What's the Question?

[AdanA]

So I'm thinking it's awesome this new group was started... but I'm curious what sort of discussions will turn out to be the truly down-to-earth valuable ones we have in this forum.

Looking out a couple of months from now, what's the discussion topic that's going to make you say, "Dang, it's a good thing we discussed X on the Prototypers Guild, 'cause otherwise it would have been a lot harder for me to do Y!"

[Jack Coats]

Adan,

My understanding is that this group isn't to REPLACE the Makerbot
group, but to focus on the possible business implications either for
manufacturing or a consultancy in all their various forms, rather than
the business of making Makerbots work and solving technical issues.
There will be some technical issues like 'how to run lots of 'bots'
that might be more appropriate here than elsewhere, just due to the
nature of 'business' vs hobby use.

That being said, I doubt anyone will say "go to ... group with that subject."

In short the business of this group is business that uses 3D builders.

Does that help?  Or am I off base with my understanding?

Thanks for asking. ... Jack

On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 5:23 PM, AdanA <ad...@akerworks.com> wrote:
>
> So I'm thinking it's awesome this new group was started... but I'm curious what sort of discussions will turn out to be the truly down-to-earth valuable ones we have in this forum.
>
> Looking out a couple of months from now, what's the discussion topic that's going to make you say, "Dang, it's a good thing we discussed X on the Prototypers Guild, 'cause otherwise it would have been a lot harder for me to do Y!"
>
>

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[Steven Castoe]

I thought it was well put. If we aren't finding answers we are looking for let's try better questions.

i.e. how many successful jobs have people completed?

I have had 3 real clients with real design jobs.

[Shawn Grant]

I've had one 'job'... a friend of mine that has an aquarium tank scraper product happened to be in the midst of deciding whether to alter the size of the product or add a second size to the product line when I got the Replicator.  Every time he wanted to adjust the size of the prototype it was taking a couple weeks and a couple hundred dollars to see the result.  He emailed me the stl and I gave him the print the next day.  He was super psyched.

On Friday, June 22, 2012 6:34:25 PM UTC-7, SVENEDT wrote:

I thought it was well put. If we aren't finding answers we are looking for let's try better questions.

i.e. how many successful jobs have people completed?

I have had 3 real clients with real design jobs.

On Jun 22, 2012 2:32 PM, "Jack Coats" <ja...@coats.org> wrote:

Adan,

My understanding is that this group isn't to REPLACE the Makerbot
group, but to focus on the possible business implications either for
manufacturing or a consultancy in all their various forms, rather than
the business of making Makerbots work and solving technical issues.
There will be some technical issues like 'how to run lots of 'bots'
that might be more appropriate here than elsewhere, just due to the
nature of 'business' vs hobby use.

That being said, I doubt anyone will say "go to ... group with that subject."

In short the business of this group is business that uses 3D builders.

Does that help?  Or am I off base with my understanding?

Thanks for asking. ... Jack

On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 5:23 PM, AdanA <ad...@akerworks.com> wrote:
>
> So I'm thinking it's awesome this new group was started... but I'm curious what sort of discussions will turn out to be the truly down-to-earth valuable ones we have in this forum.
>
> Looking out a couple of months from now, what's the discussion topic that's going to make you say, "Dang, it's a good thing we discussed X on the Prototypers Guild, 'cause otherwise it would have been a lot harder for me to do Y!"
>
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Prototypers Guild" group.
> To post to this group, send email to pt-g...@googlegroups.com.

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> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/pt-guild/-/9VUAmCBzTHcJ.
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[Steven Castoe]

I just picked up a client in medical instrument repair. He's got some new super tool he wants built.
Super exited
Anyone have a functioning laser cutter?

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[Steven Castoe]

Marketing: I have a part time job in an office supply store. This helps me do allot of my networking, I chat with people about their companies.

[Shane Graber]

How are you guys finding these clients?

Shane

Shane 

[Steven Castoe]

Go get business cards. The cheaper the better, you'll be handing them out so much you'll be practically throwing them away.
Be sure to ask other people what they do, during your conversation you'll need to tie in what you do. And be able to explain it easily. Any skills you might need for any particular job e.g. provisional patent writing, 3d modeling, etc. you'll want to develope those skills. and most of all network, drop off biz cards at hobby shops, dinners anywhere everywhere.
Write yourself a business plan (there is software for it) define your market, your competition etc. having a good business plan can easily get you a grant or low interest low risk loan.

Keep on believing.

[Joseph Chiu]

Try looking for a hackerspace/makerspace group near you. There are two around my neck of the woods that charge $4/mo plus machine time...

[Adan Akerman]

Jack,

Thanks, that's a nice way of describing the group's reasons for inception. We should flag that (and other thoughts that pop up here) for use in summarizing for others later.

Adan

[Adan Akerman]

Steven,

Excellent, I think that's a great way of starting topic, specific yet general, full of possibilities for comparison and discussion. 

I've had twenty more, yet none so far (officially) with the MakerBot. My ShopBot has been the main tool, and wood has been my medium of choice. But there are things that only plastic can/should be asked to do. Every job's been different, aside from The One Truth: the job you think you're starting is rarely the job everyone agrees upon at the end. Flexibility is the name of the game for the prototyper and the client. 

Another variation of the question for people: how many jobs have you had that went exactly like you thought they would? Shawn, your aquarium scraper sounds pretty straightforward, yet now that your friend has seen how amazing the cycle can be, I imagine you'll see interesting tangential job requests follow hard on the heels of this first one.

I say none so far officially with the Makerbot because I have actually used it already to pro-bono prototype several iterations of a tricky component of a complicated device I'm designing for some clients as part of my 'real' work: engineering design, supposedly not so much the prototyping. But when it's so easy to print stuff, and when it's so helpful to hold something in your hand and realize its shortcomings and possibilities in ways you never quite can on the screen, then I think prototyping and design will start to become inextricably linked. Maybe every designer has their Makerbot style thingy for lo-res prototyping, and then sends out to The Big Guys for fancy prints of more matured designs on The Fancy Machines. So far I haven't billed extra for this; I figure I'm in the honeymoon stage with the Makerbot and my prototypes aren't great quality because I'm not great at tuning the settings. But eventually I think I'll be able to start parallel billing: bill for design time, bill for even the lo-res prototyping that happens in the midst of early/middle stage design.

Marketing: it's been word of mouth for me, and YES: design+print+hand out cards as fast as possible. I like the idea of a part time job in a high-interaction position, such as Steven's office supply work. Interaction is how it's done, both IRL and online.

Tools: no matter how awesome your toolset (Shopbot and Makerbot, I'm set now!), the mere awareness of other tools and their capabilities will cause you to think of solutions that can only be realized with those (lasercutter, dang).