1364square feet (only 1080 is shop) in a complex in burlington. i don't have much, but will be getting a small lathe, some drill presses and tooling this weekend... will also be getting a real bandsaw and air compressor and some more damn outlets in the next week probably. hopefully within the first year i will have a cnc, the limiting factor though is going to be the small door for it to fit thru so it will have to be quite small.

mostly engine work wize? or everything on a car?
are you going to get a car lift at all?
p.s. looks good for a start

for the most part i don't plan on doing car stuff... i intend to use my background as a tool and die maker to keep myself busy doing general machining, fabrication and some light tooling build/repair work. car stuff will just be filler work for when things are slow. i don't want to limit myself to any one direction just yet though, if i get really busy i won't care too much what i'm working on. it would be nice to just do car stuff but there is far too much competition driving prices and profits down.

it'd also be kinda hard to get a car in since it is only dock loading, oh well, perhaps in the future one of the spaces with a larger door and grade loading may open up for me.

nice job....great start! good luck with the future

Congrats, the dock will be far more of a boon than an an grade door. When I had my shop open I desperately needed a dock. I was constantly chucking skids up onto a truck. Pita...

Paul

looks great, good luck with the shop

Originally Posted by weiRtech

it would be nice to just do car stuff but there is far too much competition driving prices and profits down.

So true! is that picture of the turbo b18b, in your avator you'rs?

that shop is very clean and tidy, how long will it stay that way, haha!

good luck with the shop, looks like you're off to a good start!!

Originally Posted by Trance|Ghost

So true! is that picture of the turbo b18b, in your avator you'rs?
that shop is very clean and tidy, how long will it stay that way, haha!

the shop will stay very clean, i need to keep things organized so i can find stuff- i can't stand a messy work place. things look a bit different now, i've gotten more machinery and tooling in the past few weeks. for my most recent project click here:
http://forums.vitalmotion.net/perfor...cation-wg.html

and yes, the turbo in my avatar is on my own car.

looks awesome man, congrats

congrats and good luck !

Originally Posted by weiRtech

hopefully within the first year i will have a cnc, the limiting factor though is going to be the small door for it to fit thru so it will have to be quite small.

If you got that knee mill in there without any problems, this may be right up your ally:

VM 1 Machining Center - Hurco 2005

It's footprint is no bigger than the mill you've got now. Starting price is just a hair under $40 000 USD. I don't know if that's good because I haven't actuallly priced out a mill to purchase yet, but it seems alright. The only thing I see about it is it uses it's own control software instead of GE or Siemens.

I know you're already in the trade and would more than likely teach me a thing or two on which CNC is better, but when I saw your post it reminded me of their ad so I thought I'd pass it along.


Looks like a nice shop though, good luck.

Congrats! Looks great thus far!

Originally Posted by fixitmattman

If you got that knee mill in there without any problems, this may be right up your ally:

VM 1 Machining Center - Hurco 2005

It's footprint is no bigger than the mill you've got now. Starting price is just a hair under $40 000 USD. I don't know if that's good because I haven't actuallly priced out a mill to purchase yet, but it seems alright. The only thing I see about it is it uses it's own control software instead of GE or Siemens.

I know you're already in the trade and would more than likely teach me a thing or two on which CNC is better, but when I saw your post it reminded me of their ad so I thought I'd pass it along.


Looks like a nice shop though, good luck.

i've had my eye on one of those for a couple years now... that is probably what i'd end up getting, or a haas... they have some creative lease terms available- you can lease your cnc based upon machine up-time. that is, you only pay for time the machine is turned on. if you are a good programmer and good at setups then it can be very worth while if you consider the cost.

well, i've been doing ok for the first couple months on my own. this month has been quite busy actually so i can't complain.

these are pics of a project i did for a place i worked part time at before i opened my own shop. it is the frame for a leak test stand for a specific exhaust system. i did some of the tooling as well but i didn't bother with many pics of that stuff. i'll post up pics of the fully assembled stand. i dropped it off at my customer's shop so they could wire everything up and install all the tooling onto it. the down side to this project was that i didn't have my mig until after i completed it... the up side though was that i was paid hourly for it so it didn't matter so much.




more shop stuff:




i got most of my equipment at auctions... there are some pretty good deals to be had at them for sure.

i have been doing a lot of this kinda stuff as well... industrial valve actuation. customer provides the valve and the actuator and i mount them together with a coupler joining them. pretty basic stuff but it is decent money when they give you an order for 30 at once.



just some welds on one of the tooling pieces for the leak test frame:




for anyone considering starting your own business, no matter what it is, there are a lot of things you don't consider in the beginning. i'm more of a hands on person so i'm not into doing the paperwork stuff, but i've found i spend almost as much time at the desk as i do in the shop... it is suprising at how little you actually get done in a day when you are the one who has to run out and pick up material, drop stuff off... thankfully one of my biggest customers is in the unit next to mine!

Very nice welds. Nice work. What's your main focus? Industrial or auto?

I saw a manifold in one of your pictures above, did you make it?

Lookin good bro.

Geezus H Christ! You Tig welded that leak tester? I hope you have a water cooler, just looking at that length makes my hands hurt Rofl...did you two pass it or do you have a really heavy duty tig? My 200 amp unit won't come close to single passing plate like that.

Paul

Originally Posted by Pharaoh

I saw a manifold in one of your pictures above, did you make it?

yes, that is a manifold for a bmw i did a while back.

Originally Posted by blkrx7

Geezus H Christ! You Tig welded that leak tester? I hope you have a water cooler, just looking at that length makes my hands hurt Rofl...did you two pass it or do you have a really heavy duty tig? My 200 amp unit won't come close to single passing plate like that.

Paul

i did it all single pass without any trouble. the tube wall is only 1/4". the only heavy plate is the two blocks on the end and they are just sitting on top. the other pieces are just 1/2" plate... no different than welding a head flange. i actually only did the 1/2" at 160amps. i just did some weaving on some of the bigger gaps like on the radius joints. if you add filler quick enough it works well. no water cooler... but i do have a 250 amp rated torch, although it is only a miller 180sd.

Haas are decent cnc's. Ive used them b4(when I did machining). Inexpensive and are workers. You can push them with some pretty fast feed rates through deep cuts. They're generally not high speed (spindles max @8000rpm, but you can get a air speed up kit thou) but the pwr is there to aug. Good all around cnc. Matsura is a really really good high speed, very acurate machine, but 2-3x as much.

If your tol are higher then +/- .0005 you'll be fine.