Maybe you noticed that earlier this week CSR Elite wheel disappeared from Fanatec's online stores. We could only suspect it is currently sold out, but now we know for a fact.
Thomas explained it all on his blog. Due to Chinese New Year holidays, factories there are closed, so Fanatec stopped receiving new units and they sold everything they had in stock in both EU and USA warehouses. The next shipment is scheduled to arrive in late February, so it is probably safe to assume that new buyers will receive them in early March.
Thomas also wrote a bit about the raised price of Elite wheels. When these wheels first became available for pre-order, Fanatec bumped the previously announced 499.95 $/€ price tag to 539.95 $/€. They did so to cover the increased shipping costs, because they decided to use UPS air mail to transport new wheels from China, so that the first wheels would, as promised, arrive to customers before Christmas.
Public was expecting the price to be reduced to 499.95 $/€ relatively soon after the New Year, but this has not happened. Demand has been so high, that they never stopped using air transport to meet the order numbers and will probably continue using it for quite a while to reduce waiting times. They are establishing higher production capacity, but due to similarities between CSR Elite and soon to be released Clubsport wheel, production of CSR Elite wheels will remain at the same level, so we can not expect the price to drop before summer, when demand lowers and they finally go back to slower but cheaper ship transport.
He also mentioned that the new Clubsport wheel electronics are still under revision and that they are looking at a late Q1 production start.
