Transcript
jamie peacock: Welcome to The Lone Machinist, where it's just you, the work, and the machine. What have you got going on today, Kurt?
Curt: Today I'm going to talk about the loveliness of me finally fixing my anodizing, which I'm quite excited about. ah Scaling. because pre -sale is i think is gonna Crush me and how.
Curt: um Scaling and batching stuff. can Cause issues. That's how I'll phrase it. How about you, Mr. Jamie? What are you going to talk about this week?
jamie peacock: We're going to talk about how... We worked a... Yeah, we made a boatload of pots. Anchor points are awesome. uh the fact that i'm illiterate i can't remember why i wrote that in there but anyway Clearly illiterate. um Yeah, but a bunch of fun stuff. INTS planning as well.
jamie peacock: But yeah, how are you this fine day Kurt?
Curt: Dude fantastic. just came back from well i say just uh when for a barbecue at my buddy's house um he has a child now and so i just assumed like usually when we had like parties they would go late and i'm like all right yeah you have a little person now so we like we shut it down super super early so i was i was home with Hours of time before this podcast started.
jamie peacock: and
Curt: so It's got mid. Made me laugh when I was driving home. I was like, oh yeah, I kind of forgot about that. anyway So. Yeah.
jamie peacock: That's funny.
Curt: How you been, man?
jamie peacock: Yeah. yeah carrying on we went and watched the rugby last night with my brother -in -law and sister -in -law they're flying back to Madagascar on Tuesday
Curt: Oh cool. Okay.
jamie peacock: Yeah, so they got all, they did a bunch of training this week on how to put drips and things in and got a bunch of meds for them. And yeah, heading back to Madagascar. Let's go live the best lives. except this time with
Curt: He's
jamie peacock: stuff that if shit goes south they can Deal with it.
Curt: Right.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: He's doing all better like speaking wise and everything is back to normal
jamie peacock: Yup. Nice one.
Curt: Sick.
jamie peacock: Driving is terrifying apparently, letting him drive.
Curt: That's awesome.
jamie peacock: So I was driving us around yesterday.
Curt: Oh, reasonable.
jamie peacock: But yeah, he's fun.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: No.
Curt: Awesome.
jamie peacock: He's 100%.
Curt: That's great. Good news.
jamie peacock: Yeah, so good news. They were on a course this week how to put in drips and stuff. um and just that if he has another seizure his mrs can put a drip and get him hydrated and medicated through the drip.
jamie peacock: um
Curt: Oh, I got it.
jamie peacock: Bye John.
Curt: Okay. Like...
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Like ivy or whatever
jamie peacock: And Avi, yeah, sorry, yeah, Avi.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: um So they were doing training this week on that. And then, yeah, they're leaving on Tuesday. Their boys are starting to miss them now. The. The five -year -old, they they have a dog there that just had puppies. The puppies are like a week old and the five -year -old's like, no, they need to learn to swim.
Curt: oh oh that
jamie peacock: Yeah. Yeah. there
Curt: her
jamie peacock: um But yeah, nothing think nothing bad happened.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: yet.
Curt: Okay, good.
jamie peacock: um Yet, being the opposite word there.
Curt: Peace.
jamie peacock: But yeah, the puppies, so they... they keeping i think they're keeping one of the puppies But they're going to try and get it to bond super closely with Adam. So it can be a seizure alert dog.
Curt: ah
jamie peacock: but to do that the dog has to be like it needs to think it's part of you it needs to go with you all the time
Curt: Oh yeah.
jamie peacock: And then...
Curt: e
jamie peacock: ah It can sense when shit's not. not good and will alert you to the fact that something is not good. Better job.
Curt: Cool.
jamie peacock: You've got to have the dog like with you all the time.
Curt: Yeah, da that makes sense. Oh, that'd be cool.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: That'd be cool.
jamie peacock: Yeah, so kind of cool. um But yeah, they it was a fun rugby game. We won. um We got a first try in like two minutes. we I would say we thunderfucked New Zealand, but we didn't. They really played well and it was, yeah.
jamie peacock: It. We barely managed to keep ahead. Speaking of... There is a game. on the Saturday before IMTS at 5 p .m. Chicago time. They're actually playing the last game of the series in the U .S.
Curt: Oh cool.
jamie peacock: And. The plan is to have a bra. at our Airbnb and watch the game. So.
Curt: Oh, that'd be fun.
jamie peacock: Anyone who listens and is going to be there.
Curt: That'd be fun.
jamie peacock: DM me and we'll make a plan.
Curt: Cool. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. So. Yeah, Danica's a bit of a rugby fan. She's very fucking noisy.
Curt: Nice.
jamie peacock: So anyway. um Yeah, tell me about your... Do you want to save the anodizing for later or do you want to start there?
Curt: No, we could start. We don't have to bury the lead. we People can just listen to it a little bit and they can go about whatever they want to do.
jamie peacock: Okay.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: um
jamie peacock: 100%.
Curt: ah
jamie peacock: I'm very curious about your analyzing.
Curt: Okay. Yeah, I thought I've pulled like every single lever they could possibly pull. So the last thing I was waiting for was the multi -etch to come in so I could replace that. Which... I was like, I'm sure it might fix, but yeah, it a hundred percent fixed it.
Curt: It like it fixed.
jamie peacock: Oh, well.
Curt: All my problems. And I was like. Huh. huh ah So. which is different like when i bought it this time there's a completely different methodology on how you make multi -etch they changed everything on the website like there's a ah ah and there's like an activation stage that I don't remember doing last time I just remember mixing in a jug and then using it I use it heated so I'm always heating it but like This time it's like, oh no, you have to like.
Curt: Heat the whole batch before you make it, even if you're going to heat. each individual cycle like you have to heat the whole batch once together and then you can portion off anyways
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: I asked. like a clot about that i'm like what is is this like smoke and mirrors or something it's like no no no it's that's like a really critical step when you do this mix because you need all the like elements to like whatever they They call us and they create. oxidizing elements and it anyways There's.
Curt: rhyme and reason to it so i was like i don't remember doing that last time but i also did it years ago so Who knows?
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: um but yeah anyways that fixed all my issues there's a bunch of procedures on their site um of like how to etch difficult to difficult titanium which i should have like i don't know why i didn't even poke on their site and read i just assumed it wouldn't be updated but they actually had a lot of updated information on there
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: So if you're anodizing titanium and you have issues, look on their site because there is some sneaky... Little tips that you can... Employ.
jamie peacock: What is the life cycle of that or the lifespan of that? stuff. Because you're obviously...
Curt: Tech.
jamie peacock: you're you're dipping titanium and etching it away so surely your titanium content in that acid or in that etch would go up over time
Curt: Yeah, so... ah the way You can buy it a couple ways, but the way i can buy it the only way I can buy it is in a powdered form. um Then you mix the powdered form all together. Like I talked about last time, it's it's a... It's a batch that isn't.
Curt: perfectly uniform so you can't portion out small portions of the powder mix the whole powder batch gives you about
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Four liters of it. And then they say that has a one -year shelf life.
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: I've found that it lasts. Many years. ah But after a certain amount of years, it obviously... doesn't work and even though it looks like it's still working um it actually the weird thing is it looked like it was working better it looked like it was etching harder
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: but i don't think it was etching harder i think it was just reacting harder um creating like a lot of bubbles because the new stuff doesn't like bubble on titanium at all my old stuff wouldn't Bubble like crazy.
jamie peacock: Oh.
Curt: Which is very weird because I was like, oh, this new stuff.
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: it's not bubbling at all in the titanium i'm like the etch must not be as good and the etches way better so I'm like So I want to try to figure out the chemical process going on there because that's kind of intriguing to me.
Curt: Um,
jamie peacock: Yeah, that's very interesting.
Curt: But yeah, so what I...
jamie peacock: Because I know... I know in aluminium anodizing, your acid has a limited time until you've dissolved enough aluminium into it that it stops working properly. Granted, I never reach that because I normally have pipes break and contaminate my fucking acid.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: But yeah, like I know there's a limited lifespan on that acid. So that's why I'm curious. Is there a limited lifetime? Like how many pieces can you dip in this multi -etch before the multi -etch is contaminated?
Curt: They're... ah Like the literature on the site says... If it's still etching, it's still good. um
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: And that's. but you're totally right that that would happen and my batch is really like i use a very small batch that i heat up um and then once that starts to get weird i just i i dump it into kind of like ah a waste container and then i refill it with the like the brand new
jamie peacock: No.
jamie peacock: two of them together.
Curt: batch that's just been sitting. that's never gone through the heating like the multiple heating cycles
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: And that's worked great for me. um
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: But yeah, if you had like. 10 a 10 liter etchant tank you're going to be just cycling that tank all the time so yeah you'll probably replace that and honestly for the cost for how expensive
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: multi -edges yes it's expensive but it's also the lowest cost thing in my whole world so like I should just replace it. every year and just not even concern myself with it so that's probably what i'll do now
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: Bye.
jamie peacock: Yeah, that's, I mean, that's what I do with NO, with NO -acetyl.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: It usually lasts about a year before I contaminate it or decide. i'm getting inconsistent results let's scrap the acid
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Um... But um yeah, I've also started measuring it. more. So I have a... I've got two hydrometers because I didn't trust the one. because i measured out when i mixed the acid i mixed it by volume not by mole
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: And the.
Curt: Mm.
jamie peacock: The concentration was way the fuck off. So I'm like, no, my hydrometer's fucked. Let me go buy another battery testing, like just a cheap battery tester.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: and it gave me the same reading. I'm like, well, fuck, apparently vi I'm illiterate. So...
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: i then decanted a bunch of acid and topped up with like meat acid into the thing till I got the concentration I needed. But having that at the right concentration makes a world of difference. i got long chats to uh clockwork industries about it
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: Although he seems to have fallen off the face of the earth, unfortunately.
Curt: Oh, hmm.
jamie peacock: Yeah, like I literally had a message saved in our chat with acid concentration.
Curt: Weird.
Curt: Huh.
jamie peacock: Now it's written on my wall.
Curt: huh
jamie peacock: so that when I need to check it I know what it must be.
Curt: Yeah, well, no.
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: That was a nice side effect of this. And now that now I know this works like everything else I've dialed in so tightly that like.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: on this last batch of like i did some crazy anodizing on this last batch of just fades
jamie peacock: I saw them. Yeah.
Curt: Yeah, um of like they're really difficult for me like I picked the hardest things to do and they were everyone and was just like exactly the same and it was like The voltages were exactly the same.
jamie peacock: na
Curt: I mean, the part size does change the voltage, but like if the part size was the same, like every pen body. was the exact same voltages every clip was the exact same voltages and like
jamie peacock: That's awesome.
Curt: I could put the whole like I couldn't do this in the past. I couldn't put like a whole batch of pens in there and then set a voltage. and let it just... Let it just be. For like. 10 minutes. and then come back and just see them all at the same time.
Curt: there's a lot of surface area. My power supply is only like one amp.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: And if you're... trying to push you know 90 volts for green.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: It takes a lot to build that up. Uh, So I was like, if I would leave it in the past, they would almost they would like burn. I would get a shitty ano.
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: i i could like i could get a color and then after that it would start to burn whereas now
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: I can just leave them and I can come back and. half an hour.
jamie peacock: Is that to do with the electrolytes?
Curt: And. There'll be a clean color.
jamie peacock: or to do with the edge.
Curt: I thought it was. uh it it's in my case it's etch related because I've used like I use the same bath.
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: So it was definitely edge -related. just either not etching well enough or etching too hard in certain areas or just a un -uniform edge.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
jamie peacock: hence
Curt: So. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Sorry. I'll go. interesting i don't know
Curt: Much better now. so
jamie peacock: Did you see Ben's story or reel this week? post or whatever it was
Curt: Um, refresh my brain, which one?
jamie peacock: Titanium flip tuple nose.
Curt: No, I don't.
jamie peacock: He's anna started anodizing.
Curt: Think so.
jamie peacock: um I'll tell them to message you about... anodizing because he's wanting to get into titanium anodizing a bit
Curt: Oh sick.
jamie peacock: And he was like, if anyone has any info, just...
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Please DM me, so I'm like, haha, I will, uh... I'll have Kurt. reach out to you because Kurt is the Anno machine.
Curt: Oh, yeah. I'll reach out. I talk to him frequently enough. So anyways, if you hear this, Master Ben, just call me anytime.
jamie peacock: No.
Curt: I'm happy to... share any secrets I possibly have with anybody. Because let's all make better shit.
jamie peacock: Nice.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. yeah he was on the um
Curt: Um,
jamie peacock: Taps and Patients hang out this week.
Curt: Oh cool. Oh cool.
jamie peacock: Yeah, he was like, hey, Jamie, look here. Click, click, click with the knife. With the acid green, I'm like, I'm excited.
Curt: Oh, sick.
jamie peacock: um Yeah. He also... He also signed me up for auto cards. and loaded all my products into auto and then i went in and started playing an auto that's a problem um
Curt: Oh yeah?
jamie peacock: like we they've got a new so he has an ad for otter well done ben Um, but they've got a new pricing tier and It's very compelling.
Curt: Yeah.
Curt: Interesting.
jamie peacock: This. As far as I know it's $35 a month. with unlimited scans i think they're limiting the number of orders you can process through order but I mean... for that price it's got to save me an hour a month and it's worth it
Curt: Sure. Yeah, yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: And if you sign up, they'll be printing cards for you at IMTS.
Curt: Hmm.
Curt: Oh, that's kind of wild.
jamie peacock: So.
Curt: fair
jamie peacock: Yeah, like I need to get a list together. like asap of all the all the hardware and components for the anchor points for the handy siemens for the barnacles i want to have all that stuff printed and pick up the cards while i'm there
Curt: That'd be cool. Yeah, that's cool.
jamie peacock: yeah so like if you sign up you get they'll print cards like they're doing a big push like with the cheaper tier to get into the community because It was a little bit... primitively crossed.
Curt: Yeah, well, that's...
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: that's smart it's yeah if you're trying to go not after his giant corporations you can have to make it
jamie peacock: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Well, that's it. like There's still the giant corporation tier. but there's now also a tier for the garage guy and the hobbyist and whatnot
Curt: Yeah, that makes...
jamie peacock: Which is... Yeah.
Curt: Makes a ton of sense. if you can if If they can afford it to do it that way, that's that's really nice.
jamie peacock: they've also They've also got a genetic workflow where you can literally be like... Hey, Mr. Order Robot. Please make me a card for this thing. It's from this supplier. I keep this many in stock. This is the minimum order.
jamie peacock: make me a card for this and it just Auto. fills out most of the stuff and then you just go and you just Fill in what's missing.
Curt: Hmm. Cool.
jamie peacock: Which is yeah like you literally talk to your phone and then it makes the cards for you, which is kind of cool
Curt: Yeah.
Curt: That's nice.
jamie peacock: i'm going to get I'll get seriously into it over the coming weeks.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Um, But we've been. ya a little busy at work
Curt: Yeah, what's ah how many boats have you filled with your parts?
jamie peacock: Mmm. So we got to order. somewhere in the middle of the month. 4800 aluminium components. So we ordered the material, but then the lathe was busy. Until...
jamie peacock: Monday or Tuesday. We have about 30 pots to go on the lathe now. We ran...
Curt: Hmm.
jamie peacock: On Wednesday, we ran from 6am. I left at 3 p .m., Carl left at 9 p .m., I went... I relieved him at 9pm and ran till 2am. Like we ran the machine for 20 hours that day.
Curt: who
jamie peacock: um And that yielded us luck. 650 ports.
Curt: No.
jamie peacock: So, like not the, yeah.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: So we've been running, like I was there yesterday running tall. I think three o 'clock. I was there from like 10 till three yesterday. um But these parts need a hole drilled through them because they are 25 solid with an 8 .5 hole through them.
jamie peacock: The problem is the Emco does not have the travels to do that.
Curt: Right, right.
jamie peacock: the part is too long and the drill is too long to be able to drill through the part so I ended up setting up a spindle gripping workflow on. on Wednesday. I came home, I designed the trays quickly. threw them on the laser cutter.
jamie peacock: Um, Before I left, I 3D printed a set of jaws for the for the handy seaman. And then when I went in back in the evening. within about I was actually on the Taps and Patients Discord chatting to the guys while I set it up. Within luck.
jamie peacock: 15, 20 minutes. I went from... running something else. to running spindle gripping. and since then I've loaded a thousand seven hundred and fifty parts. automagically Fuck.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: 48 parts every 28 minutes. so about a 30 minute turnaround including reloading the tray
Curt: Hats.
Curt: That's impressive. That's impressive. Huh.
jamie peacock: I don't want to fucking handle out that shit. Screw that. Put it in the tray and let the robot do it.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: um But yeah. Flawlessly. Had not a single issue with it.
Curt: Oh good.
jamie peacock: yeah so we've got i think we've got another There's another 50 that needs to be drilled. and uh We don't have enough parts. The lathe is still behind. like ah it took me a day to catch up to the lathe because i'm doing 100 power doing 96 parts an hour and the lathe is doing about 40 parts an hour
Curt: Oh, okay. Yeah.
jamie peacock: So I've just been.
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: catching up the difference, but we are I think we have a thousand. When I left yesterday we would have gone over a thousand seven hundred completed parts And we were...
jamie peacock: And now they're like 20 parts on the lathe short of having enough to load into the mill to finish up the 1800 parts.
Curt: Oh, okay.
jamie peacock: But yeah, we've had all three lades sparkling this week.
Curt: Nice. Okay, so the...
Curt: yeah yeah All hands on deck doing the same thing.
jamie peacock: Fuck. The machines just run.
Curt: Yeah, yeah.
jamie peacock: The problem is they run beautifully until one of them does something stupid. Then they all do something stupid.
Curt: Oh weird.
jamie peacock: Like as soon as one does something dumb, the rest are doing start doing dumb shit. And then you get them all running and they run for like two or three hours perfectly. And then one of them will do something dumb and then the other two will fuck out as well. it's just yeah murphy's law um
Curt: Weird.
jamie peacock: Yeah, but we've young.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: They've been... cranking bots. We bar pulling on Carl Slade with his grooving tool. So we've got enough space that we can just cut a groove and clamp pull forward with the grooving tool
Curt: Mm. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Um, He actually set that whole workflow up. I think all I did was... Put it in time. No. He set that whole workflow up. He copied the program from out the other machine. because it was on the NAS and then modified it.
jamie peacock: I think I just made some tweaks to the macros for him. But yeah, he basically set that whole job up himself.
Curt: Nice. Sick.
jamie peacock: So.
Curt: That's awesome.
jamie peacock: Ping. Being fancy. Um, No, that's... we are He's going to do 15 ,000 parts while I'm at IMTS.
Curt: 15 ,000?
jamie peacock: Yeah. Yep.
Curt: Wow.
jamie peacock: And that doesn't include his machine's production.
Curt: That's a lot.
jamie peacock: That's on my two lades.
Curt: That's a lot of... part I don't even care what the part is. That's a lot. I don't care if you're just parting off a slug. That's a lot of parts.
jamie peacock: So it's going to be the M10 threaded dinguses and the ringer washers he'll carry on with on Monday because we have some material while we wait for more material. We're then going to get Patera on order on Tuesday in the new month.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: and that'll be for 2 ,500 ringer washers, 2 ,500 threaded dinguses. I'm waiting for drills on that. I bought Stub 8 .7s. and I'm getting actual feeds and speeds for them.
jamie peacock: And then he's going to run. one of the aluminium parts. We don't know which one yet. That's my job for this week is set up, get all the programs styled for those. That's on the good way.
Curt: wow
jamie peacock: The Emco is going to run seven and a half thousand aluminium parts as well. out of extruded tube. That is...
Curt: Oh.
jamie peacock: hopefully going to be on sides that actually fit through the collet.
Curt: I have my fingers crossed for you.
jamie peacock: yeah if it doesn't we've got to take a collar to be wire cut to 25 point whatever so that oh sorry 22 point whatever so that it'll actually feed through
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah, but we mean ball pulling on the Emco.
Curt: Yeah. Cool.
jamie peacock: uh the ball puller was slipping a bit in the beginning so i took it off drilled a hole through put a grub screw and you got two grub screws that grab the the ball
Curt: Hmm.
jamie peacock: And it's I don't ah don't think it's Mr. Barple. in like 1800 plots.
Curt: Oh, perfect, Lloyd. Knock on wood, it won't.
jamie peacock: Yeah. The only problem was getting the shavings out of the machine. because it's near a wall you can't use the rear exit to get the stuff out you've got to dig them through the door
Curt: Ugh. Okay.
jamie peacock: Yeah. So I think that machine may need to move at some point.
Curt: Yeah, that's fair. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. But proper spindle liners. World of difference.
Curt: Oh, really? Okay.
jamie peacock: Dude, we were having inconsistent bar pulling on the good way. so i was 3d printing the parametric spindle liner that i made which is fine if you making like 10 pots Um, I made a proper sleeve.
jamie peacock: put guards and whatnot that fits properly like we spent a day making nuts for the um for the good way for the spin to retain the spindle liner and making nuts for the uh Spin Doctor.
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: um I ended up just making it on the fucking lathe.
Curt: Mm -mm.
jamie peacock: I mean, not on the lane, on the mall.
Curt: Hm.
jamie peacock: So I made it. and then took the chuck off the zero point, spun it on to check it fits, then put it back and then slit it off.
Curt: Mmm. Nice.
jamie peacock: um But yeah, I made a nut with a locking thing. So now we've got we're building spindle liners for all the machines. because it makes a very big difference to the quality of the bar pull.
Curt: That would make sense. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. um I've got to modify the one, the M -Kai needs to deal with that this week. because the current bar pulling store it's a bar pushing setup so the retainer cap isn't through and we want to load bar through the back not through the door because loading through the door sucks So I need to just make a new cap, but that's just got open the file, modify it and throw it on the mill.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Like the moon.
Curt: Nice.
jamie peacock: I like them all. The mill makes life easy.
Curt: He said Millbilly last week.
jamie peacock: Good job.
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: I do proper Millbilly manoeuvres. I made those little...
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: um venting ports freaking 0 .75 hole through them like full -on lathe part There's me on the mill.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah. There's... sometimes I agree. that i I made... For the little fidgets, there's one screw that I have to make.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: that it just doesn't make sense to make it on the lathe because i have to thread like right up to a huge shoulder
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: So I'm like, well, I don't have a tiny enough threading tool.
jamie peacock: Exactly.
Curt: But I'm like, you know what I can do with my thread mill? So I just, yeah, I'm. I bore.
jamie peacock: Exactly.
Curt: Like with the machine, and then I thread mill with it and I basically part off.
jamie peacock: So I was...
Curt: A screw.
jamie peacock: i was throwing in 10 diameter brass machining at 8 hex machining it away drilling it, threading it, slitting saw it off. Done.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: one op. takes three minutes to make one and it's finished Mark.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah, no, millbilling is the way to go. But yeah, on those... ah yeah on those parts i covered this yeah i went in at nine and worked from nine till two Because, uh... We needed to make up hours and I felt bad making Carl sleep there.
Curt: Well, yeah yeah, I would feel like a bit of a dick doing that too.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Yeah Yeah.
jamie peacock: Like even yesterday, he came in yesterday, got it running. uh sorted out the shavings guy then i got there at like nine o 'clock in the morning He left at 10 because he had other stuff to do because it's Saturday.
jamie peacock: And then. ah I carried on there till like three o 'clock because I had. i had well we needed the machine to run but i had other stuff i needed to do so Yeah. i kept popping stuff in and out of the mill so i'd run a tray of pots while i programmed what i needed to do then pull the tray off the anchor points Dropping a vase. Machine what I need to machine.
jamie peacock: Pull the Vasa, drop the tray back on and carry on running spindle gripping.
Curt: So here you're doing the work of like, you know, when people... see all these fancy machinists have these big palette changing robots and they're like, oh, now I can intermix my own.
jamie peacock: Yep.
Curt: Like you're doing the exact same thing. You're just the palette changing robot.
jamie peacock: Exactly. i'm the palette changer yeah no like it's freaking great it's like i literally ran
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: i finished up a bunch of ar -15 mag bases that needed an opt -to
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: So I was up to date with the parts. I pulled the tray out, put in my vases, did a setup and yeah ran that while I... while i played with the fourth axis because that was interesting And poked around in the PLC for like an hour and a half on on the LK.
Curt: Ooh, exciting.
jamie peacock: Yeah, so there's a button for chip conveyor backwards.
Curt: hey
jamie peacock: Except it's only a button on the controller, there's no M code for it. I had assumed there was an M code.
Curt: Oh, okay.
jamie peacock: Yeah, I was a bit... annoyed so i was poking through the plc to try and find if there's an m code for it Um, There is not. So then I ended up changing the way the fourth axis indexer works.
jamie peacock: Um, by using a single input, if it goes on for between 0 .25 and... four seconds. it will index. And if it goes on for more than four seconds, it returns to zero.
Curt: Okay.
Curt: Oh, okay.
jamie peacock: Ew.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: So now my And then I had to figure out how much backlash my...
Curt: That worked.
jamie peacock: Fourth has, which is zero. um which i was quite impressed by like i had an indicator on it and i was trying to dial in the backlash and it was overshooting so dialing down the backlash uh comp until there was none and then it worked fine
Curt: Heh heh. Cool.
jamie peacock: Yeah, i was like okay, I'm not gonna complain um But yeah, I got that all integrated yesterday and then I integrated a pressure switch. Turns out I'm illiterate. So. ah The customer with the RAL 2 smoked the encoder.
jamie peacock: I bought four pressure switches. I was like, oh, cool. They do pressure switches. Let me buy the one that goes positive and negative. Then I can use it for vacuum. as well. And... Ordered them, they arrived, I plugged it in.
jamie peacock: and our blue air internets HHH as in... over pressure. So I really like 100 kPa. Go to Google. Oh shit, it's a one -ball switch.
jamie peacock: for one ball. range.
Curt: oh
jamie peacock: So positive.
Curt: ah
jamie peacock: 1 bar to negative 1 bar. I'm like, fuck. So I go look. They had a 1000 kPa version. I just decided to buy the one that goes both ways. so they And I have four of them that are useless. I was meant to be on site tomorrow, on Monday.
jamie peacock: And I messaged him. I'm like, listen, I'm not going to make it. I plugged the sensor in. It's not going to work for your application. I've got another one on order. I'll see you at the end of September. Like your machine's running. i'll deal with it when I get back. So I put it on my vacuum system and then set it up that.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: if the vacuum is within the range that there's no leaks It... Goes like what or whatever that the little display and if it's out of range it goes red So if there's a leak. that it goes red so at a glance i can just look at it and see what my pressure's at
Curt: Oh, nice. Okay, yeah, yeah.
jamie peacock: not good If it's red, you know it's bad. for when I'm doing vacuum work holding. So I was...
Curt: that's nice
jamie peacock: poking around in the machine adding all sorts of fun features yesterday while uh while the machine was running and the lathe was running and it was waiting for things but yeah turns out i'm illiterate that's the important bit
Curt: nice
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: That's easy enough mistake. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah, like that. show fucking Now I know. uh so now i've got four of these things that i have no real use for they work for vacuum which is fine and i'll use them for that and it also has an output that i could in theory feed back into into the machine, that of the vacuum.
jamie peacock: goes out of range it pauses or stops or does something but see Couldn't be bothered.
Curt: m
jamie peacock: just throw the pot be a man
Curt: Yeah, exactly Yeah.
jamie peacock: Look.
Curt: yeah I forgot.
jamie peacock: So...
Curt: For those talk I was chatting with somebody someone who's buying machine. I'm actually I'm talking with a few of them. So they're easy to Mixed in anyways, they're talking about mountain device.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: They're like all the and they have their considering a machine my size, I think that I might even be considering the X5.
jamie peacock: Hmm.
Curt: And he's like, oh, I was going to mount my vice sideways. Is that? kosher and i'm like but i mean yeah sure like why not you can but i'm like just remember like if you're gonna throw apart
jamie peacock: y 'all
Curt: It's. Probably going to get thrown. forward and backward in that case as opposed to like lefty righty And he's like. Was that bad? i'm like well the The door. On that side.
jamie peacock: Door -and -Way covers, yeah.
Curt: so yeah so i'm like you're kind of going to be whipping it at yourself so i'm like it's i mean these are different it's a cage on the door so it's not going to come flying out like like Ben had.
jamie peacock: Yeah. It's more the real way covers that you don't want to fuck up
Curt: but Oh, totally. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Yeah, so he's like, oh, I never thought of that. I was like, yeah, I mean. Just be just be a gangster and don't throw parts.
jamie peacock: just don't throw a pot, yeah
Curt: Yeah, exactly.
jamie peacock: Easy solution.
Curt: But if you do, yeah I mean, I could throw my part. um as hard as i want we just go tink and fall into the chip bin so it's not a huge issue but still it's like
jamie peacock: Yeah. Yeah.
Curt: yeah although the the fidgets they're two inches like a titanium so that would make more noise yeah
jamie peacock: Actually... Not bad. decent sauce Um,
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. Got a quote on another verse. this week. Same as my four inch vases that I have. on my palette. but I want only one on a pallet so it's not as heavy to lift.
Curt: Oh yeah, fair. That's reasonable. yeah
jamie peacock: because that's the problem like lifting that pallet is a fucking yeah it's a ball like So I don't always need two vices, but I like having a four inch vice when I want to put soft jaws or something.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: So I've got a piece of aluminium to make a...
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Pat. uh new palette So I've got to quote on another boss. and uh yeah We'll see how cashflow looks and I'll just buy it.
Curt: Cool.
jamie peacock: Although I'm kind of tempted to buy a brand name one.
Curt: Mmm. Just to flex, yeah.
jamie peacock: Well, no the the ones I'm the Chinese ones.
Curt: but
jamie peacock: I've got a decent for the money.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: but there's a bit of jaw lift and a bit of stupidness that goes on with him like
Curt: Oh yeah. And then you get what you pay for.
jamie peacock: So.
Curt: Yeah, for sure.
jamie peacock: Exactly. um Yeah, I don't know. um We'll see. We'll see what I end up doing. But then also that palette. I'm thinking of uh finding some 16 diamonds or hollow pins and then putting uh lang spacing so i can drop a mechanical anchor point on there if i want And bolt through from the top with... cylinder with hollow dowels.
Curt: Okay, I see. Okay.
jamie peacock: So I can put a mechanical on my four pneumatics. to do dumb shit.
Curt: yeah Yeah.
jamie peacock: Because you never know.
Curt: yeah I guess It's like a tower of ices.
jamie peacock: Yeah, cuz my mechanical I think is gonna be in the way now with the new Uh, trunnion adapter that I made for the fourth axis. That's gonna take my...
jamie peacock: pneumatic vast so my pneumatic vast is going to go on to the fourth axis
Curt: Right.
jamie peacock: pretty much permanently
Curt: Right.
jamie peacock: Well, with a... with the jang plate um That's going to go on there permanently, so then I think that... is going to be in the way i'm not and entirely sure yet
Curt: Yeah, right right right.
jamie peacock: So i might need to I might need to be a little fancy, but we'll see. That's a problem for when I get back.
Curt: Yeah, exactly That's fun.
jamie peacock: lock Everything's just getting kicked to the end of September now.
Curt: Yeah, I know you're like a you're like a school teacher in the last month of ah of teaching we're just like I fucking whatever phone it in Yeah
jamie peacock: an extra problem. Yeah. Yeah. but yeah change being able to pull stuff in and out of the machine like is super nice. like changing from running vases to running palettes to running other shit like i need to actually make uh naff palettes I'm half tempted to go in this off black today because I'm running out of time.
Curt: Hmm.
jamie peacock: and just go run a bunch of knife palettes quickly and then run. then i can get like 30 30 minutes to an hour of walk away on nerves. and just quickly blast through all the knives i need to machine
Curt: Mm.
jamie peacock: um because that's just going to be full of work this week. Just keep knobs running.
Curt: Right. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. And then I'm sending stuff to Anno before I leave for the US. that when I get back, I have mag bases. ready to be scrapped. Because, yeah. 30 % scrap rate.
jamie peacock: on the batch of scent.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: but yeah i don't know we'll see when i move down and set up i may just Bring it back in the house.
Curt: Yeah, that's rough
Curt: Yeah. i say just Bring them all to the U .S., get them anodized while you're at the show, then bring them all back home.
jamie peacock: The problem is like anodizing there is brutally expensive.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Like here.
Curt: Oh yeah.
jamie peacock: The 30 % scrap rates. It's... I'm still making fucking good money on the pots.
Curt: Right.
jamie peacock: i'm like I'm happy to accept a 30 % scrap rate on these because...
Curt: right
jamie peacock: The material cost is next to nothing. The machining time is like six minutes. And... I make 50, I send them out. If I only get 30 good ones, it is what it is. I throw those other ones in the bin and I move on with my life.
Curt: Yeah. yeah that's Yeah, you're not going to be able to beat that.
jamie peacock: Mark.
Curt: with
jamie peacock: and No.
Curt: Anything around? this neck of the woods.
jamie peacock: Oh no, definitely not. Like, it's costing me $2 to anodize a part.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: So cheap.
jamie peacock: It's stupid cheap. So like I still plan on keeping Anno in house for all the other dumb shit I do, but yeah. That can that can go out So what, uh...
Curt: Sick.
jamie peacock: I see you scaling.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: The haters are gonna love you.
Curt: So, um, a Yeah. um Actually, just to finish off that anodizing topic, remember last week I was talking about tumb tumbling because I didn't want to tumble.
jamie peacock: Yeah. Yes.
Curt: I wanted to deburr because tumbling was ruining my fit. That was also related to the etch.
jamie peacock: See ya.
Curt: Um, because now
jamie peacock: Figured as much
Curt: Yeah. Now the tumbling and the... Machine part, everything is coming out. uniform no matter the finish like there's very little difference but it looks visually
jamie peacock: Okay. Oh yeah.
Curt: it's visually pretty so i was like okay well that solved that issue
jamie peacock: Yeah, this. The difference is whether it's satin or machine finish.
Curt: Yeah, exactly and it still looks like
jamie peacock: Right for the tumbling.
Curt: It was looking ridiculous. ah like a few weeks back and
jamie peacock: but now the color's really close.
Curt: and now it just it looks like your eye looks at it and you don't you don't you don't call it like it doesn't look stupid so anyways that that helps solve that problem I'm still looking.
jamie peacock: Moss.
Curt: I'm just still looking at those brushes though because that solves other problems. um But yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah, that's on the list for IMTSs to go look at abrasives. because it's something I'd like to add to the mix.
Curt: Yeah.
Curt: there's a I'll find the company. um I've looked at their brushes a ton. uh it's not it's not brush research it's another company um Anyways, they got really cool.
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: all kinds of weird stuff
jamie peacock: Yeah. Well, I mean, that's how they deburr rims, alloy rims.
Curt: But yes.
Curt: Oh yeah?
jamie peacock: They've got, yeah, they've got. Machines that take brushes. that they run over the rims to deburr the backside of the from flashing.
Curt: Makes sense.
jamie peacock: No.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: like it's it's freaking impressive and yeah they burn through prussia's like three or four brushes a day on these machines like you go to factories just stacks of brushes waiting to go
Curt: Heh heh.
Curt: Yeah, it's like... Yeah, I... I don't know. It's it's it's cool. um But yeah. ah Scaling up. ah Scaling up my batches without boredom. That's my... that's my a thing right now.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: um because at my cur like i can machine way more than i can finish right now still with everything that i've done it's like my bottleneck is still
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: um like even with the machines i have if they run if they run all day i think i can go uh, up to like, 4x of what I'm currently producing. If the machine's just...
jamie peacock: Jeez, okay.
Curt: If the machines could just run without me having to like tend to them. So like.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Zero point them. um And then. be able to like the lay there's kind of There's only so much you can... like you can bar pull but like at the at what at some point there's only so much you can automate on the lathe just because it's going to burn through material fast enough that i don't I don't have a long enough bar and like.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: It's good. I can handle the lathe. The mill, I can't handle like three minute cycles. So it's going to have to have like multiple hour cycles. That's where all your shit comes in. But if I can get those.
jamie peacock: spindlegrpper
Curt: uh yeah i maybe maybe loading pen bodies is gonna be annoying but anyways that's stuff i can just like i
jamie peacock: What do you think? annoying but you could potentially
Curt: I could think through that. like
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: It's not crazy hard.
jamie peacock: There's things you can... Yeah.
Curt: Yeah, it's like there's a lot of ways to skin that cat. um But if I can keep... Anyway, so... Long story short. um Machining isn't my bottleneck, but finishing is. So now that's now it's where like where a lot of my thought is going to be like, okay.
Curt: I like, I anodize these pens. He's crazy. Crazy Anodized Colors. Super fun.
jamie peacock: Hmm.
Curt: i cannot do that at like if i had to do let's say i had to do a hundred of those pens
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: I could do it, but it would take me. Days. to do them. Which is like, okay, that's not...
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: It's not going to be workable. um So just trying to find ways where I'm like, okay, can I do this in like giant racks? Can I do this? Like, how can I better automate these systems?
jamie peacock: Hacksmith anodizing robot.
Curt: so it's basically the way i'm going is yeah the hacksmith kind of way um Which is good because I've solved most of my problems now.
jamie peacock: Well... You were saying you can put a batch in and just leave it for 30 minutes and let the voltage come up and it's not burning the parts.
Curt: But...
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: so
Curt: So that... That solved that.
jamie peacock: That solves that.
Curt: the I think the next thing is going to be ditching my... budget. um ultrasonics and trying to buy like i think i'll get a like a crest i think there's some of the best right now
jamie peacock: Oh, okay.
Curt: Buy a really nice Ultras.
jamie peacock: So what I'm hearing is add that to the IMTS list.
Curt: Yeah, um buy a really nice ultrasonic to see what's possible because right now I can still only get...
jamie peacock: Man. Yeah.
Curt: perfect results with scrubbing so i will like i will ultrasonic apart bring it out And then like still before I go through an anodizing stage, I'll like manually scrub it.
Curt: which is crazy annoying and not scalable.
jamie peacock: Yep.
Curt: um so i was like if i had a really good ultrasonic could i just Skip this because I'm sure I could. So I think I might just...
jamie peacock: Um,
Curt: buy a really good ultrasonic and see.
jamie peacock: Danny Rudolph posted a video this morning on Instagram.
Curt: Oh, okay.
jamie peacock: of a sandblasting robot.
Curt: Oh yeah. That's I love is that little robot.
jamie peacock: You are picking it up putting it in the thing it goes in spins and sandblasts UL picks it up, puts it back, yeah.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah, I love that. Um,
jamie peacock: Yeah, it's great.
Curt: Yeah, so I think I think it crests is on my unless people chime in if you know a better ultrasonic or you have one That's like just absolutely annihilates. Let me know I don't mind spending money in this regard because it's gonna save me Um, So.
jamie peacock: Yeah. Um, And the scrubbing is just to mechanically remove any crap that's on the...
Curt: to yeah like i think the problem is my ultrasonic just isn't aggressive enough so even if it does like if the part like let's say this oil contamination that is getting off it's getting it off but it's not like dislodging it fully from like deep pockets and stuff
jamie peacock: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. Apparently there is a huge difference between an ultrasonic and a crest ultrasonic.
Curt: We're not.
Curt: I would imagine so.
jamie peacock: Yep.
Curt: Mine costs like $300 and theirs are like. multiple thousands of dollars which in this land is dirt cheap because my labor is very expensive too so
jamie peacock: It may be worthwhile reaching out to Grimmsworks. I know they did something similar. Like they went through this a few years back.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: where they went to a higher end um ultrasonic and it made a world of difference.
Curt: Yeah, I know I'm pretty sure he's running a crest tank as well
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: and uh i should I think we talked about Ultrasonics. I think I might have bent his ear about it in the past. Maybe, I don't know. I've talked to a few dorks about it.
jamie peacock: Well he's going to be at IMTS this time.
Curt: Ooh.
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: So. um yeah anyways i might go that way just i don't know just dumb like things that i'm just I mean, shipping, that's another thing. like There's just so many stupid things that you don't even think about like that just...
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: you need to automate in order to. Go to the next kind of.
jamie peacock: to scale.
Curt: level Yeah, exactly.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: like Like I can say, I can make, I can machine, if I machined a thousand pens. I can't i can't ship them i can't box them up like i it would spend i would spend weeks blocking up orders like this
jamie peacock: Yeah. Whoa. i was I was chatting to my neighbor yesterday.
Curt: Just silly.
jamie peacock: So my neighbor. that the workshop came over. um you need me to machine a little castle drive thing for a mill
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: And he's like, no, he's making force rules come over in Avalon. So I went over, had some lunch with him, chatted. He's like, yeah, he used to work for a company. His boss went over to the US, opened a store there. No. What did he say he was doing?
jamie peacock: They're doing accessories for trucks or something. And he went to a trade show. And the guy was like, Oh, cool. Can we have a thousand a week? And he's like...
Curt: ah
jamie peacock: uh uh uh we can make 10 a week was their production cap.
Curt: o
jamie peacock: Now, like...
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: that eventually shut the shop in the US because they just couldn't keep up with orders.
Curt: What is that um?
jamie peacock: Look.
Curt: ah There's a name for it. Isn't it called like... the Oprah effect or something like that. We're like.
jamie peacock: probably yeah You get...
Curt: The...
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Yeah, you get like a shit ton of orders and companies scale to meet that demand and then they fill it and then realize that that demand isn't going to be continuous and they just crumble because now their overhead is through the roof.
jamie peacock: Yes.
jamie peacock: Well, yeah. Exactly. So like I was thinking about the model situation with making products. like At the moment it's fine. I can keep up with orders. It's not an issue.
jamie peacock: but i've designed all my processes that if i have to scale they are all scalable because If I need to. Mike.
Curt: Sure.
jamie peacock: 200. grip as a month, I need to be able to scale that.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah, exactly
jamie peacock: So design design everything to be scalable.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Dark.
Curt: Yeah, and like... And I was thinking one of the levers that I could pull that I'm not going to pull because I have zero interest in it is you could scale with a with a human. Like i can I can double my throughput by having ah another person.
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: Which... i don't want to do i don't want a person like i want to
jamie peacock: that comes with its own set of issues.
Curt: Yeah, I managed people for years. There's a whole host of other problems you get with that. um so that's not something i'm interested in but it's it is a it is an a solution for a lot of people it's just like yeah get another person Because now you've...
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: you have the time that you have to spend on bullshit tasks. so
jamie peacock: Well, not necessarily.
Curt: Not necessarily or and it could be you could maybe remove 100 % your bullshit tasks Or you can remove 10 % of them and add 90 % of other bullshit tasks and like it's all over the map
jamie peacock: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yep. like i spend way too much time doing adminship but i don't trust anyone to do the adminship because um the country who goes to jail if they fuck it up.
Curt: they're That's exactly it. Yeah, exactly.
jamie peacock: That's it. I'm the fucker who's going to jail if there's a fuck up. Like, no, no thanks.
Curt: Hehe.
jamie peacock: I will handle it. No one has access to my invoicing because that can get out of hand very quickly if people accidentally invoice stuff and now you've got to do, you've got to void invoices and just no. It gets done right the first time or it doesn't get done.
Curt: Yeah. yeah
jamie peacock: Knock. Yeah, so... It's a... Yeah, it's an interesting one to try and like offloading the lathes to coal. That's fine. That I can deal with. he can run the lades he's capable of doing that so he does that he does a bit of the quoting he handles ordering material for the lades or getting quotes from the people then i do the payments and yeah Like we've got a workflow that works.
Curt: Yeah.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: But john now we're trying to get all the tooling and stuff. Hmm, sure. On hand before I leave. so that he can run those 15 000 parts without any issues
Curt: Yeah. Yeah totally.
jamie peacock: No. Joe. It's uh... yeah Fun. Um...
Curt: Yeah. Heh.
jamie peacock: which one Which one there would you like to...
Curt: So. Ah. I want to hear about... What's more work while in the U .S.?
jamie peacock: Well, this ties into the mold, so... i currently i sanded through my two of my fingers
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: What? There and there.
Curt: Oh okay.
jamie peacock: from sanding those molds. Yes, it was super pleasant.
Curt: Okay, speaking of manual labor, yeah.
jamie peacock: are spent. Yeah, I spent...
Curt: well
jamie peacock: I spent close on seven hours sanding those molds.
Curt: ah
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Uh -huh.
jamie peacock: Got them done. it's fine this is what it is uh still made a load of money on them so i don't really mind um Customer was meant to come pick up on Thursday. I was like, no worries, I'll make sure I'm around.
jamie peacock: And then he messaged me just before he was meant to be there. He's like, sorry, I'll be there tomorrow. So I'm like, okay, no worries. I had plans for tomorrow, but whatever. So he came through. Happy with the molds. He's like, okay, cool. Needs to chat to you about another job. So I knew this this conversation was coming because my friend does the design work for him.
Curt: Hmm.
jamie peacock: I'm like okay, I'm out of the country. from the seventh. It's like, oh, I'm like. Get them to send it. I'll quote it. I'll program it. I'll get everything prepped while I'm away. And when I get back, the material will be I can just climb in quickly and do it.
jamie peacock: It's a... I think it's a one meter long pot. with like 400 holes in it that are all... Tart positional and tart toleranced.
Curt: Ooh.
jamie peacock: It's an assembly jig for... A radar component, I believe. And then I've still got to machine the Tufnel parts that I'll get. attached to this jig and then bought a... lemonates The lemonade's a two piece of carbon.
Curt: oo
jamie peacock: Yeah. super fun so i should get those drawings this week that I can start working through quoting and planning and everything.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: and then get it all planned and programmed from the US. while I'm there. and then uh As soon as I get back, I can. Like, I get i get back into the workshop. Uh...
jamie peacock: calendar No, next month. So I leave on the 7th in the afternoon. I fly out of South Africa.
Curt: Mm -hmm.
jamie peacock: I land back in South Africa. on the 23rd. I didn't get. So... I land back here at like 3 .30 in the afternoon.
jamie peacock: On the 24th, I get in my car at three o 'clock in the morning and I drive to Plett for a wedding and I drive back on the 28th. So I'll be back in the workshop on the 29th.
Curt: Oh. Just.
jamie peacock: so 22 days of... 30. I'm out. not in the workshop.
Curt: And in. Wildly different time zones. To top it all off.
jamie peacock: Yes. So, like, Colin and I were chatting about that.
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: I sent him a link to a – it's a really nice – clock where you can slide the bars so you slide the bar and it tells you what time it is where you want what time it is in Chicago. So I'm like, cool.
jamie peacock: When I wake up in the morning, we'll just have a phone call and just catch up on what happened in the day. And then... ah Yeah, because we got like three or four hours of overlap.
Curt: Right, right, right. Yeah, yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. So just to try and keep on top of what's going on. So yeah, that's going to be...
Curt: Oh.
jamie peacock: It's going to be fun. Trying to like well at least at least the shop is running
Curt: ah Oh.
jamie peacock: Last time the shop stood still.
Curt: Right, yeah, exactly. You're making a few bucks as opposed to negative dollars. yeah
jamie peacock: Yeah, so I need to know this week ran through everything with him um how to clear alarms on all the machines, shit like that. Because yesterday... No, Friday I got it. He's like, ah the spindle won't run on the good way.
jamie peacock: It's showing H00. I'm like. So I open the panel and I'm like, no, that's normal. Go look. Here, push the spindle disable button. on the panel
Curt: ah Oh shit. Haha.
jamie peacock: I'm like, call. Look, it works! So it's like, it's just. He saw it as an error code on there because he didn't know what it's what it meant. So like it's just, I need to just run through everything and just make sure he's up to date with.
Curt: Right.
jamie peacock: all the errors that all the different machines can throw. Um, We were running. the Emco and then all of a sudden the spindle starts stalling. on one of the balls of material when we're parting off. So I had to change it to Peck so that it wouldn't give us shit.
jamie peacock: Like, I don't know if it was where they were excluding the bar went from one slug to another slug and the material consistency wasn't the same or some shit. but like just out of the blue.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: fucked and then Three balls later, it's fine again.
Curt: yeah that's Yeah, those are confusing ones.
jamie peacock: Yeah, like really stupid. So now it's pecking and I'm just like whatever let it take an extra 10 seconds it means that it's reliable.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. So... Yeah. Anyway, so I'm going to be working while I'm in the US. While I'm on vacation, I'm going to be working. I'm going to be getting material processing.
Curt: perfect
jamie peacock: I'm going to be programming jobs. Um,
Curt: Hustlin'.
jamie peacock: It's going to be great. Yeah, fuck. Well, I had to air freight in guard bushes for these molds.
Curt: Huh.
jamie peacock: Because the local supplier had 22 in stock and I needed 60.
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: And I'm like, well, fuck, order me another 50 and air freight the things.
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: uh so that's one of the things with these guys i'm like i need to know what we need for this we're just going to air freight them because Apparently if you don't air freight it, they put it on a drunk donkey and have it walk through Africa. because it's four to six weeks lead time
Curt: no Ho ho ho ho. That's up there.
jamie peacock: I'm like what the fuck. Lock. Even air freight, seven days later, I'm like, are you fucking joking? what is What are they putting it on?
Curt: i think like
jamie peacock: A micro lot?
Curt: brain Yeah.
jamie peacock: Lock. Yeah, like, what the fuck? that You can get shit from Europe overnight.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah.
jamie peacock: No, fuck's sake. So, yeah, anyway. We're going to get all that shit ordered while I'm out of the country. And then figure out how the fuck I'm going to machine all this stuff because it's like 200 millimeter wide by like meter long parts. And then everything in the middle is high accuracy.
jamie peacock: and then the outer holes are not as accurate i'm like we just slide it over indicate it pick up the bo and ball and like... shift the work we're going to be off by If thou, if that.
jamie peacock: But worst case.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: So, yeah, they were they were happy with that.
Curt: Yeah, yeah
Curt: Sick.
jamie peacock: Let's go. um Which one?
Curt: That's it.
jamie peacock: you
Curt: How about...
jamie peacock: Let's go with the middle one. Middle one.
Curt: How about... how about first about speaking about sound effects we roll the sweet sound effects of
jamie peacock: Oh yes, good point.
Curt: minecarts and talk about our lovely minecart People. Which...
jamie peacock: We have Patreons who make the wheels on the minecart for Kurt go round and round.
Curt: And you hear this on the podcast, like it's barely, you can barely hear the mine cart in our ears. It's like, it blows up my eardrums and I love it.
jamie peacock: Yeah. Ah, she's such a nerd, Kurt. Yeah, we have Patreons. The Patreons make the wheels on the minecart go round and round. And we are great.
Curt: but
jamie peacock: We are very appreciative of them. They also make the... um airbnb happened for IMTS. uh the top tier patrons all get a shout out every week Anyone on the $6 and above tier gets access to the after show.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Um... I will be exporting a list of all the addresses and giving them to Kurt, we were discussing that this week. um
Curt: we
jamie peacock: yeah that we can get all the stuff so if you need to update your address on patreon please do so we can send stuff to you because i'm bringing stuff to imts that will then Get sent to Kurt that will then get sent out.
Curt: Yes.
jamie peacock: which has ah proved challenging.
Curt: So you have to go.
jamie peacock: We will actually, let me. We'll dive into that as well.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah.
jamie peacock: um
Curt: Yeah. yeah
jamie peacock: Let me just put a... a note there uh yeah my wife went and made me buy a bunch of things uh but i don't think
Curt: o
jamie peacock: Not all the things are going to Kurt, but yeah, it's a bit of a bit of a shit show. Anyway, I'll talk to your Patreons. They get shouted out every week. Jade from Bedrock20, Luke from Fabtastic, AJ from Subtract Manufacturing, Jason S, EJ from Eternal Welding, the Aussie Machinist, Christian Olsen.
jamie peacock: Charles Watt. Carl from Cursed Machine, Matt from Offworld Gear, who popped me a message yesterday. Alex B., John from Tucson Performance and Engine Tricks, Matt from Modern Fuel. Josh from Laser Machine, Greg from Tabletop Machine Shop, Ben from Prickly Pear Prototypes, and Jesse from Data Pro.
jamie peacock: Proto. I've got the top drawer. Um, Thank you, patrons. You make the wheels on the minecart go round and round.
Curt: buh buh buh buh Blah, blah, blah.
jamie peacock: Kurt riding minecarts in his mind. But yeah, thank you, patrons. You make the yeah the wheels on the minecart go round and round. uh yeah i didn't realize we're this far into the flippant podcast I wasn't watching the clock this week.
Curt: The ah the amount of people that have sent are sending me mine related shit on Instagram. I love you all um
jamie peacock: mos
Curt: I appreciate every single. thing you sent me. They're always something heinous.
jamie peacock: um So.
Curt: Like, yeah, yeah, it's it's great.
jamie peacock: So our patrons, we wanted to get little drawstring bags printed.
Curt: I love it all.
jamie peacock: for IMTS.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: So we're going to have for the meetup. And then we'll have some stuff in them that we're going to send to you to forward on. that branded loan machinist.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: Danica asked for a quote from the one branding company.
Curt: Ooh.
jamie peacock: on Monday. We're still waiting for the quote. They sent the quote, but it's wrong. Sorak, please change this. They sent the quote again. Please change this. Send it again. So eventually I just bought bags and we're going to do DTF and transfer them ourselves.
Curt: Oh, there we are.
jamie peacock: I just could not be fucked with people who can't read an email.
Curt: That's.
jamie peacock: um So yeah, we're doing a whole bunch of bags. and goodies, got stickers. We ordered 2 ,300 stickers for INTS.
Curt: Wow, that's a lot.
jamie peacock: Yes. We didn't the fuck around. um I think the stickers were... Yeah, this is gonna make everyone sad. Um... Sixth Sense's sticker.
Curt: Jesus. great That's so cheap.
jamie peacock: Oh, sorry, no, no, sorry, I'm lying. Um...
Curt: I don't care if they're 60.
jamie peacock: they They put the process.
Curt: That's still...
jamie peacock: It's still six cents. It's one random five cents per sticker. They're small.
Curt: Wow
jamie peacock: They're 50 millimeters in the longest dimension. But yeah, I got a power. And there's a bunch of fun ones too.
Curt: That's so inexpensive.
jamie peacock: So there'll be an assortment in the goodie bags including the goodie bags going to the patrons Um... And then if you signed up for the. The IMTS meetup, if you say you're going to be there. There will be a bag with your name on it with a few extra goodies.
jamie peacock: So are we bringing over...
Curt: Ooh.
jamie peacock: some local chocolates and things and
Curt: Ooh.
jamie peacock: snacks.
Curt: Ooh.
jamie peacock: that we're going to throw in the bags for the... for the patreon for the people who said they're going to be at the at the meetup which I think most of them are actually patrons. So it should be fun.
Curt: Oh cool.
jamie peacock: And then we'll have a few spares kicking around as well.
Curt: Cool. Nice, oh that's awesome.
jamie peacock: Yeah. so yeah we're doing fun things but yeah getting the the quote for the bags was really fucking frustrating
Curt: but hi
jamie peacock: Um,
Curt: I hate that stuff.
jamie peacock: Cool. So what's happening with laser batching slightly?
Curt: Um... So yeah, speaking of how it...
jamie peacock: Being erotic.
Curt: Yeah, so how it is. ah I was once again hustling. This always happens when you're hustling. And I was like, okay, I got these rolling. This is going good over here. I'm doing some anodizing. What I'm gonna do is I'm just gonna get the laser running because I don't like to turn my back on that thing because it always wants to burn my house down.
Curt: um so i was like you know what i'm gonna do i'm like i'm gonna laser a bunch of packaging while i'm doing this and Everything would be a hunky -dory.
jamie peacock: Yep.
Curt: So I started putting... uh card stock sheets in and just hitting go go go and it's like i spent the entire day Like. just doing my shit and As I was hitting go go, go, go, go, go, I didn't think anything. was awry everything was coming like i checked the parts as they were coming out i'm like all the laser packaging is coming out wonderfully um So I spent, yeah I don't know, six hours doing this.
Curt: And then. ah had them all stacked up and then i grab my box i'm going to pack up orders and then i take one of the like laser things that i lasered and like go to origami fold it and put it in my box and i'm like Oh, it's not even like...
Curt: It's not even remotely close to the size of the box. I'm like... like i'm like a quarter inch or like a half inch out i'm like Huh? I'm like... okay well obviously my box size changed because i ordered it like i'm like this is this is the problem like obviously the supplier sent me the wrong box or something so i go and check on my old boxes that i still had i'm like but doesn't fit my old box either and then it like dawned on me like ah one night where i was like
Curt: hey instead of ordering multiple size boxes why don't you just standardize everything to like one size box because the shipping cost wasn't any different and they're actually more like rigid and i'm like and then what i'll do is i'll update the laser file so that everything fits and that little update the laser file so everything fits just went into the ether.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: and ah Yeah.
jamie peacock: Ugh.
Curt: So then I was like. fuck so like i didn't care about like the it's just it's paper so i just throw it in the burn pile like i don't care about the whatever you know
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: 100 sheets of paper I burned through, whatever. But I was like... oh that's like six hours of lasering to get all this thing done so then i was like Anyways, I ended up being able to like basically... laser a little jig into the laser and then i could put all the parts there and it took another Like.
Curt: 20 seconds per just to correct them to correct that is the size.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: um So I got that all fixed. But yeah, this is it. Just a perfect situation where I was like, oh, this is where batching... boxy And, like...
jamie peacock: Batch versus One Piece Flow.
Curt: One piece flow. And the thing is, if I would have one piece flowed one part, if I was folded up one box entirely and put it together.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: It would have been perfect. um and But yeah, I was just like.
jamie peacock: Oh.
Curt: Idiot. It worked out.
jamie peacock: Yeah, that's funny. It's funny when it isn't happening to me
Curt: Worked out in the end. but yeah it's exactly it's yeah i was just like
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: I wasn't too stressed about it, but like when it's like machining and it's like a lot of like material cost and everything, that's when I get sweaty.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: excuse me this one i didn't get sweaty when i was nervous but i was like oh no i just burned a bunch of times
jamie peacock: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. Yeah, that's that can be very, very annoying.
Curt: anyways It worked out.
jamie peacock: Um,
Curt: Yeah. So, uh...
jamie peacock: Yeah. Which one?
Curt: Oh. Woods. ro Or is that Fancy Valve?
jamie peacock: Or a...
Curt: is that i
jamie peacock: Yeah. I was... ah well, three days ago years old. When I discovered that the Oro doesn't always just piss water. So. I was under the impression that when the RO is pressurized, the RO system,
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: It's just always bypassing, but it isn't. It only bypasses when you're actually tapping water off of the system. So I've got the pressure booster tank thing.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: And... Once that's at pressure and full, It stops pissing water out the drain. And when you open the tap. And it goes from the booster thing into your cup. and you close the tap and then it fills the bootstrap again it pisses water until it the booster tank is full again.
jamie peacock: so I can just leave the RO system on. I was going to be turning it on and off. so yeah i learned that from the Business and Machining Podcast. saunders mentioned the valve so i'm like hey hang on let me go check if mine does that and it does which is kind of cool so i was like this seems wasteful that it's always pissing water because
Curt: oh
jamie peacock: Whenever I've run my RO, the pipe is open. It goes into a bucket, so it's always pissing water. Um,
Curt: Sure, sure.
jamie peacock: meanwhile i could have just left it on for years on end um So I was that I was
Curt: Oh, okay.
jamie peacock: like this old when i discovered it uh super useful to know because now we have ro water because apparently our workshop water is poisonous Carl drank the workshop water for the first time.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: since we've been there. and he instantly got nauseous and wanted to throw up and yeah
Curt: Oh no.
jamie peacock: So. Yeah, I've been feeling shit since we moved in there like i being sick since we moved in and I don't know if it's the water So I'm now drinking RO water at work. not tap water.
jamie peacock: We still use tap water for the coffee and shit, but that gets cooked, so it's fine.
Curt: Sure. Yeah, I guess. Yeah.
jamie peacock: yeah so but yeah are kind of weird like carl was bringing water from home in bottles and the bottles were empty so he just filled it up put it in the fridge and then as soon as he drank that water he started feeling sick
Curt: perfect
Curt: Hmm. That's less than good.
jamie peacock: Sir.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah, I don't know. Weird. um so now we just run it through the ro system and have our water at work
Curt: Clever.
jamie peacock: except the tap is not mounted anywhere.
Curt: That works.
jamie peacock: The tap, it's a little little hook on it, so it's designed to just hook onto the drums for the anno setup, and then you just open the tap and fill the drum. um
Curt: ah Okay.
jamie peacock: Sorry, I'm not mounting the tap. If you want to use water pick the tap up, hold it over your glass, open it, close it.
Curt: Yeah, fair. It'll work.
jamie peacock: Yeah, it was like It'll work. um
Curt: it's a temporary solution
jamie peacock: It's a permanent temporary solution. Because the RO system is actually there for the Anno setup. But yeah now we're drinking RO water.
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: Um, So tell me about how you are shipping automations.
Curt: more automations.
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: that's just ah Let's just, just. it's It stems from this. madness that is going on in the world right now where everything is in flux and continuously changing so a lot of my uh american customers reached out and there's they said like hey like no matter the tariff like i still want to order from you and i appreciate that that's very kind ah for people to say um and then some people were concerned they're like does your chair fly i'm like no i'm still protected but things are changing the problem is like it breaks All my automated systems.
Curt: So like the systems that take the orders and bring them in and just like auto populate SKUs and weights and shipping and all like.
jamie peacock: yeah
Curt: everything breaks. So everything is. Hmm. being done manually right now because things are just in flux um So yeah, it's just, I just. I keep finding ways to like. get around the most recent like way i've been messed up where it's like okay now this automation will actually correct for this so like i have like a ton of automations on the go that are trying to like Just figure shit out as.
Curt: Things keep changing. So anyways, hopefully there's a point of stability here i don't really care where the stability point lands As long as it's... constant for like a little bit so i could ship products without just having to be like
jamie peacock: yeah
Curt: oh right i gotta change this now because this changed and so
jamie peacock: Yeah, it's Cunnell handles that shit for me and they do a really good job of it.
Curt: Anyway.
Curt: I am really happy with the flow I have now between ah that, like I talked about last week, that aftership and... ah chit chats is one of them that i use a lot and that interfaces with the usps and all the carriers and then um I still actually use ShipStation because it does a better.
Curt: It lets me bulk orders and do things better, and I can export out of that. So I have 19 different pieces of shipping software. But. It works better because I can... i have to If I have to batch correct something, it's so much easier just to use...
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: software so
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: Yeah. It's a. It's annoying, but it's one of those things. It's one of those things where I take a ton of time to do it.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: And if I get it wrong and I ship someone the wrong product, then it's it's on me and it's like it's annoying and it takes time and people get... upset because they don't have the product and like i don't want to make a mistake and to date Knock on wood, I don't think I've made any shipping mistakes.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: So I want to keep it that way.
jamie peacock: Nice.
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: Yep.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: no shipping yeah shipping is also one of the things i don't want to let go of because It's the last leg. look You fuck it up there and...
Curt: Totally.
jamie peacock: See ya. yeahp it's difficult to correct for
Curt: It's... it's the last light and i do like i i factor in my prices so i do get paid to ship a product so like it is factoring in my time but like it doesn't give you a lot of time like i can't sit there and spend an hour on someone's package or else i will be poor um So.
jamie peacock: Nah, 100%.
Curt: It's. Yeah.
jamie peacock: yeah shipping yeah shipping as you scale becomes uh
Curt: Bye.
jamie peacock: more and more challenging
Curt: Yeah, like I said, tell...
jamie peacock: Let's.
Curt: it
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Anybody, just just go to your kitchen. And ah take ah a knife or a spoon and wrap it in tinfoil and put it in a Ziploc bag. And tell me how many you can do in an hour. I mean, don't because that's a waste of time.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: But like you got to do if you gotta to do a thousand. Yeah. You can be there a long ass time. So.
jamie peacock: Yep. no exactly um
Curt: Yeah. Anyway.
jamie peacock: So let's cover the bamboo issue that I had. I think I might have covered this.
Curt: Yes.
jamie peacock: Anyway, my printer's running beautifully now that I put a new hotend in it.
Curt: Oh, right, yeah, because your nose was fucked.
jamie peacock: Yeah, because then, yeah, the hot end was fucking leaking.
Curt: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
jamie peacock: Okay, so we did cover that. But yeah, 0 .6 nozzle for the win. Like, fucking just spewing out material. Uh, we busy. Well, we're done printing now. made rollers for our sawhorses that Oh the perfect heart!
jamie peacock: They're magnet on and they're the perfect heart to the bandsaw.
Curt: Nice.
jamie peacock: and it takes one bar and you slide it on rollers and it goes into the bandsaw and can be cut because I have an automatic bandsaw.
Curt: Right, yeah.
jamie peacock: I won't elaborate on that I'll send Kurt a picture. but I can't elaborate on it on the podcast.
Curt: check
jamie peacock: Um, but yeah anyway okay so bamboo we know about the bamboo thing being fixed the other issue i've got with bamboo printer is when i'm printing these grid finesse trays
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: They warp. and literally lift the bed off the magnet in the corners. So there's like little, little lineys over there where.
Curt: Right. Right.
jamie peacock: where the bed started you can actually actually see it there quite well Um,
Curt: Yeah, yeah.
jamie peacock: where it actually lifted the bed off the magnets. That's not. a deal breaker just something interesting i think i need to buy an enclosed printer for big prints like this
Curt: Yeah, that's ah PLA or?
jamie peacock: ptg
Curt: Okay. Hmm.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Weird. oh
jamie peacock: So yeah. That's what it is.
Curt: Hmm.
jamie peacock: like it's Our workshop is not exactly warm. so it kind of makes sense so yeah i think uh a p1s is the next thing in the queue
Curt: Okay, yeah.
Curt: Or a box. A box is cheaper. You could try a box.
jamie peacock: i need I need bigger print volume because this, I can't print a gridfinity tray for the BT30 version.
Curt: Oh.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: Because...
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yo. I don't have enough travel. So they want minis fine for 90 % of what I do, but then there's that 10 % that needs a bigger printer. and I mean, I have that, but I don't want to do it on there.
Curt: Well, yeah, totally. Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah. like the color changes are super easy just pause the print unload the filament load the filament to carry on
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: it's uh yeah they want the bamboo stuff really just works well So. Your daily cash generation. Because that leads into my hourly rate thing.
Curt: yeah that's kind of interesting because i think a lot of i mean i think aj talks about uh like what he makes per day which is it's helpful like for people listening to this podcast because it's hard it's
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: we all judge each other on Instagram and we only post the best shit. So it's like.
jamie peacock: yes
Curt: you don't If you're not bringing in a new 5 -axis every month. you kind of feel like you're falling behind. You're not.
jamie peacock: Yep.
Curt: um So ah basically I calculated out how much ah how much I make over over this, like, let's say this last batch of pens. So it worked out to be right around $500 a day. uh which is what i was making which is totally reasonable like that's gonna be more than i'm gonna make it Most jobs, um but.
Curt: at the same time like i mean that works for me because i have like zero overhead
jamie peacock: That's... Yeah, that's a very interesting number you landed on there, but we'll get to that another.
Curt: Yeah, so like and it was just like I want to I want to. Change that to like I want to increase that of course everyone wants to increase it um
jamie peacock: not everyone wants to increase it yet
Curt: Yeah, but say I want to increase it at... the uh limits of my sanity too like i want to still enjoy what i'm doing like yeah i can make quadruple that uh if i hated myself um and i don't i don't want to do that like ah there's a balance between what i want like if
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: yeah there's there's a lot of there's a lot of factors to play enjoy what you do and enjoy your life and like be able to live the life you want to live and that's kind of how We all want to be.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: um But yeah, it basically it works out for me. ah about a thousand If I can make about $1 ,000 a day. um That's pretty. Like that, that covers a lot of shit that lets me.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: That lets me grow with. machines here that lets me prototype that gives me that gives me a lot of runway to do all kinds of shit um and like as i said do the Let's do the, let's say work 75 % research or like. build new products for 25%.
Curt: um So yeah, if I get to that $1 ,000 a day area, that's about kind of the sweet spot for me.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: sweet spot for my current lifestyle um which is is ample so um But I'm also not going to bitch at $500 a day because that's...
jamie peacock: So.
Curt: more I was making out a day job.
jamie peacock: That. So that brings our my hourly rate thing in too. It lands pretty much on $500 a day is what we need to, we need to hit a thousand Rand an hour.
Curt: Mm.
jamie peacock: as an average through the month if we want to work. Only 168 up. hours a month. and that is to break even
Curt: Right, okay.
jamie peacock: That's not making money yet, that's paying salaries and breaking even.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: um so like we now running running the lathes at A lower than our ideal rate? But we're running 15 ,000 ports. So they are going to run flat out eight hours a day.
jamie peacock: Four.
Curt: Mm.
jamie peacock: three or four weeks, so We are hitting that number between the two. Well, we're not actually hitting that number between the two dates. With the third lathe, we hit that number. Um, and with any work i bring in we normally just bolster those numbers up but like we are targeting a thousand dollars a day is what our actual daily target is for jspec and then that sets us up for growth and whatnot and that's only 61 that's like Well, I'll...
jamie peacock: What we have to hit is $61 an hour. is what we need to be hitting. as our average for the month. Um,
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: but then like i did the molds and the molds are just fucking stupid um
Curt: Right, right.
jamie peacock: Like they were. depending on how I cut that up. that was like a thousand five hundred dollars a day just on what i was doing
Curt: Yeah, and that's...
jamie peacock: That includes hand sanding.
Curt: And that's why I always like I run this calculation and these when I say day I'm talking about like I will start work like reasonable hours These are not 12 hour days.
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: Like these are eight ish hours days
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Um, some somebody's a little bit longer somebody's a little bit shorter but they're roughly eight eight hour days
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Excuse me, five days a week. Um, and averaged out to 30 days because like you said some days I make. less money. than a guy collecting cans and some days I make crazy money it's just a It just depends on what I'm doing.
jamie peacock: Yes. The pins, yeah. 100 %
Curt: Yeah. So if I average it over 30 days, that gives me a really good. a really good kind of running total.
jamie peacock: So we... We did our calculations on... Worst case, we're working a 12 hour day. So we calculated our throughput on 12 hours of the day.
jamie peacock: At, uh...
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: of that only Nine hours old. like actual work hours the extra The extra hour's up. Sorry, 11 hour day. No fuck.
jamie peacock: Sorry, trying to figure out the math. Anyway, what it came down to was nine hours of the machine running per day.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: Five days a week.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Which leaves us... Extra days if we need them. These are two extra days of shit -its -the -fan per week. We can run extra hours. We can run later. But the goal is to work. Eight hours a day.
jamie peacock: Like 40 hours a week is where we actually trying to get to. Um,
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: But obviously with low low value parts, we need to run slightly more hours to just... Get the quantity out the door.
Curt: Yeah. Un.
jamie peacock: because that's yeah i'm going to i'm just look at lathes like little lathes.
Curt: i should know
Curt: I should also preface this by saying, $500 a day for me. is ah plenty to live on and cover all my bills but the thousand dollars a day mark is to basically
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: it's It's the long term. it's it gives it's my It's my quote, pension. It lets me.
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: Pay. Health. I mean, i Canada is a little different, but whatever. It lets me. uh account for that lets me account
jamie peacock: Put some money away for the future.
Curt: Put money away for when I want to retire so I don't have to do this. I'm going to do this probably till I...
jamie peacock: yes
Curt: Just like. until I'm an ancient old man because I enjoy it.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: At least that's what I... think right now but at the same time I want to plan for like maybe that's not going to be my case and I don't want to be 70 and be like well if I don't work next week I starve. So that's where the.
jamie peacock: 100%.
Curt: So increasing that comes into play. It's like, oh, let's put some money away.
jamie peacock: Look.
Curt: Someday I could retire if I wanted to.
jamie peacock: With us. With us moving to the shop my monthly overhead obviously we'll call on as well The monthly overhead literally doubled for Jspec.
Curt: Yeah, makes sense.
jamie peacock: And even at that, it's not fucking like in comparison to what I've... heard from the guards overseas um It's not a huge amount of money, but it's... it's nine thousand dollars a month that we need to
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: put through to just cover. the business being existing and me not starving.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah.
jamie peacock: That's me taking just what I need out the business to pay for, health insurance, rent, all that shit. It's not me taking an extra.
Curt: Yep.
jamie peacock: couple of thousand dollars to put into retirement or any of that shit yet
Curt: Yep.
jamie peacock: So that's it.
Curt: That's it. that's That's basically where I'm at too.
jamie peacock: bing
Curt: like It covers covers all my bills.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: It covers the machine payment. It covers the house. it covers like It covers that kind of shit.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: and That's about it. like There's not a lot of...
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: put her away for a rainy day kind of stuff yeah yeah
jamie peacock: It's me. Yes. but that's all like now being moving to the shop having call on board allows us to
Curt: So.
jamie peacock: put ourselves like the goal is to get into a cash positive position We obviously owe the guy who helped us with the move. uh he's now he gave us 15 000 parts for next month because he wants to get paid back quicker um so we're running those parts at like a stupidly low rate i said to him next month i'm like Listen.
jamie peacock: If all goes well, and I've got work as well. Obviously, I'm away, so it's a bit difficult. But if I've got stuff on the books, then sure, we'll pay you back. it like We've got a spreadsheet. like What does... What is the...
jamie peacock: bare minimum he we can take from the job that we don't go backwards and everything extra we pay him pay to him. to settle up as quickly as we can We should be done with that in the next three months. with the the loan there and then then we printing money So we're going to eat shit for three months and then...
Curt: Yeah, totally
jamie peacock: We should be good. but then the quantities of those orders go down. Because right now he's just putting stock down to get his money back.
Curt: Go.
jamie peacock: because he needs to buy the property that they're in. like all of a sudden they now have to buy the building and the more money he can put into that. The bigger... percentage he owns of the building.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Because they're buying it between the three directors.
Curt: Well, and like...
Curt: And... and Like and and same kind of. in my situation for like loans as well like this time next year like The machine frees up.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: six i pay 1600 bucks a month on its loan Um, So like. Because I wanted to do that. I wanted to pay it off in about three years' time. So next year at this time, it'll be it'll be paid off.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: So then all of a sudden that. freeze up a little bit extra cash and that cash could just like you said
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: Go into.
jamie peacock: Well... I was chatting to i was cha to my brother this week and he's like, hey, have you paid off your machine yet?
Curt: Rainy day fund.
jamie peacock: I'm like, no. My brother -in -law asked me not to pay it off quickly. Because...
Curt: Hmm.
jamie peacock: He doesn't have any income at the moment. he's just moved to Madagascar, still getting shit set up. The money I pay him for the machine every month goes to just keeping them, like giving them cash flow to keep afloat.
jamie peacock: So he's like, please don't pay me like a lump sum and settle it.
Curt: Mm.
jamie peacock: He's kind of counting on the interest. So I'm like, that's fine.
Curt: Oh, okay.
jamie peacock: we can keep going
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: but if that works better for you that that's fine that lets me get a little bit more cash positive before we We move on like um I want to buy another lathe uh if i've got
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: We're going to get POs out until February probably. then that I can go to the magazine. Oh, he can't. He has orders. Lock.
Curt: Mm hmm.
jamie peacock: Let's get a machine to get these out the fucking door. But even the machine um the delay I'm looking at buying is not. particularly expensive. um It's a $21 ,000 machine.
Curt: Right, yeah.
jamie peacock: Brand new life.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Fuck. It's not expensive. Although I might go another retrofit. because I can do it for a third of that. um It's just a case of finding a victim.
Curt: hang
jamie peacock: to uh to retrofit and The thing is with us having the shop and having the space, we can put it in.
Curt: Yeah. he Yeah.
jamie peacock: We're still running production. When I get a gap, I can work on it. um so yeah we we might go that route although i might try to find something with a bar feeder this time
Curt: Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
jamie peacock: But yeah I need to actually go visit the guy I bought the Emco and the Goodway from and go see if he's got anything laying around. that i can abuse.
Curt: ah Nice.
jamie peacock: yeah But I mean, having called it retrofits makes sense because the machines are still running.
Curt: Nice.
Curt: Fair. Yeah.
jamie peacock: It's nuts.
Curt: yeah
jamie peacock: Everything stands because Jamie's playing on Sartor, busy doing a retrofit.
Curt: Yeah, exactly.
jamie peacock: So yeah we will we will see.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: But yeah, the the hourly rate thing like that, that's something I find very interesting. like Everyone keeps it very close to the chest what they are billing per hour.
Curt: Yeah, and like it's...
jamie peacock: But...
Curt: Whatever. It is what it is.
jamie peacock: I mean, products products are a different situation, like job shopping, hourly rates.
Curt: like it's
jamie peacock: and product based hourly rate are two very very different things products are way more lucrative
Curt: oh yeah i know what's coming down the pipe next week for sure and it's not it's not a surprise and for sure absolutely Yeah.
jamie peacock: No. Yes.
jamie peacock: But I mean, even the margins on products are a lot higher usually.
Curt: Yeah. Yeah, especially if you like, I'm lucky enough that every product that's high in demand and i I could probably still increase my prices and not.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: not go under. um So it's.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: It's a nice place to be. to be in. Um,
Curt: oh absolutely yeah absolutely
jamie peacock: Okay, we've got one more topic left. IMTS Planning.
Curt: Yes.
jamie peacock: So...
Curt: Shoot.
jamie peacock: Yes, I have got a plan for IMTS for which halls I'm heading on which mornings.
Curt: Heh.
jamie peacock: uh i will be publishing that i'll probably just poke it on my instagram uh so if anyone wants to tag along just really like the mornings i'm going with a little bit of purpose like i've got boots i want to look at uh the afternoons are pretty much just a yolo if people want to go look at stuff and want opinions i'll go give opinions opinions are free um And then obviously the first three days of INTS, there are meetups.
jamie peacock: On the Monday is the loan machinist meetup at 2pm at the G28 booth. on Tuesday. is the taps and patients meet up at the Tormach booth at 2 p .m. and on Wednesday At the Kern booth is the Instant Machinists with Intolerance meetup at 3 p .m., not 2 p .m.
jamie peacock: Look forward to seeing everybody at all of those. um I think the instant machines one is going to be a freaking blast. That's going to run the whole afternoon. like they expect to get nothing done from three till you get kicked out of the booth um But yeah, that's going to be a lot of fun.
jamie peacock: uh seeing everybody and being a social butterfly because Yeah, I'm getting really excited now. Everyone's talking about the social butterfly aspect of IMTS now.
Curt: ah
jamie peacock: So... Yeah, it's going to be a proper duel. I'm very excited for it.
Curt: that's That's awesome.
jamie peacock: That's all. Sweet. What is in your Google box, Kurt?
Curt: ah In my Google box is Libra office because I... Got. Super tired of Adobe, and I just... Yeah, I've never enjoyed their software so LibreOffice lets you open PDFs and edit them and do whatever the heck you want to them That's literally the only reason I had Adobe um After ship.
Curt: Once again, because I was using it, I like it. ah tbs one that's a a drone frame. I'm looking at Prince.
jamie peacock: Nos.
Curt: parts I'd but there's a ton of AliExpress parts. Just sitting over there. looking at me right now they came in today i'm so excited there's my little tiny whoops and Yeah.
jamie peacock: Oh, nice. Okay.
Curt: uh vape shops because i was looking to buy 18 650 cells locally and that was the only place i could think of that would probably have a bunch of eight
jamie peacock: Okay. how's that yes
Curt: They do have them. Nobody knew what an 18650 cell was, but I was like, that.
jamie peacock: No. So the problem there is they've been mislabeled Like, horribly mislabeled.
Curt: Oh, yeah.
jamie peacock: Yeah, 1865D. Sorry. 18650. the max capacity you will get. is 3 ,000 milliamps, and those are Panasonics.
Curt: Yep.
jamie peacock: Go to the vape shop.
Curt: That's what I bought
jamie peacock: You can get a $25 ,000 million.
Curt: Oh, I know. Yeah. That's yeah. Thankfully the ones around here, they were all either the Samsung cells or the Panasonic cells. um So yeah, I got...
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: Yeah, I got some decent ones. And. The Zone? uh sim it's on steam if if you fly fpv if you're into this uh which none of you are um it's actually ah it' an It's kind of a potato -looking sim. but the physics are.
Curt: Amazing. They're so good.
jamie peacock: cat
Curt: like it it feels it feels exactly like my my five inch uh and none of the sims do so yeah it's good It's good stuff.
jamie peacock: Okay. That's cool.
Curt: Made by a local YouTube dude. So yeah.
jamie peacock: Oh, nice.
Curt: Anyways. anyways Yeah.
jamie peacock: Oh, speaking of YouTube dudes.
Curt: What's you?
jamie peacock: Mr. Steel put a video out. Um,
Curt: I watched it. yeah
jamie peacock: Yeah, going over the rise and fall of Rotor Riot.
Curt: Yep. Yeah, I was.
jamie peacock: Yeah, that's what I watched the other night
Curt: That was cool.
jamie peacock: Really good. um Yeah, I've got ER nuts because you're making ER. Oh jeez, I'll call it all the thingies. That's what I get for talking to my wife and now fucking dying.
jamie peacock: One second.
Curt: I don't know how that has any relation.
jamie peacock: Sorry, she's going to an air show.
Curt: but
jamie peacock: She wanted to know if I wanted to go with, but I actually need to get stuff done today.
Curt: Oh.
Curt: Air shows. I love those.
jamie peacock: Yeah. Sorry, one sec. Oh, fuck. Okay. Win later, because trying to... figure out the issue with Saints 4. Rugged phone. because Carl said rugged phone and now my Instagram has adverts. for rugged phone Um...
jamie peacock: Looking for a cold sore? so i was looking marketplace and new and trying to figure out where i can get a decent quality cold saw for cutting aluminium Oh, jeez. Looking up. looking at micro center.
jamie peacock: because it's micro center.
Curt: I wanna go. I wanna go.
jamie peacock: So... Jacob and I are going to Micro Center after we visit Justin. I might just go and buy a... DJ Osmo Nano while I'm there. and then looking up the INTS map.
Curt: I got those. I got another store while you're in.
jamie peacock: I feel.
Curt: ah New York. But anyways, carry on. Sorry, keep talking.
jamie peacock: All right, okay. Yeah, then the IMTS map. because I've been looking at all the booths.
Curt: Cool.
jamie peacock: what ah Where can people find you and your things?
Curt: ah You can find me and my things at confoundedmachine .com. Uh... This whole next month I'm just... going to be working on stock for pre -sale um so if there's uh if you've registered that go to the contact page and put your email in there and then i'll i'll email you when it's coming up
jamie peacock: And spell your email properly.
Curt: And spell your email properly because one person was yelling at me.
jamie peacock: Thank you.
Curt: um saying that they never get my emails and then i checked and then i realized they maybe made a little bit of a typo and then he still chastised me about not having systems linked together so yeah Typical. Typical coder.
jamie peacock: Typical Jacob.
Curt: talking out of their uh talking stay in their lane I love Jacob.
jamie peacock: na
Curt: He's he's such a nice, he's such a kind dude.
jamie peacock: So we're going to have a faucet IJ as I lock this.
Curt: so I won't even be there, so you have to fight for me.
jamie peacock: Um,
jamie peacock: We can follow up the cardboard cutouts. um Yeah. So Danik and I were discussing yesterday revamping my... JSpecsArt. because it's ah it's looking very dated.
jamie peacock: I don't know if she'll do it this week, but anyway.
Curt: Okay.
jamie peacock: You can find me at jspeceng .com. On there, there's a link to Nautical Workholding, to the jspec underscore engineering. Instagram and to Nordic. uh To the online store where you can buy shirts.
jamie peacock: i know I think I got them in the order.
Curt: Hm.
jamie peacock: Anyway, yeah, nautical workholding. which we will be doing the transfer of the domains at some point. Um, apparently i just need to go i just don't know which login to use for our domain provider so i'll make that i could do that this week
Curt: Mm.
jamie peacock: Um, But yeah, anyway, you can find us at jspickng .com. That's the... That's the gist of it. I got a little bit sidetracked. What do you have to tomorrow, Kurt?
Curt: ah Oh, I found the name of that store, B and &H Photo. You have to go to B and &H Photo if you're in New York.
jamie peacock: Good night.
Curt: It's a camera shop. And it's like multiple levels. It's yeah, it's insane.
jamie peacock: Oh, geez.
Curt: Peace.
jamie peacock: Okay.
Curt: If you're into that shit, if you're not into cameras, don't go, but it's.
jamie peacock: i'll go just because uh
Curt: It's... Got a ton of shit there
jamie peacock: Yeah. um Yeah, we got three days in New York, so.
Curt: Ah.
jamie peacock: Why not?
Curt: Oh, you have time.
jamie peacock: All right.
Curt: Go there.
jamie peacock: Yeah.
Curt: Um,
jamie peacock: What the hell? that's cool Yeah, I made the mistake of going there now
Curt: oh bnh yeah i kind of wish i went there went on there anyways um tomorrow i'm doing We'll do it tomorrow. I think I'm going to... a wedding, actually. I think I'll go to a wedding tomorrow.
jamie peacock: Hi.
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Fancy!
Curt: Yeah. So that's what I got going on. How about you? What are you doing?
jamie peacock: I am. Not sure. I might go to the workshop today and just run knives or run Alice bands or whatever. um I'm kind of running out of time before we...
jamie peacock: wish about. So... i need to sort packaging for this i just need to sort out the cardboard inserts to make this fit in the box properly So that is definitely happening it's happening today. um Yeah, I don't think no brother went to the air show.
jamie peacock: So... I don't know. I might just go to the issue as well, but... I don't feel like standing in the sun for six hours today.
Curt: Yeah, fair.
jamie peacock: The problem is, yeah I've got shit to do and I'm not getting to...
Curt: and
jamie peacock: Not getting to it. So I need to... Just buckle down and get a bunch of odds and ends done today. I also need to anodize a gray anchor point, mechanical anchor point.
Curt: Makes sense.
Curt: Mmm.
jamie peacock: It's gonna get a chart on it
jamie peacock: Let's see if he listens. Um,
Curt: ahead
jamie peacock: Yeah, so i need to I need to get stuff together for... bringing with me to the US4. demos and things.
Curt: Cool.
jamie peacock: So. Lots of fun. And then, yeah, are our backpacks arrived. Putting fanciness on the backpacks.
Curt: Ooh.
jamie peacock: Yes.
Curt: Look at you.
jamie peacock: I know.
Curt: So fancy.
jamie peacock: DTF for the win. Danik is doing DTF printing. tomorrow she's sending out like five or six one meter lengths of DTF for printing. And then you'll pick it up on Wednesday and then do all the transfers to all the shirts and things.
Curt: Cool. Cool.
jamie peacock: Shirts bags bags more bags some other bags Yeah. It's going to be great fun.
Curt: yeah Nice.
jamie peacock: so because Yeah, It's rapidly approaching. Like we're literally leaving.
Curt: No doubt, yeah.
jamie peacock: We're leaving in eight days.
Curt: It's crazy.
jamie peacock: Slightly terrifying. that's all
Curt: Yeah.
jamie peacock: Anyway... Thank you, patrons. Thank you, people, for listening. um and the patrons as well thank you if you enjoyed the podcast please consider sharing it and liking and subscribing and all those things.
jamie peacock: well the podcast is also on youtube uh Go subscribe there so we can stay ahead of... to have some patience. just to annoy them.
Curt: Exactly.
jamie peacock: Mark literally just to annoy them.
Curt: It's the only reason. Okay.
jamie peacock: um Yeah. Anyone got any recommendations for a podcast player that isn't Spotify, please DM me. because Spotify's fucking useless and I hate it. Um, But if you've been listening on there, please go like the podcast on Spotify.
jamie peacock: But yeah, thank you very much for listening and dara we'll see you guys next week.
Curt: Take care, all.
