Saber Forum

Hey there forum!

My friend has been waiting for an Initiate v5 for 3 months, and was told it would come in a while ago. Anyone know anything about the Initiate stock?

Thanks!  :D

I'd recommend emailing the [email protected], I know the apprentice seem to be while the dominix & sentinels are not currently. Not seen anyone not here mention the initiate V5 so got no feedback on it myself however it appears they are responding to email better as of late.

I was offered the Dark Initiate LE v5 a couple of weeks ago as a substitute for the Dominix I had ordered, so unless there was a mass amount of orders since then, I'd say they have some available.

Okay, thank you! I just think it is weird that it has been that long...mine came in one week.

Unfortunately it can be more complicated than just having a hilt in stock.   Lets say four people order initiate V5s on the same day.   One orders a stunt with Tri-Cree AB blade.   One orders a Fire Orange blade with Obsidian Lite sound.   One orders a Diamond Controller set-up.   And one orders an LE stunt with a Counsular Green blade.

These orders hit the manufacturing floor and they come down the line.   The folks assembling them start building ... but there's a problem.   The last green LED just went into a Dominix V3 some guy named Karmack ordered, and there are no more.   So that saber is set aside.    The other three are assembled and ship in a week or two.

Meanwhile, the LED manufacturer has a snag in his supply chain and all green LEDs get back-ordered.   8 weeks go by before new green LED modules are finally manufactured and shipped to US.

Now, 10 weeks after the order, three customers are playing with their sabers.   Two have ordered a second saber and gotten them.   And one guy is still waiting for his very basic saber, wondering if his order got dropped on the floor or something...

This is of course hypothetical, but there are so many different pieces-parts that can cause problems with these things that it can be impossible to predict which order will stall and which will sail through in record time.  I fully expected to wait months for my last order.   It was a premium hilt with quick disconnects on the LED, a recharge port, premium sound, the works.   I got it in a week, while others who ordered the same hilt but with different options had to wait far longer.  Why?   Some other component was back-ordered or simply on order, causing a bit of a delay.

So take heart.   Send an email to [email protected] with your order number and brief description of your inquiry in the subject line and a detailed and friendly request in the body.  They have been good about letting people know if there's a component or hilt body that has gotten back-ordered or is temporarily out of stock, and will often offer an alternative if the wait is going to be excessive.

Good luck and happy sabering!

I've got to be honest, I've never considered all this.   Excellent points, Karmack.

I never thought about that either, Karmack! In my mind, it's all one saber, but it's actually many different moving parts.

Easy to do.  The sad part is it only takes one component to hold the whole order up.   I suspect this is the cause of many of the delays as well as what looks like a wide inconsistency in delivery times, even with similar hilts.  Its easy to imagine a bin with thousands of LED modules in it, but I suspect the actual numbers on-hand are far lower.   Especially with their volume. 

Anyway, I don't want to discourage anyone, I think US is doing an amazing job keeping up with demand considering the conditions.  It helps me to be a little more patient, though, when I think about just how many moving pieces need to come together just to make the simplest saber, let alone one of the more complex ones.