Turns out hardware is hard. My view of it is scope creep that caused delays in starting environmental testing, ultimately leaving us with too little time to properly address the problems that we discovered.
We tried to use 3d printed cases for the prototype units, but it turns out 3d printed material (at least the type we used) is porous and doesn't respond well to heat expansion when left out in the sun. We spent far too long trying to get our 15 printed cases to be watertight, and once we finally did, they expanded in the sun and cracked. But we couldn't afford injection molding and didn't properly explore cheaper plastic casting methods.
We spent a bunch of money on tooling for cast aluminum parts that ended up being about 1/32" too tight and complicated fitting components in. And we had a major scope creep in the form of wanting to support mid-rental lockup (we were "stationless" in that the bikes had all the tech, there was still a rack that rentals started/ended at) via a retractable pin and chain, that ended up causing electrical issues with detecting lockup, condensation issues due to the larger openings, much more complicated mechanical workings... I honestly think that if we had cut that single feature, things might have turned out differently.
We tried to use 3d printed cases for the prototype units, but it turns out 3d printed material (at least the type we used) is porous and doesn't respond well to heat expansion when left out in the sun. We spent far too long trying to get our 15 printed cases to be watertight, and once we finally did, they expanded in the sun and cracked. But we couldn't afford injection molding and didn't properly explore cheaper plastic casting methods.
We spent a bunch of money on tooling for cast aluminum parts that ended up being about 1/32" too tight and complicated fitting components in. And we had a major scope creep in the form of wanting to support mid-rental lockup (we were "stationless" in that the bikes had all the tech, there was still a rack that rentals started/ended at) via a retractable pin and chain, that ended up causing electrical issues with detecting lockup, condensation issues due to the larger openings, much more complicated mechanical workings... I honestly think that if we had cut that single feature, things might have turned out differently.