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Fido for Sale (Coming Soon)

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Apitronics

Hey everyone!

I've been thinking about getting some Fidos produced to help bring down the costs and expand functionality. I'm going to be exploring the design & production options this month and will be going forth with manufacturing when/if I find a way to fund it!

I've submitted a loan application with Kiva Zip, an online microlending community. It's a lot like Kickstarter except that I'll be paying you back within a year! If you're interested in a neat little Fido package, I encourage you to loan me what you can. More importantly though, I'd love to hear feedback on my intentions on this product.

The main change is that I'm fairly certain I'm going to sell the unit assembled. I'll switch to surface mount components which should make the product smaller and cheaper (than if I sold assembled through-hole). I'm going to try to maintain "Arduino-compatibility" though to encourage people to modify the code. I'm going to explore the costs of providing a simple USB connection so there will still be a bootloader, etc.

One exciting difference is that I will upgrade the chip to an ATmega1280. This will give me more programming room and a lot more pins to play with. I will be able to explore screen and button options, as well as adding more sensors (soil and air humidity). Also, I will be figuring out things with RJ so that people will be able to program and manage their device for free online and analyze data their data for a modest subscription cost.

So that's the gist of it. Please ask me any questions you have and give me feedback on these ideas. Don't be afraid of being critical!

Louis

https://zip.kiva.org/loans/281

Dave Vondle's picture

I'd look into selling these through kippkitts: http://kippkitts.com/ Kipp is a great guy, has manufacturing and distribution partners lined up, and shares profit 50/50 with the designer. Could be a quick way to get going without a lot of investment.

Good Luck

Louis's picture

That is an interesting idea... I kind of like the idea of figuring out manufacturing myself but maybe this could definitely be a good option if/when I find out I've bitten off more than I can chew!