Technology Transplant gone missing?

Circuitbenders · December 13, 2010, 03:52:03 PM

Has anyone here ever actually bought anything from Technology Transplant in Hong Kong, or even received a reply to an email you've sent them?

All i want to do is give them some money for some SH101 parts, but they have an infuriating habit of only actually answering about 20% of the emails i've sent them. In fact the only time i've ever got a reply is via their ebay shop and even then its only the first email you send. Anything after that they appear to ignore you.

On their site you can buy a years membership for $10 which supposedly gives you access to a lot more spares and parts. I say supposedly as i paid for membership about a week ago and according to my account on their site its still 'pending' although the money has left my paypal account.

I bought an x0xb0x kit from them on ebay a while back and they were very helpful, up until all contact suddenly ceased. It arrived quickly and worked fine though.

Does anyone have any experience with them? Good or bad.

Gordonjcp · December 13, 2010, 06:51:41 PM

I've bought bits off them; some sliders for my Juno HS-60. I don't recall what they were like to deal with. The bits took about four days to arrive.

selfpreservation · December 13, 2010, 07:36:38 PM

ive been trying to buy a b ig 909/707 knob and a 106 essential kit off them for months i cant verify my account tried to register a different email didnt send me a verify email contcted them by email totally useless

Circuitbenders · December 14, 2010, 01:26:50 AM

four days to arrive from Hong Kong? Thats pretty impressive! From what i've heard shipping can take anywhere from a week to two months from them.

I really don't understand the way they operate. I sent them an email on ebay about a month ago asking if they still had any SH101 bender assemblies. They replied saying they could sell me 10 for $75 or 20 for $100.

Ok so i'm thinking that sounds like a pretty good deal as i'm sure there would be enough people interested that i could shift 18 and keep a couple for myself, so i send them an email saying i'm definately interested and ask about shipping details, and they never get back to me. I've sent about 5 emails asking about it since then and they appear to be just ignoring me.

Why? Hpw on earth do they ever make any money?

selfpreservation · December 14, 2010, 09:01:27 AM

i think they only operate when they actually have stock but advertise the whole time , you see the stuff on eaby every 6 months or so thats probably when they actually have it

selfpreservation · December 14, 2010, 09:02:50 AM

Quote from: Gordonjcp on December 13, 2010, 06:51:41 PM
I've bought bits off them; some sliders for my Juno HS-60. I don't recall what they were like to deal with. The bits took about four days to arrive.

gordon you dont happen to have 2 sliders spare i could buy do you ?

Ciderfeks · December 19, 2010, 04:46:13 PM

I bought a set of replacement pots and a set of replacement tact switches for a TB-303 from their ebay shop and it was fine. There was no after sales contact required and it all arrived in about 5 days. I was pretty impressed with them really.

Gordonjcp · December 19, 2010, 10:48:03 PM

Quote from: selfpreservation on December 14, 2010, 09:02:50 AM
Quote from: Gordonjcp on December 13, 2010, 06:51:41 PM
I've bought bits off them; some sliders for my Juno HS-60. I don't recall what they were like to deal with. The bits took about four days to arrive.
gordon you dont happen to have 2 sliders spare i could buy do you ?

I do actually, sitting right here in front of me. Gaz me with your details. You're owe me a pint or two.

selfpreservation · December 24, 2010, 12:02:44 AM

Quote from: Gordonjcp on December 19, 2010, 10:48:03 PM
Quote from: selfpreservation on December 14, 2010, 09:02:50 AM
Quote from: Gordonjcp on December 13, 2010, 06:51:41 PM
I've bought bits off them; some sliders for my Juno HS-60. I don't recall what they were like to deal with. The bits took about four days to arrive.
gordon you dont happen to have 2 sliders spare i could buy do you ?

I do actually, sitting right here in front of me. Gaz me with your details. You're owe me a pint or two.

thats a shame gordon they finally got back to me today after about 2 months and i bought what i needed cheers anyway mate

Gordonjcp · December 24, 2010, 07:49:38 AM

No worries. One caveat - they come with new knobs. Now, I wanted to keep the old knobs because they are colour coded on the HS-60, but I found that the spindles were very *very* slightly wider and needed a wee modification before the original knobs fitted. Watch out for where those filings go!

Circuitbenders · January 31, 2011, 05:49:01 PM

I finally got this sorted out by paying $50 to become a full member of the Technology Transplant website. Its amazing how much attention about £30 will buy you!

The trouble is, what with that cost and getting completely stitched up by UK customs we'll be very lucky to even break even on this deal.

On a side note, if you live in the UK and have ever got charged parcelforce's £8 or £13.50 'clearance fee' on top of the customs VAT fee, you might be interested to know that its completely illegal for them to charge you that money. Do a search for information on it on the net. If you just refuse to pay theres nothing they can do about it. They're not about to take you to court over it as they can't afford to have a judgement against them, and its illegal for them to ransom your package for a fee to do a job you never asked them to do. You can even claim back any 'clearance fees' you've paid them in the past if you have a receipt, and they barely even question it.

Circuitbenders · May 04, 2011, 02:51:42 PM

Rumour has it that Technology Transplant have actually stopped trading and Touched By Sound in Germany are claiming to have bought their entire remaining stock of parts. I hope to god that this isn't true, although Touched by Sound do seem to suddenly have a lot of TT parts for sale at nearly DOUBLE the normal TT prices.

http://www.touched-by-sound.com/en/Vintage.html?m=Technology%20Transplant

£71 plus shipping for a set of SH101 faders! £45 for a battery compartment cover! erm............ i don't think so!

Whats even more annoying is that i ordered a load of parts from TT about a month ago and haven't heard anything from them............

Bogus Noise · May 05, 2011, 11:51:19 PM

Gah, that's gotta be well frustrating! Well over the top on those new prices too

Circuitbenders · May 06, 2011, 12:43:41 PM

As someone said on our facebook page, they should change their name to Touched By Greed.

£65 for eight replacement pots for a TB303, and yet virtually the same eight pots for the 606 cost £45. Thats still ludicrously expensive but something tells me they're just making this up, depending on exactly how much they think they can possibly gouge people for. £45 for an SH101 battery door cover is just outrageous!

I'm very tempted to pay a couple of thousand pounds to get some SH101 faders made up by Alpha. Then i could sell them at half the price of Touched By Sound and still make a massive profit, with the added bonus of really pissing them off. $:-\$

Gordonjcp · May 09, 2011, 07:53:42 AM

Dooo eeeet!

I bet you could get enough 303 owners - and I bet they're the same pots in 606s too, as well as the SH101 - to pledge the money for a set of pots so that you'd at least take a bite out of your costs up front.