triplette scoring machine for 250

[Zara_athlen]

There is an add for a TCA scoring machine in the USFA magazine for 250 dollars.

For this cheap is it worth it?

[neevel]

IMHO, No. Spend the extra $100 or so for Eigertek, Blue Sky, or Favero. Over the service life of the box, it's not that much more. Triplette boxes were dropped from use at National tournaments after it was found that they drop a small but non-zero percentage of double hits in sabre (i.e, only one side lights when both sides hit). One high school in my team has had nothing but grief with the power supplies, and I and other people I know have received little jolts when using them reminiscent of old relay boxes.

-Dave

[Zara_athlen]

ok damn that sucks, I was hoping maybe they got better cause 250 dollars for an FIE machine is really freaking cheap.

[neevel]

I'd take Southernsword's post as further confirmation of my opinion . Would you rather buy the Lada from the Russian mechanic who can tell you all the tricks to keep it from breaking down permanently on a cross-country trip, or just spend a bit more for a Honda that you'll only need to put fuel into?

[neevel]

ok damn that sucks, I was hoping maybe they got better cause 250 dollars for an FIE machine is really freaking cheap.

"FIE"? The Triplette club box? You'll also find folks on the street in Manhattan who'll be glad to sell you a "Rolex" watch for really freaking cheap, too.

[Zara_athlen]

"FIE"? The Triplette club box? You'll also find folks on the street in Manhattan who'll be glad to sell you a "Rolex" watch for really freaking cheap, too.

Well FIE timings Hmm so the box works fine as long as you plug it into the wall first? hmmm tough decision

[neevel]

If it's that easy to blow the fuse in the power supply, I'd consider it a serious design flaw (it'd certainly never make it past UL). The power supply you're selecting _is_ a part of the design. If it doesn't work flawlessly, it means that:

A- The power supply your using is an inappropriate design, and you should source another one, or
B- you've got a design flaw in your product that needs to be put right before releasing it.

Letting a product with a usability issue like that come to market is sloppy engineering and quality control. If it's that easy to short the power-supply when plugging it in, I'd at least choose a different style of connector that doesn't have both the + and - pins exposed and able to come into contact with the case.

[prototoast]

Well FIE timings Hmm so the box works fine as long as you plug it into the wall first? hmmm tough decision

Yeah, the box isn't FIE approved at all. They just say have it programmed to the official FIE timings, and so they choose to prominently display FIE in their advertising, though not explicitly saying it's FIE approved.

[neevel]

Beyond the power supplies, there are a number of other issues which I and many of the other national armorers have found with Triplette boxes which makes me recommend that people look elsewhere. The sabre issue I mentioned is the most glaring, and really does render a box unfit for use in competition in that weapon (the designer of the box confimed the flaw to Ron Herman- it was known early on but not rectified). Do you want, say, a qualifier for Nationals or JOs to be wrongly decided because the scoring machine dropped one side of a double touch? Trust me, if you're shopping for a new box, the extra $100 for a better one will be worth it.

[CvilleFencer]

Also the ones for sale in the magazine are without the hard case. Without the armored "pistol box" cases they are even more fragile and prone to damage. We have them in our division, the FIE model with the pistol cases and a few of the red ones in the black plastic pistol cases. We are making plans to get rid of them and replacing them with Favero after having nothing but trouble with them since they were bought new at great expense to the division.

If you are going to buy new, get a Favero box. If you find any TCA boxes really cheap on ebay, especially if they are in the armored cases it is not a horrible idea as they have a few good design points to offset their many weaknesses (they are not bad if they sit in one spot, are never transported or packed up and you don't fence saber), but for my money I would buy just about any other comparably priced box. Also anything that TCA sells that they insinuate may be FIE, ask to see the Commission letter for it before you buy it. They have a bit of a rep for a lack of integrity in how they advertise some of their "FIE" equipment.

[Zara_athlen]

I think im going to get an eigertek, the price is very good, and the size is nice also. Thanks all for the info, its too bad about TCA, they really should refine their boxes because their other products are made very well.

[CvilleFencer]

I am not a huge fan of the Eigertechs... The lights are small, the buzzer is hard to hear and there is not a separate light for off targets, which can make it difficult for the color blind among us to tell the green from the white. Also if I am at one end of the strip I can have trouble seeing the lights, which are flush with the box and sort of small to begin with from the end of the strip. Not a problem if you have a judge for every bout but kind of annoying for club fencing. Also its size gives the impression that it is somewhat fragile and they do not stand up super well on their own. A club that I fence with has one and they had to put Velcro on the bottom to keep it from falling over. The only real advantage of the Eigertech boxes that I see is that they run off of battery power and are very small. So if you are fencing outdoors or in some other weird situation where you don't have any power supplys they might make a nice choice. The Faveros are a better machine in my opinion and from my direct experience having used the two a decent amount. Just my $0.02

[Zara_athlen]

I think the eigertek eclipse box does have seperate off target lights? The favero box is probaly the best, what about the SG-11?

[CvilleFencer]

Sorry, I should never post before coffee. What I meant to say was that the off target lights are not in the normal positions for separate lights and (it could just be me) I tend to confuse them. If they were in line with each other in a more normal way I would like them much better and it would be a bit easier to tell them apart I think. And they should be bigger. Like a lot bigger. Like bigger than a quarter (they probably are bigger than a quarter, before anyone goes running with a measuring tape, but they sure don't seem like it!). On the plus side you can get it to play Daisy with the buzzer as a self-test.

As to the SG 11 boxes I have never owned one of been a full time member of a club that does but I have been around them at comps and so forth and have spoken to people who have used them. The problem with getting the lights confused is even worse as they are all in the same squares. One bank of LEDS for each side does everything. On/Off Target, Grounding, etc. I have also heard that they are somewhat fragile to any kind of damage. The worst is that there is apparently one guy in the world with the right software/hardware to make changes to the damn things. If you have one of these at the next rules change be prepared for a several months (likely without your box, and of course you have to pay to ship it back and forth) wait for them to get to you unless your club has an "in" of some sort. To upgrade either the Eigertech or the Favero is a simple chip swap and very little pain or suffering. On the plus side for the SG 11 is the fact that they use LED sources for the light, but so do the Favero's and are in my opinion better made, better featured, easier to maintain and an all around superior product for less money. You can get a Favero for about a hundred less than an SG box.

I did a lot of research and testing before I went to the Faveros for our club and looked at all the low price options that were around before deciding on the Favero boxes for our club. For us they are the best around, but your needs may be a bit different. The worst thing I have to say about the Favero boxes is that they are a bit large, but this does not bother me at all as it makes them more visible and there is plenty of room in our salle.

[esskreemr]

Beyond the power supplies, there are a number of other issues which I and many of the other national armorers have found with Triplette boxes which makes me recommend that people look elsewhere. The sabre issue I mentioned is the most glaring, and really does render a box unfit for use in competition in that weapon (the designer of the box confimed the flaw to Ron Herman- it was known early on but not rectified). Do you want, say, a qualifier for Nationals or JOs to be wrongly decided because the scoring machine dropped one side of a double touch? Trust me, if you're shopping for a new box, the extra $100 for a better one will be worth it.

I've had problems on at least two occassions where the Triplette boxes ground out sweaty fencers. We moved to a Favero on one occassion, no problem. I think there are several threads devoted to why you should not purchase a Triplette box...

I hate to diss a domestic product, but maybe someday the problems will be fixed...

[SJCFU#2]

Personally I have greater difficulty distinguishing between the green and yellow LED's on a FAVERO ARM-01 than seeing the small LED's on the white LED's on a EIGERTEK.

The advantages of the EIGERTEK are small size and the ability to run off a 9-volt battery. These make it easy to set up, take down and travel with (I've noticed it is the machine the students choose first when setting up a strip). The disadvantages are that being so small is that it sometimes seems lost on a large table top, and the lights are not as readily visible to spectators (assuming there are any).

We have two Tripplette machines. Assuming you avoid blowing the fuse on the power supply, they work well enough to get by, but they can get flakey, especially toward the end of a long day (never bothered to determine if it was due to sweaty fencers or if the box was just getting to hot after being left on all day).

[neevel]

I think the eigertek eclipse box does have seperate off target lights? The favero box is probaly the best, what about the SG-11?

Yes, the Eigertek has separate off target lights. As Cville mentioned, the Eigerteks lights are small and the tone isn't real loud. It wouldn't be the best box to use for your finals strip at a big tournament, but as a club box I think it's hard to beat. The easy portability, durability, capacity to be run from a 9-V battery, and (especially nowadays with the foil and sabre settings in flux) free firmware upgrades that you can install yourself are points in it's favor.

The Favero has a bigger display, but is thus more bulky. It's good that you can install new firmware yourself, though it's not offered for free like the Eigertek F/W. If you were buying several boxes, you might consider one or two Faveros (especially the FA-05 with clock display) for finals strips and then some Eigerteks.

The chief problem with the SG-11 nowadays is that the firmware is not in a socketed, user-replaceable chip. You have to send it in to Blue Gauntlet (who'll pass it on to Ted Li) for new firmware to be downloaded.

-Dave

[rrs]

can anybody comment on the leon paul or blue sky boxes? are there any noticeable differences in how they implement the new timing when compared with the favero or eigertek boxes?

[oiuyt]

LP and Eigertek apparently implemented the new timings similarly, which is different than how Favero/Uhlmann/Allstar implement them. Difference is whether or not the debounce time for off-targets was changed (no in the first case, yes, lengthened to 15ms in the second case). Which is correct depends on which answer from the FIE you believe.

-B :)

[DHCJr]

I suggested to Darryl of Blue Sky, not to make any changes until we find out for sure what those changes are. At the FIE meeting, Dan will be bringing up this point at the SEMI meeting.