UEGO sensor - what happened with the price?!?

[Garfield Willis]

On Sun, 22 Oct 2000 22:50:44 -0500, "Jeff Bromberger" <blownz at home.com>
wrote:

>I just looked a couple of weeks ago at hparts.com and the honda/ntk sensor
>was like $100... now it's $219 with a retail price of $296... 

Yup, happened over a month ago.

>did they just
>find out that these things are cool or did ntk/honda have a major price
>increase?

Likely *both*; the former resulting from the latter is my guess.

It was only a matter of time until Honda caught on to the sales numbers
being way over their own service dept. requirements. Plus NTK itself has
had a project underway for the last 6+ mos to obsolete their "blue
boxes" and custom NTK sensors they build for it, and come out with a new
"not backward compatible" blue box, using sensors that are
"mass-produced". Their words in quotes.

The last time I called to get an update on when the new systems would be
ready (last week), the person I always talked to suddenly wouldn't
discuss it anymore, saying instead that their current models of sensor &
box were the only ones currently available. Another guess, but I figure
they're taking so long with the new electronics, that their premature
announcement of a coming replacement has affected their sales of the
older models, which they still have considerable inventory of, so
they've decided to stonewall any further inquiries on the new stuff
until it's ready. Sound marketing, I spose, but a lil late.

If you don't remember a previous post on their "new blue box & sensor",
the strong suspicion is that the new "mass-produced" sensor they're
going to switch to, IS the Honda/NTK; hence the need for a new &
not-backward compatible blue box to interface it. When they (NTK) were
willing to talk about their new/upcoming stuff last month, they were
saying it would be priced exactly the same as the old, which if you
remember, is $600 for the sensor and $400 for the box. Well, imagine
their customer's consternation if they discovered that with the new
systems, the very same sensors were being sold by Honda for $160 list
($90+ our price at hparts.com until just recently).

So another plausible explanation is that NTK itself has actually raised
the price to Honda, in preparation for using it as their own
"standard/mass-produced" UEGO sensor. Whatever the cause, some robust
dynamics at work to suddenly double the price of an OEM sensor.

Just some ruminations; obviously I dunno what's going on any more than
the next Joe. For all I know, the whole thing could be explained from
their mfg. line going to pot, and their yields suddenly dropping in
half. Wadawino?

In any case, yup the sensor price is suddenly now over twice what it
used to be. A sad day for those on a budget, but still well within the
"perceived value" of the device, eh? I gotta check to see if the newer
ND 4-wire UEGOs have also gone up proportionately, since they used to be
priced very close to the NTKs.

Gar


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