9mm pot drought?

[mjg]

Just trying to buy all the 9mm pots I need on Tayda... and they are out of the sizes I need.  Restock is listed as end of November.  Two and a half months???  Outrageous. 

Of course, they have hundreds of thousands in stock of the values I don't want. 

Gah, first world problems!   

[madbean]

Looks like smallbear is out of a few common values too. In some ways this might be a good thing - if demand is that high Alpha will keep making them and hopefully ramp up production!

[alanp]

You can use high value pots, and put resistors across the lugs to change the taper and pot value.

https://www.diystompboxes.com/analogalchemy/emh/emh.html

[Rockhorst]

Try Thonk

[Rockhorst]

Also, Alpha makes whatever you ask them to make, to your spec, as long as you buy a 1000 of 'em minimum. That's what Thonk does. Another nice thing about the Thonk ones is that the little locater tab is absent, so you don't have to snap it off.

[mjg]

Thanks for the Thonk link, that looks like a good source for my pot habit.  Unfortunately their shipping will make it not worthwhile for small orders.  But I'll keep it in mind if Tayda doesn't restock. 

Ended up finding what I wanted on Banzai Music, and their shipping rates weren't as bad.  Then noticed they have reverb tanks for much cheaper than I can get them in Australia... so threw in one of them... then my partner saw they sell a 'nasal flute', so hey, throw in one of those as well.  Can never have enough nasal flutes apparently. 

Apparently the Australian dollar is shedding value at the moment, this is going to become an even more expensive hobby. 

[Rockhorst]

Looking more closely though, especially if you order a significant number of pots (because, say, you know that you'll always need some 100kA pots) Thonk quickly becomes cheaper than Banzai. A 9mm pot at Banzai is 2E40 while at Thonk it's 1E50. So that beats any shipping pretty quickly. Also, Banzai shipping times can be abysmal (not always, but sometimes). Thank isn't over night, but at least it's consistent, which to me is more important because I'm able to plan ahead...just 2cents to consider.

[chromesphere]

I ordered 1000 x 100ka's 9mm earlier this year as its a common value i use.  The process was the same as always, lead times etc, nothing to suggest its a manufacturer delay.  I wonder if the drought is due more to lack of demand.

These pots are expensive.  The actual cost in 1000 quantity is around $1usd.  If they dont sell, your stuck with $1000 worth of stock you cant move.

[zgrav]

I think the trade tariffs are slowing down some general restocking for some suppliers, and the new stock will probably come with some price increases. 

[pickdropper]

I think the trade tariffs are slowing down some general restocking for some suppliers, and the new stock will probably come with some price increases.

I'd be curious if that's already playing a factor.  It certainly could be.

I doubt that it's affecting potentiometers, but component lead times are stretching very long right now.  MLCC caps in particular are killing everybody in the industry.  If you browse Mouser, there are a bunch of "Factory not taking orders right now" statements.  Companies are freaking out, so everybody is placing large orders to fix the issue going forward, which is making everything worse.

https://epsnews.com/2018/05/23/electronic-component-shortages/
https://passive-components.eu/resistor-shortage-why-and-how/

And an interesting article on tariffs
https://macrofab.com/blog/decoding-tariff-impacts-us-electronics-manufacturing/