Diving continues.......................

I scrounged up some time to get a little paint on the dive sign today. I had primed it yesterday between cutting vinyl and a delivery for another job. It is quickly coming together now. It will be a nice piece to hang on display in the other sign shop. I am really starting to like these kinds of signs. I may just make a killer sign for this kind of work, and put it out front of the shop. It would be great stuff to do between jobs. The helmet got all it's patina on it, and all that's left for that is to attach the porthole cages. Painting has been a joy, when I get the chance, and it moves along fairly quickly! I really should have done it double sided with a full helmet in the middle, but my HDU supply is getting low, and I can't get any more until late next week! I have decided to make a bracket with rusty chains that the sign will hang from. I think this will knock it out of the park. I have a bunch of styrene to machine for a friend of mine on Sunday, so I will be able to get more painting done as our Techno cnc chews out that stuff. With a trade show booth looming around the corner, I will have to paint fast!

In this photo, the text has been done on the top, and the rust is just starting on the bottom text. The wood grain went really fast, as did the blue color.

I couldn't wait to place the helmet and porthole cages in place for the photo. It can be a little like Christmas when the parts all start to come together!


JO

Dive sign gets a turn

I excitedly got to the shop today to get the start of the Dive Sign going. I had already created all the vectors and the 3d helmet a couple of weeks back. Now that the router was free, I was going to get it cut today. I hadn't toolpathed the relief, which I thought that I had, so that kind of slowed me down at the start. But before long, I had the signfoam screwed down, and our Technocnc fired up. While that was running away, I was able to toolpath the rest of the parts that needed cutting. A couple of hours later, the parts were all machined and I started getting the primer on. This has been quite fun, from the design concept, right to the machining. I look forward to seeing it finished. Soon Jamie, soon.

#Technocnc keeps us very busy!

I am going to harp this blog on the benefits of owning a cnc router. This is a purchase that anybody who is involved in fabrication should be considering. I truly love my Techno cnc. I have said before that I have owned other machines, but Techno cnc is the one I stand by. There is no on-going compensation, or a bonus, or anything. My preference is Techno cnc, through and through. In order for someone to continually talk about, and continually promote a product, it has to be a reliable piece of gear, with exceptional customer service to back it up. Most cnc router purchases will be paid off completely by the 6-8 month mark, due to the diversity that they enable. We are always getting jobs that aren't related to movies and television at all. This is a direct result of good marketing, and the equipment to back it up. With a return like the one I just quoted, a fabrication company will actually LOSE money in the long run by NOT having one. When I started, I was on a very limited budget for a machine purchase, so I had to get a 'less than ideal' used machine. Still, I learned haw to use it quite well. That machine was paid off on the first job we got it for. Pretty nice if you ask me. This opened up the way for a second machine purchase. This one was considerably more money, but paid off in 3 months. By that point, I was ready for a 'real' machine. A Techno cnc router. Every time I fire up our Techno, I am assured it's going to do the job, and do it flawlessly, in record time. One of the last jobs we ran on it was trimming vac-formed shells for a Laser Quest game manufacturer. We originally machined the vac form mold for these vest plates, so getting us to trim the parts out of the vac-form sheet made sense. This kind of job is a far cry from 'props and sets', but shows how a Techno cnc can, and will, open the door to new business, regardless of the type of fabrication business your in. We have done custom wood mouldings for mansions, in-layed wood doors, styrofoam packaging prototypes, the list goes on and on. And we aren't in ANY of those businesses.

Every time we do a run of these vests, there are between 50 and 100 pieces. Once the file is written, it just gets used over and over again. Another job I couldn't do without our router!

JO