Looking for ideas / advice, i think :)

[Davek0974]

Hi Dave,
A good place for you try try and sell these types of items is Etsy. They seem to specialize in handcrafted and more unusual stuff.


Mike.

IIRC I was on Easy for a while, probably still on it - never ever had a tickle from it! Amazon is bad but etsy was non-existent for sales or leads.

I also tried very hard to get on "Not on the highstreet" but was refused each time.

I'll have another look at Etsy

[Davek0974]

Dave,
Here are a few suggestions, for what they are worth, with the understanding that I am just being
candid in my response.

1. Define your plan to address your "temporary" financial situation. Expect 1 month for say each $10,000 of
    yearly income as a time line.
2. Define what you want to do both short and long term work wise. The first step to achieving any goal is to envision     it. Remember that you can have anything you want but when you decide you must pay for it.
    This may be the hardest  mental work you ever did my friend. It includes analyzing skill sets and the application of     them to current manufacturing needs.Prioritizing tasks to be done, and there are a lot of them that will be generated,
    from the thinking.

Now go take of yourself  and no one else. You are not worth anything to anybody if you are not at peace.
Exercise ( just a nice daily walk will do), eat healthy, don't drink ( you need a clear mind), be at peace with your master ( he is always with you). Work hard on #2, relax / rest , and by all means do something that gives you enjoyment.

I just have to say a few things:
- You will progress or fade away. So you build on any skill set you currently have. You will be learning forever
   no matter what profession / work one is in. If not your fading away!
- Understand that YOU have a buisness and that is simply to make money. Matters not if you work for someone else.
   Change your thinking about work is.
- Consider investing in your buisness, namely you, ie; part of the plan may be to take a course to get certified in            welding
- Get used to the idea that you will need to find a job over and over again. That is the dynamic times we live in.
   So at any time for the buisness have a fall back plan in place. You will work again and it could be more rewarding
   than before. Nothing is ever perfect, pay is great-job sucks, job is great- pay sucks, just the way it is.

You may not realise it, but this may be the greatest opportunity you ever had........since for the first time in a long time
YOU are taking control of your buisness! Allow no time for pitty parties, always think positive, plan and implement,
now go do what needs to be done!

FWIW,
RICH
 

Thanks Rich, a lot to digest there.

The changeover period should hopefully not be too bad, we are adjusting now to lower outgoings in advance and there will be redundancy to tide us over so i'm not going to go into panic mode the day i leave In 14m I can start drawing on one or both of my pensions - this will really lift the financial position and mean I have less urgency to get a long-hours job etc. Naturally if something comes along i won't give it up - you can never be too well off right?

I'll re-read the post a few times as it is pretty deep, but I'm a fairly relaxed low-stress person, tend to approach situations and just deal with them as it needs at the time. I don't "not" drink, maybe one or two a week. Exercise is problem as I have early arthritis in knees and wrists - a common problem for long-term printers! Years of kneeling on concert floors loading paper by hand into presses is ok when young but really bites when the years roll on. This makes walking long distances out, I was advised NOT to jog or run, cycling is ok though. This of course will affect any job I go for.

Fun times ahead

[mkullman]

I like your idea of custom control cabinets. I know I would be interested in a box or kit that I could get to clean up my existing control cabinet.  I am currently using an old 4U rack mount PC case I hacked the face off of and replaced with aluminum sheets milled into panels. I'd love to upgrade it with something more... professional.

A couple of suggestions for potential markets that may be of interest to you.
3D printer related parts and or Quad-copter drone related parts are pretty hot right now.
within the last couple of months, I've had a few job requests for drone camera mounts and couple requests for brackets to mount a tablet to a RC controller.
As for 3D printer parts, it's very similar to CNC hardware and it attracts the same the do-it-yourself minded people.
I'm sure by poking around in either community, you could drum up some fantastic niche market ideas
 

[Davek0974]

HI,

I bought a 3d printer some years ago, joined a forum, found that some the parts were lacking as they were made from perspex and mdf, took the design, converted it for laser cutting and had them made outside and sold to members, later on i made them myself by plasma cutting and hand finishing and now they are CNC milled and hand finished. Unfortunately practically every one of this model now has my parts on it and sales have of course dried up.

Most of the newer printers have learned from these early ones and are now far better built. The Cetus printer even has linear rails !

Drones I know little of, will check that out.

My cabinet idea was maybe fully built, ready to connect supplied motors, 3 axis, 3 axis +slave or 4 axis options, ethernet connection, linear PSU, some flavour of motion controller. Something like that, lots of options but all with the idea of fit, connect and go. I have checked and they are of course already on eBay but using low cost parts, smaller motors etc - I want something that will last. Just ideas at present

[mkullman]

I like your idea, but with respect to the fact that a majority of the home-built-CNC market is a Do-it-yourself kind of crowd, you may see more business in the cabinet itself. I.E. many of us pride ourselves in having put the electronics together ourselves, but having a chassis to launch that build from would be a great starting point.

but perhaps you could meet in the middle and offer both.

[Davek0974]

Hmm, thats what i was thinking - we are all builders and tweaks so i would be preaching to the wrong crowd

I always use standard industrial steel enclosures, apart from the Bridgeport which has a cabinet about 4' x 3' x 1' - its massive and its full up! This was welded up from 3mm steel sheet and sprayed.

The more I look into it, the less of a market there is i think, most DIY CNC'ers will happily put together the parts and assemble a panel of some sorts - its part of the fun for most, I would only be of appeal to those with less electronics ability or those with small machines that have failing TB multi-axis boards in them etc. I can offer to build to order maybe - you specify what motor size and connection method and away we go, something like that maybe??