB]

People tend to complain when things go wrong. It is nice to let people know when you are amazed with their their brilliant service or product.

Three examples:

(1) One of my soldering irons is a Weller TC202D, bought in 1980 and proudly MADE IN AUSTRALIA. It did a lot of work over many years, but a few years ago the contacts between the iron itself and its socket had badly pitted. I emailed Weller in Albury, New South Wales. They sent me a full kit of replacement parts for FREE. Thanks, Weller! It is used for off-site work mainly these days.

(2) My yellow plastic lunch box, MADE IN AUSTRALIA. It is related to electronics (sort of) because I bought it in 1986 to take to work in the electronics industry. I have used that lunch box every working day since then. I estimated the lunch box lid has been opened or closed about 54,000 times so far. The lid still seals as good as new. When it had its 21st birthday six years ago, I emailed a note of appreciation to the manufacturer, Decor here in Melbourne. I doubt any lunch box made in China would even have a hope of lasting that long.

(3) Following Dave Jones's review of PCB's from Circuit Labs in NZ, I decided to give them a try for some urgent PCBs. A few different 4-layer boards on a panel ordered Tuesday - delivered to my workplace here in Australia on Friday at a cost that was cheaper and far quicker than getting them from a top prototype vendor in Malaysia. Amazing, especially since they were 4 layers which takes longer to make. I ordered one panel but received two. The quality was outstanding and I got them in black solder mask (for optical reasons) at no extra cost. The white ink top and bottom overlays were of superb quality. Very impressive service from Circuit Labs.

It is worth giving credit where credit is due. So, what examples have others had of amazing service somehow related to your electronics life that was way beyond your expectations? Please, no reviews about a company you have a pecuniary interest in. 

[Rigby]

I decided to give them a try for some urgent [work].

A gamblin' man.

Urgency is when I avoid question marks in the process.  You add question marks on the urgent stuff!  Balls of steel, mate.

[PedroDaGr8]

As I mentioned a few times before, I had exceptional service from Array Electronics. I picked up a Circuit specialists rebadged Array 3645A in very rough shape. It had blown pass transistors, broken banana terminal, etc. After looking for months for the banana terminal (they use the ones similar to HP body color with a colored tip), I finally decided to contact them and ask if I could buy the broken terminal. They shipped me TWO full sets (red, black, green) for free. I didn't even have to pay for shipping. Scott Zhang, the senior sales rep was VERY polite and helpful.

[free_electron]

Sierra Proto Express in Sunnyvale. in 8 years and 100+ PCB projects (with 4 mil track/gap ) 

ZERO defects.
ZERO late deliveries.

[VK3DRB]

Sierra Proto Express in Sunnyvale. in 8 years and 100+ PCB projects (with 4 mil track/gap ) 

ZERO defects.
ZERO late deliveries.

That is outstanding indeed. Hence they keep getting your business. And they obviously provide a quality of service that third world countries can only aspire to.

[VK3DRB]

I have a US manufactured Speed Queen (rebranded as Kleenmaid here in Australia) washing machine that has lasted this family for 26 years and has never missed a beat except for a seal I had to replace. The machine was commercial but without the coin slot, costing twice the price of a consumer machine. It owes me nothing!

As they say, "QUALITY IS REMEMBERED LONG AFTER THE PRICE IS FORGOTTEN."

Contains electro-mechanicals, no sold state devices. I wonder whether if it was full of electronic sensors, PCB with a microcontroller, display, features etc whether it would have lasted 26 years with all that vibration, age and wear. It is simple and effective - and extremely reliable.

If it ever dies, I will have to replace it with something else. I heard all consumer washing machines are crap - built to a low cost and quality... I would have to buy another commercial machine to see my years out.

[Rigby]

I heard all consumer washing machines are crap - built to a low cost and quality...

Don't trust absolutes like that.  Absolutes pretty much don't exist, especially with imprecise terms like "quality."

The problem is that the people you're going to talk to about their washing machines don't know a damn thing about what quality actually is.  My neighbor growing up put big rocks in with his wash because he said it got things cleaner.  Eventually those rocks would bulge out the basin and it would stop working.  He called it poor quality.  I called him a moron.

In the US we have a publication called "Consumer Reports" that reviews things like this, and they actually know what they're doing.  Several people on this forum will straight-up denounce Consumer Reports for political reasons, though they usually don't know that's why.  In my experience, most of them have never picked up anything from Consumer Reports.  My point is that if you can find a model in Consumer Reports that is the same as, or rebranded in, one you'd find in Australia, then you can more or less trust the review. 

That might help you if this one ever breaks, though if it's electro-mechanical only, why don't you just fix the one you have, if it ever breaks, instead of buying new?

[iampoor]

"relatively" speaking....of course consumer models are going to be not built to the same standard as commercial machines.  O0

[nihilism]

The problem is that the people you're going to talk to about their washing machines don't know a damn thing about what quality actually is.  My neighbor growing up put big rocks in with his wash because he said it got things cleaner.  Eventually those rocks would bulge out the basin and it wouhy don't you just fix the one you have, if it ever breaks, instead of buying new?

He probably complained about the crappy fabrics his clothes were made out of too. everything always had holes in it after a few washes.

[BravoV]

Maha MH-C9000, don't remember exactly when I bought it, but I guess its more than 5 years.

Constantly plugged for 24 hours, left and forgotten at the corner of my lab and quite dusty. A real work horse and has been charging tons of various brands of nimh cells through out it's life. Still working fine and surprisingly its still very accurate in measuring the charge/discharge current and battery's capacity.

[krish2487]

HP Proliant N36L microserver.

Bought it a couple of years ago, installed CENTOS on it and running 4-5 VMs on it. Powered on 24x7.
No specific cooling, just dumped it in a corner with a UPS for backup during power failure.

I live in a place where the temperature goes upto 52-53 degrees C in summer, and dusty as hell.

So far 0 downtime and still is quiet as a whisper.

The HP attitude towards creating gear that simply-works carried over from the T&M division to IT.
 

[Kjelt]

Proliant was compaq AFAIK

Outstanding service: Delta power supplies here in the netherlands. Got two replacement knobs for my old 30-10 PSU for free when asked and a copy of the service manual.