I wouldnt buy a MRT version. Mylaps can just release a patch and make the new ones obsolete. Also it has been mentioned that they will eventually phase out the 2 wire and will only use the 3 wire.

There it is^^^^^^^boom

Here is a thread for those who are curious about what is involved in creating a transponder:

http://www.rctech.net/forum/radio-el...er-design.html

And since you have actually working knowledge, can you elaborate on just how much it costs to produce a Transponder?

You mean to tell me the 2 wire I purchased a couple of months of go will be phased out? what time frame are we talking here? Link to thread?

I'm going to be pretty upset if I have to switch to a 3 wire.

why can't we go back to running a number and hand counting? used to work just fine

Are you drunk?

:lol: Quoted for posterity.

I think the selling price has very little to do with the cost of the components and the labor that goes into making transponders. Other costs are likely much greater, since they can only be spread across a relatively small number of units sold. (These things are not made by the millions; a few tens of thousands is about right.)

But most people only consider the value of the components that go into the device. That would be well under $10, which makes the selling price seem exorbitant. However, that's a bit like saying Microsoft Word should only cost $10 because the CDROM disk costs less than $1.

Startup costs such as design engineering, patents, injection molds, and government approvals (FCC, CE, etc.) are quite large. Then there is the cost of running the company, such as support engineering, customer service, web site maintenance, shipping, and all of the salaries associated with those items, along with rent, utilities, etc. These add much more to the price than components and assembly labor.

Despite all of this, I believe the price is actually set by what the market will bear, to maximize profits (which is the goal of many companies). If the price were much higher, they wouldn't sell. If the price were much lower, then the margins are minimal. Somewhere in the middle is the correct price to maximize profits. (And it's usually best to err on the high side!)

This was all discussed in my transponder and decoder design threads.

But, with all that said, I also believe they should be less expensive. Someone else mentioned $50, and that seems to be about what I would want to pay.

As I understand it, if you have the hybrid, the model with the removable holder shown on the left, you should be OK. If I remember correctly the site mentioned being prepared for the future or something like that when they were introduced.

The older one on the right, with the fixed tabs, works for now. Will it not work at some point in the future, I don't know.

http://img16.imageshack.us/img16/176...ransponder.jpg

It was I who said $50 would be about right, because having produced parts for Paintball Markers, I know all too well the processes and the efforts required to produce an actual product. I understand R&D and such but Transponders aren't quantum physics and are rather simple and inexpensive enough to produce, that @ $50 they'd recoup their money rather quickly. Also Mylaps produces transponders for a wide variety of sports and I happen to know for a fact they produced the RC4 in the tens of thousands and the Hybrid model in the hundreds of thousands. Most RC enthusiasts like ourselves who love to race usually have more than one car (usually 3) and as such they tend to buy a transponder for each of their cars. If you took 50,000 RC guys and multiplied that by 3 you're already well into 6 figures for the total amount units per person. Bearing in mind many guys have even more vehicles, it's not practical for a company who owns and controls the market and has everyone pretty much by the gonads, to do small runs when they have a clear projection as to how many units they will move.

Now moving into phase 2 of this changeover whereby they will phase out their own genuine product for no other reason than to sell more units, they'll have produced a great deal more units to drive their cost per unit as low as their cash flow will allow and MyLaps has plenty of scratch.

There is a compatibility chart pinned at the top of the electronics thread, read it.

ok just wanted to make sure. When 2 wire was stated but not the hybrid, I got worried that they would phase it out. The words stated was 2 wire may be phased out and only 3 wire would work. Not hybrid 2 wire, thank you for the clarification.

JimmyG - Not sure if you were directing it to me, but I dont really care. No offense but when I purchased mine I bought it because it worked with everything. I took from what was said that the Hybrid 2 wire was going to be phased out, not older 2 wire ones.

I was telling everybody who didn't understand which pt's worked with what system.. no worries.

I talked to MyLaps before, and they didn't see phasing out their old transponders, because it is their transponders.. They wont phase out their own product. The only time they did it is when they came out with a new system 8800 to RC2 etc..