One of the things that I have been doing is spending more time than I planned at a machine shop. It's a Do-It-Yourself place where you buy a membership, get a safety checkout on some machines and they let you have at it. It's not hard to figure out who they are, but I'm not naming them because they're not a sponsor and our sponsors need promoting. Kinda one of those deals.
I have learned how to use a 3 axis mill and found it actually a lot of fun. It is deeply satisfying to actually make something from the bare materials. I have also taken up TIG welding. I'm at most an okay welder though. The key to both is practice. Shortly, I'll be using some of the saws and the lathes. There's been a lot of personal growth here, but it wasn't actually intended.
We had wanted to have everything purely done by the pros. We just don't have the cash: pro machinist/welder == fscking expensive. So, if this is going to happen, everywhere we can, we do ourselves. Tank welding we will not (with a blink tag) be doing ourselves! ;)
However, one of the weird direct effects of the Law of Unintended Consequences is that we are getting to be minor celebrities. We get besieged by people wanting to know what we're doing and more than a few actually knew of us before hand. "You're Phoenicia!?!" "Wow! It's so cool to meet you!" Then they go on to ask a lot of technical questions that they, honestly, only half understand the answers to. This takes up a lot of time we could be cutting, welding, etc.
I've been advised that I ought to blow off these people. After all, time really is precious and getting down to the machine shop really is nontrivial with my life right now. However, I really can't afford much in the way of bad press. Some of the people that frequent the DIY machine shop are quite well connected and quite well off. With Team Phoenicia being constantly with it's hat in hand...
I have learned how to use a 3 axis mill and found it actually a lot of fun. It is deeply satisfying to actually make something from the bare materials. I have also taken up TIG welding. I'm at most an okay welder though. The key to both is practice. Shortly, I'll be using some of the saws and the lathes. There's been a lot of personal growth here, but it wasn't actually intended.
We had wanted to have everything purely done by the pros. We just don't have the cash: pro machinist/welder == fscking expensive. So, if this is going to happen, everywhere we can, we do ourselves. Tank welding we will not (with a blink tag) be doing ourselves! ;)
However, one of the weird direct effects of the Law of Unintended Consequences is that we are getting to be minor celebrities. We get besieged by people wanting to know what we're doing and more than a few actually knew of us before hand. "You're Phoenicia!?!" "Wow! It's so cool to meet you!" Then they go on to ask a lot of technical questions that they, honestly, only half understand the answers to. This takes up a lot of time we could be cutting, welding, etc.
I've been advised that I ought to blow off these people. After all, time really is precious and getting down to the machine shop really is nontrivial with my life right now. However, I really can't afford much in the way of bad press. Some of the people that frequent the DIY machine shop are quite well connected and quite well off. With Team Phoenicia being constantly with it's hat in hand...
2 comments:
You need a Facebook group!
Carlos
"With Team Phoenicia being constantly with it's hat in hand..."
...it makes plenty of good sense to play point with public relations.
Investing a little time now may pay off big later!
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