Implosion at ADV Fiberglass - No more hard tops

😆 Glad I'm wearing boots its getting deep.

That's why I don't put money towards anything that doesn't,in reality, tangibly exist. Particularly pricey items. If a supplier doesn't have the capitol to get a product off the ground it may as well be a pyramid scheme.

Deeper then deep. Hip waders won't help with this letter. Let's see, we promised you a product, it's not our fault we are not going to deliver on that product, we spent your money, but you need to call your C.C. company to see if you can get your money back. Yep...sounds about right in today's world. Can you spell law suit...sure...sure...sure you can!

Wow - just wow!

Bschurr

Wow - just wow!

Yup. That pretty sums up my initial reaction.

@All Terrain Nation just dropped a video it. Apparently they had a preorder for one but managed to escape before it all came crumbling down.

Im happy I pulled my money back in April

Reply from APG (ADV Fiberglass' production partner) attached.

Unfortunately there are a lot of companies that make you pay for products that they don’t have in stock. My guess is that for all involved parties, there is a little bit of sales hustle going on. Like everything else Bronco related, no one was ready for the roll out from Ford all the way down the Conga line. Really hard to design, produce and deliver products with little to no investment capital. All too common in these crazy times. I hope this gets sorted out. Someone somewhere hopefully has receipts in hand. Money sent, money spent, and all the email threads.

ADV shows payments of about $4.4 ,million to APG in their filings. Having read the APG response I have to wonder where APG thought that money was coming from? They obviously knew that ADV was taking pre-orders.

JoergH

ADV shows payments of about $4.4 ,million to APG in their filings. Having read the APG response I have to wonder where APG thought that money was coming from? They obviously knew that ADV was taking pre-orders.

Yeah they're just trying to save face. The contract between APG and ADV required ADV to deliver monthly sales reports. So it's extremely hard to believe APG's statement when they say they had no idea.

My personal read:

Both parties entered into the agreement without any intention to screw over each other. But both were woefully unprepared for the difficulty of the task and how much money it would take to get everything done. It got to the point earlier this year where it was obvious things weren't going well, but at some point you have no choice but to continue to shovel money into the furnace and hope something pops out the other side.

Eventually Ford caught up on production, other aftermarket vendors entered the hard top market, and they were stuck in a rut. No deliverable product to show for it and the pile of money they were using the fuel the project had disappeared.

RagnarKon

Yeah they're just trying to save face. The contract between APG and ADV required ADV to deliver monthly sales reports. So it's extremely hard to believe APG's statement when they say they had no idea.

My personal read:

Both parties entered into the agreement without any intention to screw over each other. But both were woefully unprepared for the difficulty of the task and how much money it would take to get everything done. It got to the point earlier this year where it was obvious things weren't going well, but at some point you have no choice but to continue to shovel money into the furnace and hope something pops out the other side.

Eventually Ford caught up on production, other aftermarket vendors entered the hard top market, and they were stuck in a rut. No deliverable product to show for it and the pile of money they were using the fuel the project had disappeared.

Yeah, I agree. I just think that they could have been more transparent with the folks who were pre-ordering these things. I also don't understand the engineering involved in putting toothier something like this. But Turn managed to get it done, and I've heard good tings about their product. So why was this one so much more difficult?

RagnarKon

Yeah they're just trying to save face. The contract between APG and ADV required ADV to deliver monthly sales reports. So it's extremely hard to believe APG's statement when they say they had no idea.

My personal read:

Both parties entered into the agreement without any intention to screw over each other. But both were woefully unprepared for the difficulty of the task and how much money it would take to get everything done. It got to the point earlier this year where it was obvious things weren't going well, but at some point you have no choice but to continue to shovel money into the furnace and hope something pops out the other side.

Eventually Ford caught up on production, other aftermarket vendors entered the hard top market, and they were stuck in a rut. No deliverable product to show for it and the pile of money they were using the fuel the project had disappeared.

I'm in no way convinced that Ford has caught up on hard top production. Underlined by the fact that alot of people are getting screwed on this still waiting. If Ford was caught up, most of these customers would have shifted. I've been waiting 2 years for my warranty replacement top. No leaks so I'm fine waiting so long as it does happen.

We've seen these movies before. Both company's are culpable to some degree. This will end one of two ways: both companies will get a slap on the wrist and be levied with small fines or they will have judgments against them, they will file bankruptcy without facing the music and be open with a new name within a year. Cooperate America vs Consumer, this is the world we live in. Only thing that can be done is to help ensure their track records be linked to future companies with the same ownership.
Again no one should put money down on goods that are a concept or dream rather then a deliverable. You either get crushed by a pyramid scheme or best case scenario are an unwitting investor that gets no dividends nor shares.

Im glad I didnt preorder a top from them. I was burned pretty bad in a scheme like this 8-10 years ago through kickstarter.

Man maybe Broncos are just not meant to have hard tops. Ford can’t get it figured out and the aftermarket can’t seem to get a handle on it either. How’s those armadillo aluminum tops anyone get on yet. Other than Tyler ( BroncBuster)

JoergH

Yeah, I agree. I just think that they could have been more transparent with the folks who were pre-ordering these things. I also don't understand the engineering involved in putting toothier something like this. But Turn managed to get it done, and I've heard good tings about their product. So why was this one so much more difficult?

Yeah... feels like ADV Fiberglass was in way over their heads. The contracts they signed were very much in favor of APG, and once you combine it with the amount of preorders they took... they just dug themselves a gigantic hole with no way to get out in case it went wrong. It effectively was a Kickstarter but they didn't really advertise it as such.

According to ADV Fiberglass, the hard tops were constructed using pressure-injected closed-cell foam rather than the more traditional honeycomb/resin method that Turn Off-road and Ford's OEM hardtops use. I am familiar-ish with the honeycomb/resin method, used to make RC plane wings using that method back when I was really into that hobby. But I know nothing about it whatever ADV/APG were trying to make. If you believe what they said it would have been super high quality... and also apparently very difficult to manufacture.

Hopefully, there will be an authentic investigation by a responsible (both senses of the word) government agency. But considering the incestuous relationships between regulators, district attorneys, lobbyists, politicians, politicians' staffs (i.e. the "Deep State") I wouldn't be optimistic.

RagnarKon

Yeah... feels like ADV Fiberglass was in way over their heads. The contracts they signed were very much in favor of APG, and once you combine it with the amount of preorders they took... they just dug themselves a gigantic hole with no way to get out in case it went wrong. It effectively was a Kickstarter but they didn't really advertise it as such.

According to ADV Fiberglass, the hard tops were constructed using pressure-injected closed-cell foam rather than the more traditional honeycomb/resin method that Turn Off-road and Ford's OEM hardtops use. I am familiar-ish with the honeycomb/resin method, used to make RC plane wings using that method back when I was really into that hobby. But I know nothing about it whatever ADV/APG were trying to make. If you believe what they said it would have been super high quality... and also apparently very difficult to manufacture.

I have a degree in manufacturing engineering. I studied a lot on plastics manufacturing. I've been following the Bronco hardtop drama since the get-go in 2021 even before the snakeskin waxing incident triggered a stop work on the MIC top and led to MIC top 2.0. On B6G (before I got kicked out...) I posted numerous times that the honeycomb construction method could be replaced with injection of structural foam between the inner and outer panels. It seems ADV/APG decided on that construction method. The MIC top is made from thermoplastic (thermo-formed plastic) rather than thermosetting plastic, which makes the top less expensive to produce. The Modular Bronco top is made from Sheet Molding Compound (SMC), which is a thermosetting plastic. SMC is the better material choice because it is more thermally stable and stronger. I've always thought the top should be a sandwich of SMC outer panel and a SMC inner panel bonded to a pre-formed structural foam inner core; thermoformed plastic panels would work also. It's an expensive construction method because of the tooling involved and difficulty to mass produce because of the post-part processing needed to complete the top (latches, seals, glass etc.). Ford/Webasto can make it work because they have large capital budgets to build the tooling and the large forming machines need to produce the individual components and the robotic machines for trimming panels. Ford/Webasto got behind on the development curve due to late construction of Webasto's Michigan production facility and COVID. Tooling and machinery was coming from Wuhan, China and Northern Italy...

And Ford amortizes the top production over hundreds of thousands of Bronco units. Small companies like ADV and APG have no scale to cover the production costs or ability to capitalize costly tooling and machinery needed for mass production. It was a hard ask from the beginning. There is no surprise here the attempt failed. IMO the MIC top is a well-engineered piece. The one on my 2-door is excellently constructed. I think you are correct, once Ford/Webasto got their shit together, the aftermarket for 3rd party tops dried up.

OrangecrushBronco

We've seen these movies before. Both company's are culpable to some degree. This will end one of two ways: both companies will get a slap on the wrist and be levied with small fines or they will have judgments against them, they will file bankruptcy without facing the music and be open with a new name within a year.

I agree..

OrangecrushBronco

Again no one should put money down on goods that are a concept or dream rather then a deliverable. You either get crushed by a pyramid scheme or best case scenario are an unwitting investor that gets no dividends nor shares.

Do we know how many customers got screwed? I know it says 1,200 or so were pre-orders but I assume some of those backed out before all was lost. I also wonder how many investors lost extremely large amounts of money in this fiasco..

Also, I think ADV's patent pending excuse is BS. If what they say is true, they could fight the patent. I am not a patent expert but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express once..

Lastly, ADV advising people there is nothing they can do in regards to refunds or assisting in getting their money back is absolute rubbish IMO. People did not pre-order and pay APG for the tops, they pre-ordered and paid ADV..

ADV took the pre-order money and tossed it into a sinking ship. Now they want to wash their hands clean of the disaster. I am not saying APG does not have any responsibility here but ADV are the ones who took the customers cash with the promise of a product not APG..