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Uncle Krunkus
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Joined: Jul 11, 2005 Posts: 4761 Location: Sydney, Australia
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Posted: Tue Oct 23, 2007 8:32 pm Post subject:
Are ALPS pots supposed to be good quality? |
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I've finally tracked down a chronic problem with a Behringer guitar amp. It's a dual gang PCB mount ALPS pot which is scratchy as hell on one trace and intermittently disconnecting on the other. Even if I can get it out, I don't know if I can get the same one to replace it. It has a long shaft, and all 6 connections down one side. About 12mm across. Any suggestions? Could I dismantle it and fix it? I've done it before, but not with an ALPS. It looks very compact, so pulling it apart might make it even less reliable.  _________________ What makes a space ours, is what we put there, and what we do there. |
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fonik

Joined: Jun 07, 2006 Posts: 3950 Location: Germany
Audio files: 23
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 2:32 am Post subject:
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they manufacture a wide range of components with different quality:
does it look like this? (medium quality, >2EUR)
or like this? (high end, >10EUR)
or like this one? (cheap, <1EUR)
 _________________
cheers,
matthias
____________
Big Boss at fonitronik
Tech Buddy at Random*Source |
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bugbrand

Joined: Nov 27, 2005 Posts: 846 Location: Bristol, UK
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 2:46 am Post subject:
Re: Are ALPS pots supposed to be good quality? |
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Uncle Krunkus wrote: | I've finally tracked down a chronic problem with a Behringer guitar amp. ..... |
....I won't get into views of Behringer though I'm sure a few people will say this answers itself!
I've seen the medium-quality ones Mathias mentions pop apart (in a 303 clone) and didn't think it'd be so easy to mend -> or, maybe fix it in the short run, but I figured that it'd only be a matter of time before it happened again.
(I ended up not fixing the thing)
I saw this sort of thing at Farnell (but didn't look through all they offer)
(not a long shaft though)
I'm sure I've heard that Behringer have a spares department, no? Or maybe they just expect people to buy a new one a year down the line!
***
And while we're talking about Alps pots....
I've used their standard 16mm 'commercial' pots for ages (from Rapid) and they've seemed, to me, to be very good - decent price (and an ideal size), but reliable.
(actually, I'd really like to find an easy source for ones with short shafts - I have to hacksaw off a lot of shafts because I can only get the slightly longer ones - Futurlec is the only place I've found that has short shaft ones for a decent price, but I'm wary of getting a large order from them due to import taxes..)
So, anyone else have any comments on the 16mm ones? _________________ http://www.bugbrand.co.uk
http://www.bugbrand.blogspot.com |
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etaoin

Joined: Jun 30, 2005 Posts: 761 Location: Utrecht, NL
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:28 am Post subject:
Re: Are ALPS pots supposed to be good quality? |
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Quote: | Futurlec is the only place I've found that has short shaft ones for a decent price, but I'm wary of getting a large order from them due to import taxes..) |
I think you mean Alpha. Futurlec doesn't sell Alps (I think).
I usually split up Futurlec orders that I think will get to large (and hence noticed by the tax man). The additional $4 shipping is better than any duties and I only have to order a few to make it cheaper than anything I can get in the EU.
My local favourite has a decent stock of short (round) shaft Alpha in log, lin and even reverse log, but they are far more expensive. Banzai in Germany sell a huge number of Alpha pots, also in 12mm and 24mm as well as PCB-mount. _________________ http://www.casia.org/modular/ |
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Uncle Krunkus
Moderator

Joined: Jul 11, 2005 Posts: 4761 Location: Sydney, Australia
Audio files: 52
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 5:44 am Post subject:
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It's not a 90deg one, and doesn't match any of the pictures you posted Mathias. Tom, I found the same type at Farnell, but it's got a longer shaft, and only 6 terminals.
I'm thinking about doing a bit of home surgery!  _________________ What makes a space ours, is what we put there, and what we do there. |
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bugbrand

Joined: Nov 27, 2005 Posts: 846 Location: Bristol, UK
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 6:01 am Post subject:
Re: Are ALPS pots supposed to be good quality? |
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Etaoin wrote: |
I think you mean Alpha. Futurlec doesn't sell Alps (I think).
I usually split up Futurlec orders that I think will get to large (and hence noticed by the tax man). The additional $4 shipping is better than any duties and I only have to order a few to make it cheaper than anything I can get in the EU.
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Yes, silly me!
Good point on splitting up orders... sounds like a plan! _________________ http://www.bugbrand.co.uk
http://www.bugbrand.blogspot.com |
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prophei

Joined: Jan 27, 2007 Posts: 234 Location: san francisco, ca
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 6:22 am Post subject:
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i recently bought a lot of alps pots that look like the mediums listed above, and find them to be fantastic. the travel is silky smooth, and i haven't had any fall apart at all. |
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bugbrand

Joined: Nov 27, 2005 Posts: 846 Location: Bristol, UK
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 6:23 am Post subject:
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prophei wrote: | i recently bought a lot of alps pots that look like the mediums listed above, and find them to be fantastic. the travel is silky smooth, and i haven't had any fall apart at all. |
Was that an Ebay bulk purchase mentioned here on the forum?
I was looking at those today - very tempting! _________________ http://www.bugbrand.co.uk
http://www.bugbrand.blogspot.com |
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Uncle Krunkus
Moderator

Joined: Jul 11, 2005 Posts: 4761 Location: Sydney, Australia
Audio files: 52
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 7:03 am Post subject:
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Man, this job is a big number 2!
The pot has two tabs hanging off the sides which solder down for mechanical strength. Getting it off there is gonna be a bitch! I have to remove all the solder from those two tabs, and the 6 terminals, and the whole area is littered with SMD resistors! This is all just to get access to the pot which I most likely won't be able to fix. _________________ What makes a space ours, is what we put there, and what we do there. |
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prophei

Joined: Jan 27, 2007 Posts: 234 Location: san francisco, ca
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 7:10 am Post subject:
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bugbrand wrote: | prophei wrote: | i recently bought a lot of alps pots that look like the mediums listed above, and find them to be fantastic. the travel is silky smooth, and i haven't had any fall apart at all. |
Was that an Ebay bulk purchase mentioned here on the forum?
I was looking at those today - very tempting! |
yep =]
i posted about it cause it looked like such a good deal. pots are so damn expensive, and i am in love with sealed pots like those as we use them in the products we build at the company i work for. i used to de-solder them from our junk pile... no more!!
an added bonus with that auction is that they come with nice hexnut hardware, so they are ready to panel mount AND look good! |
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Rykhaard
Joined: Sep 02, 2007 Posts: 1290 Location: Canada
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 7:38 am Post subject:
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Has anyone else been buying / using the Alpha pots from Small Bear Electronics?
I've been impressed enough with the $ when you buy 25 or more and have ordered a few piles of them.
I've been so busy building for the last few months though, I haven't yet had time to sit and actually play my synth....... so I don't know yet, their quality level.
With all of this discussion - it'd be cool if I could get feedback from anyone else with experience before I buy any more huge quantities.
Thanks for any possible bits of info. on this.  |
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Broadwave

Joined: Feb 16, 2007 Posts: 347 Location: Manchester UK
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 8:39 am Post subject:
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I use the "commercial" 16mm, splined shaft Alpha pots (Futurlec, not SmallBear) - very nice smooth response.
Out of my last batch of 150 (100k Lin) 8 proved to be faulty - bad joint from the solder tag to the track, the rivit seemed a bit loose.
Of course you don't find that out until you've mounted up the pot, wired it up, powered up, listened to your VCO's frequency jumping all over the place, screamed and sworn like a trooper, calmed down enough for a nice cup of tea and a 10 minute break - I guess you know how the rest of it goes  _________________ Kronos 2-88, Kronos 61, Studiologic Sledge V2/SL, Broadwave ARP 2600EX, Broadwave 18U ARP based Eurorack Modular, Broadwave Minimoog Clone, GEM S2 Turbo.
Synth DIY Projects
Musical Doodlings |
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Rykhaard
Joined: Sep 02, 2007 Posts: 1290 Location: Canada
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 8:42 am Post subject:
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AndyR1960 wrote: | I use the "commercial" 16mm, splined shaft Alpha pots (Futurlec, not SmallBear) - very nice smooth response.
Out of my last batch of 150 (100k Lin) 8 proved to be faulty - bad joint from the solder tag to the track, the rivit seemed a bit loose.
Of course you don't find that out until you've mounted up the pot, wired it up, powered up, listened to your VCO's frequency jumping all over the place, screamed and sworn like a trooper, calmed down enough for a nice cup of tea and a 10 minute break - I guess you know how the rest of it goes  |
Still DO appreciate that note, though! Bin there ... though, with 'offshore' brand of pots, that I no longer use. (Mode Electronics - decent, cheap $ pots, but don't have the cheap access any more, that I used to.) |
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TheAncientOne

Joined: Dec 26, 2006 Posts: 144 Location: United Kingdom
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:19 pm Post subject:
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Dear Uncle K
A suggestion: I have to do this every few months on a repair of some kind. ON approach is to take a fine grinding disc in your trusty Dremel and cut through the mounting pillars before desoldering the rest.
Somtimes you can snip them off and sometimes the pot can be broken up in situ, and the pins removed one art a time. I work on the theory that the pot is expendable, (usually), the board isn't .
With some modern boards i can be a real challenge to remove things like this without wrecking the board. Another non-favourite is the surface moutn power regulator chips that use a big slab of PCB copper for a heatsink. I have an antique tinsmiths electric soldering iron I use to get enough heat into the package tab.
A friend of mine had to replace a BGA package on a batch of boards at his work. Now that IS nasty.... even if you have the oven to put them back on. _________________ Mike |
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Funky40
Joined: Sep 24, 2005 Posts: 875 Location: Swiss
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 4:07 pm Post subject:
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Alps pots:
my TC D-Two has also alps pots(looks like the cheap/small ones. btw. you get them with and without 90° angle )
TC is nown for good quality.( exept my own D-Two )
Alpha pots:
@Etaoin
in germany you get them cheaper from www.musikding.de then from Banzai ( good personal service there.)
btw.
if one is asking, you get them also as print version, and as Stereo pots
Small bear or also rapidonline in the UK has them one more time cheaper (much cheaper ! )
@Rykhaard
Dotcom uses the 24 mm alphas,
and have a look to the the Klees from Scott Stiites and State Machine .
What i see is, that most People use the Alphas ( 16mm and 24mm ) and the spectrols.
So you are right with these
I use 16mm alphas too.
I have used aprox. 80. On one module i have a fault which could be caused by a broken pot |
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Uncle Krunkus
Moderator

Joined: Jul 11, 2005 Posts: 4761 Location: Sydney, Australia
Audio files: 52
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 4:45 pm Post subject:
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Thanks for the tip Prof,
I would love to just snip it out and break it up, but I don't know where I could get a replacement at this stage, so I'll have to keep looking. _________________ What makes a space ours, is what we put there, and what we do there. |
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Uncle Krunkus
Moderator

Joined: Jul 11, 2005 Posts: 4761 Location: Sydney, Australia
Audio files: 52
G2 patch files: 1
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 8:38 pm Post subject:
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Well even I cannot believe what I just did.
I successfully, desoldered the tiny, dual trace, pot from the PCB. (popping the terminals off the body in the process) Dismantled the main body to gain access to the traces and wipers. Cleaned the traces, tweaked the wipers. Re-assembled the body. Re-attached the terminal block. Cleaned up the PCB, and re-soldered the "better than new" pot onto the board. Tested the amp, and, although it's still a little scratchy when you're changing the master volume, it's fully functional, and effectively "brought back from the dead"!
When inspecting the traces, I noticed that part of one of them had no wiper marks at all. This means it was probably quite dodgy before it even left the factory. Quite likely, because of this, only half the amp ever actually worked.
As this is not the kind of thing which is undertaken very often, I took some photos for you to all see what I'm talking about. They will follow shortly.
Some journeys take you to places you would never normally want to go.
Getting back from there leaves you feeling very good about yourself.  _________________ What makes a space ours, is what we put there, and what we do there. |
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Rykhaard
Joined: Sep 02, 2007 Posts: 1290 Location: Canada
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 9:47 pm Post subject:
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Funky40 wrote: |
@Rykhaard
Dotcom uses the 24 mm alphas,
and have a look to the the Klees from Scott Stiites and State Machine .
What i see is, that most People use the Alphas ( 16mm and 24mm ) and the spectrols.
So you are right with these
I use 16mm alphas too.
I have used aprox. 80. On one module i have a fault which could be caused by a broken pot |
Great enough news to me! I'll continue purchasing them in at least 25 pc. quantities from Small Bear then. To save more money, I'll prolly just bump up to purchasing 100 at a time.
Thanks for the news. Small Bear have wonderful speed in shipping. Very happy with them.
Now - if I could just find as cheap a source for slide switches, for my coming drum sequencers. (Major sigh) |
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Randaleem
Joined: May 17, 2007 Posts: 456 Location: Northern CA, USA
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 10:40 pm Post subject:
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Uncle Krunkus wrote: | Well even I cannot believe what I just did. I successfully... Some journeys take you to places you would never normally want to go. Getting back from there leaves you feeling very good about yourself.  |
Glad to hear of your success! Nice work, Uncle Krunkus!
Kind regards, Randal |
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etaoin

Joined: Jun 30, 2005 Posts: 761 Location: Utrecht, NL
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Posted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 11:27 pm Post subject:
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Quote: |
in germany you get them cheaper from www.musikding.de then from Banzai ( good personal service there.)
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Are you sure? Banzai ask 1.29 euro for a 16mm full shaft lin or log Alpha. Musikding ask 1.30. Doesn't seem to be much difference between the two.
I've ordered from both in the past (not pots but other stuff) and found Banzai to be the better packer and shipper to NL. _________________ http://www.casia.org/modular/ |
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jhaible

Joined: May 25, 2007 Posts: 2014 Location: Germany
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Posted: Fri Oct 26, 2007 7:36 am Post subject:
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Funky40 wrote: |
TC is nown for good quality.( exept my own D-Two )
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My D-Two has problems as well.
It's an awesome device, great user interface and all.
But the display of mine died *twice*.
JH. _________________ "I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours." (Mk 11,23f) |
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jhaible

Joined: May 25, 2007 Posts: 2014 Location: Germany
Audio files: 24
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Posted: Fri Oct 26, 2007 7:40 am Post subject:
Re: Are ALPS pots supposed to be good quality? |
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bugbrand wrote: | I saw this sort of thing at Farnell (but didn't look through all they offer)
(not a long shaft though)
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These ones are actually quite good.
They also come in a 4-pin version for single pots (the picture shows the dual pot version).
I've used lots of them, and didn't have a single failure yet.
They are available with longer shafts - I think RS Components have the longer shaft version. I think they are also less expensive at RS.
Too bad that both only have a very limited range of values left.
They used to have a large variety, including some reverse log pots. Not anymore.
JH. _________________ "I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours." (Mk 11,23f) |
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Funky40
Joined: Sep 24, 2005 Posts: 875 Location: Swiss
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Posted: Fri Oct 26, 2007 8:50 am Post subject:
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sorry for more Alpha OT
Etaoin wrote: | Quote: |
in germany you get them cheaper from www.musikding.de then from Banzai ( good personal service there.)
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Are you sure? Banzai ask 1.29 euro for a 16mm full shaft lin or log Alpha. Musikding ask 1.30. Doesn't seem to be much difference between the two.
I've ordered from both in the past (not pots but other stuff) and found Banzai to be the better packer and shipper to NL. |
i got them down to 0.80€ , but we've taken several hundrets
Actual i payed 0.85€. thats the normal price when taking 100 i think. ( quantity was 100 in total )
http://www.musikding.de/product_info.php?cPath=50_54&products_id=184
btw.: he is counting different values togehter and makes discounts for that total amount. ( maybe check it first by Mail )
btw.2:
after insisting objection he counts now the German taxes directly off .
Earlier he did not, and then just after faxing the custom documents
btw.3:
i got today the Print 16mm alphas.
they have unfortunatly a very long shaft. Really to long ( it's a 6mm rippled shaft. )
but as sayed: rapidonline in uk is much (!) cheaper one more time |
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softfin

Joined: Oct 11, 2006 Posts: 271 Location: Far in the north
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Posted: Fri Oct 26, 2007 10:46 am Post subject:
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I've been using the split shaft Alpha pots for about a year now and have found them to be reliable and pleasurable to use (because of their small size). Futurlec is real cheap when buying a pile of pots at a time. I always order in batches of 25 (á $0.45) or 100 (á $0.40) so I get the pots duty free Really helps to keep the costs down. |
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etaoin

Joined: Jun 30, 2005 Posts: 761 Location: Utrecht, NL
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Posted: Fri Oct 26, 2007 12:20 pm Post subject:
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Quote: | after insisting objection he counts now the German taxes directly off .
Earlier he did not, and then just after faxing the custom documents |
Yes, that's your luck in Switserland, he can sell tax free to you. But he can't to me... _________________ http://www.casia.org/modular/ |
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