Need Help!- starting machine shop

[mikeybarber]

I would really like to start my own simple machine shop. The capital investment seems pretty large, so I'm curious how others have gotten their start. I would like to start with a Haas VMC in my garage, the thinking being that I could run parts in the evening and possibly in the morning for long runs, and keep my day job. The problem would be finding clients. Has anyone had success getting new customers over the internet?

I would be curious to know the following:

1) How have other shop owners gotten their start?

2) How do you solicit new customers?

Thanks,

Mike

[KIMFAB]

It's best if you have a product to sell but sometimes you can get by by looking at the help wanted ads for machinists and offer to do the work.
Keep your day job tho.

[jim adams]

How’s your day job Pay because the job shop is the toughest business there is.
The machine is the easy part and finding the work is not hard.
The hard part is doing the work on time and making money at the same time.
When I started we had all-nighters once a week sometimes two nights in a row.
You have Kids? Married?
I was.
Still have kids but no wife.
My partner is now going through a deviorce now.
You also need to have a good QA set up.
You can't send anything out that is not perfect.
Biding on line is very tough because you are biding against guy who have been doing it a long time and know the business right now it is even worse because of the slow down in Detroit lots of guys looking to keep the doors open.
Best way to go is to find a small company close to you that need one on one service.
Don't mean to bum you out but these are tough times

Good luck
P.S.
Don’t forget you need a business license and all the taxes that come with it
The current government is very unfriendly to small business.

[Donkey Hotey]

I'll end this thread in one post.

Take a gander over to this forum, spend a few hours looking at old threads and read the sentiments of other guys trying to pay the bills. See if you want to be a part of this market:
http://cnczone.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=74

Then take a look at the results in this poll and read the responses (all of them):
http://cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=78445

I bid a few jobs, just trying to help out some of the guys who were looking for precision machining. I have the machines, and for right now, it's a hobby/training center for me. I bought so I could manufacture my own goods, not be a job shop (I still have my day job).

The parts I bid were awarded for such low prices that I wouldn't even turn the machines on for that amount. It's honestly cheaper for me to ignore the bid-work, go to my day job and suck up some extra hours. I don't get overtime, I'm paid at straight hourly rate for extra hours. It was still more profitable for me to go to work than to wear out cutters, use up coolant, put time on my spindles and risk crashing my machines.

After you're done with the forums here, start cruising the used machinery market for 2-5 year old Haas machines from failed businesses (that probably had a lot more experience, machines and tooling to start with). eBay has a fair amount of Haas equipment listed and other sites specialize in the stuff. If you want to save 50% off of retail, buy everything from a guy who lost his butt trying to do what you're suggesting.

The entire country is in a manufacturing tail-spin. The auto industry was not the big companies. They were the consumers of the parts. Those parts were almost completely outsourced to small and medium sized machine shops. Consider the guy who had the wheel spindle contract for Saturn cars. He was guaranteed 100-200K spindles per year. Add a few more parts to his contract and he had a thriving business. Now he's out of work and scrambling for scraps to keep the lights on. You're going to be competing with him for work (even the small jobs).

If you were a standard, brick & mortar manufacturer, would you give a machining contract to a guy working out of his garage, during the evenings, or would you lean toward the machine shop that is there every day, with a staff, a QA department and a phone that works during regular business hours?

Keep in mind that a big contract like that isn't awarded by some stuffed shirt wanting to 'give you a chance.' It's awarded by some paper pusher in a cubicle who has to pick a supplier that isn't going to make them look like a moron. You'll need a stack of ISO certifications and probably a vendor approval inspection to even be awarded a paltry amount of work from a big company (IE: not going to be given to a guy in his garage).

What are you going to offer to get them to choose your garage over all the benefits of the 'real' machine shop? Not trying to badger but, really consider all of this because that's what's going to go through your potential customer's head.

If you aren't manufacturing your own goods (for at least 75% of your revenue), there is almost no hope of succeeding at what you're suggesting. In fact, I'd say that there is absolutely zero chance but, then, maybe you live in the center of an industrial area. Maybe all the other machine shops have gone out of business for no apparent reason, leaving a huge vacuum in your locale. Since that's not likely, you have zero chance of success.

There are guys making it but, they are producing their own goods. They are not 'machine shops'; they are manufacturers (that includes the design, marketing and sales).

There, that's the tough love lesson for the day.

I just hurt the feelings of a bunch of guys trying to survive right now. They'll chime in shortly, if the tone of this thread isn't making them sick. Sorry guys.

[Geof]

Originally Posted by Donkey Hotey I'll end this thread in one post. ........ here, that's the tough love lesson for the day. .....

Good grief! I thought I could lay reality on the line fairly well but I have met my master.

The sad part is that I cannot find fault with any of the sentiments expressed.

Isn't there a Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times."?

I think we are in interesting times.


Some advice I do have of a somewhat positive nature is: Don't try starting your own venture right now, but don't give the idea up altogether. Try and put money aside so that in the future when things seem brighter you have the resources to venture on your own. Learn, learn, learn; I think in the future there will be opportunities for people who can do everything from quick manual work up to fully CAD/CAM multi-axis stuff. Learn welding, electrical and electronic stuff, hydraulics and pneumatics, metallurgy and properties of materials; in other words become all-rounded.

The goal is to prepare yourself so that when an opportunity arises you can jump on it; whether or not it is starting your own business or just getting a better paying day job.

[Donkey Hotey]

Originally Posted by Geof Good grief! I thought I could lay reality on the line fairly well but I have met my master.

I wondered if you would find this thread.

Without naming names, there are guys on here who bought their own machines, put them in their own back building and are experiencing growth. The common thread seems to be that they bought the machines as tools for their own products or services. I don't think any of them intended to be general job shops that just hung out a shingle and hoped for the work to come in.

There is a local machine shop that I've dealt with through my day job. They are a great place, offer skilled machining, on new Haas machines, at a great price (too great IMO but, I can't tell them that). I believe the main thing keeping them afloat right now is a contract they have with the government, building a black-box device of their own design.

The machining work is too intermittent to pay the bills. I don't know financial details of their business but, I can count heads, machines and square feet and I can guess how much it costs to keep the doors open. They weren't doing it for the prices they charged us.

Yeah, my last post was kinda' doom & gloom. I suppose picking up a used Haas machine and getting familiar with it in your spare time isn't such a bad idea. There are more expensive hobbies out there.

You could fit a VF-1, VF-2, VF-0, VF-0E through a garage door as long as it's got the umbrella tool changer instead of the side-mount. You could buy a solid, used one for the cost of a nice car.
http://business.shop.ebay.com/Metalw...=p3286.c0.m282

Then again, if you bought real estate right now instead, it might appreciate more in the next 5 years than a machining business.

[mikeybarber]

Thanks for the replies. Sometimes it's good to have a dose of reality to throw cold water on my wild aspirations.

I'm an electrical engineer at a small company, so I've picked up solid modeling and mechanical designing out of necessity. I'd really like to develop my own product lines, but the barrier is time and money to prototype.

My idea was to get a mill to do a job on an in-house part if I could get the boss to go along - kind of like a contract. I agree that no large business in their right mind would hire someone out of a garage, but I think smaller businesses might go for something like that if they personally knew me and wanted cheap parts... wait a minute, there I go again...

I'll give those other threads you referred to a look. Thanks for the feedback.

Mike

[Donkey Hotey]

Ahh...well, that's completely different. Just hanging out the shingle isn't the same as having a ready-made customer or two. I'd bet that more than one business has been started off of the work that an employer didn't want to expand into.

Then again, your profitability would be tied to the whims of your employer. Not a good situation but, not quite as bad as just buying the equipment and crossing your fingers.

Unless you're an underpaid engineer, I'd bet you're making more than you would with a single machine. It would probably take at least two machines and a steady amount of work, to take home what you make now (just a guess, based on my own numbers).

[Geof]

Originally Posted by Donkey Hotey Ahh...well, that's completely different. Just hanging out the shingle isn't the same as having a ready-made customer or two.....

Mr Hotey obviously awakes before me.

My comment is 'ditto'; this puts a whole new complexion on the issue. If you can get tooled up and in operation without incurring any debt, or if you can service the debt even when the machines are not bringing in any income then go for it.

You will have to work like a maniac for a few years to make it fly but that is possible; I know, I did it.

[KIMFAB]

You can make more in engineering with better security but you will probably find more satisfaction in making something.

I was an engineer for 37 years and did the machine work on the side to keep my sanity.
The nice thing is the extra but unreliable income.

Sooner or later though you will probably come up with a product or over the years will pick up a following through word of mouth.

[behindpropeller]

Originally Posted by mikeybarber Thanks for the replies. Sometimes it's good to have a dose of reality to throw cold water on my wild aspirations. I'm an electrical engineer at a small company, so I've picked up solid modeling and mechanical designing out of necessity. I'd really like to develop my own product lines, but the barrier is time and money to prototype. My idea was to get a mill to do a job on an in-house part if I could get the boss to go along - kind of like a contract. I agree that no large business in their right mind would hire someone out of a garage, but I think smaller businesses might go for something like that if they personally knew me and wanted cheap parts... wait a minute, there I go again... I'll give those other threads you referred to a look. Thanks for the feedback. Mike

Mike-

One year ago we bought a TM-2. All that I knew about machining was learned from a bridgeport and a south bend lathe at a friends shop.

I'm a mechanical designer for my day job, my night job s learning CNC.

I'm slowly learning, I read this site and (im) cnczone.com every day.

From what I know now...the machine we bought is perfect for learning and prototypes. I'm 100% glad we didn't buy anything smaller.

Beyond the price of the machine you need to know the prices of the following:

Cad/Cam
Tool Holders
Cutting Tools
WorkHolding (vises, etc)

That being said....

I would suggest buying a TM series used and learn how to use it. Once you know how to run that machine you can easily just jump up to the next machine. The good thing about jumping up from a TM to a VFX is your tooling will all follow into the next machine.


Tim

[TOTALLYRC]

Very interesting posts.
It makes me want to cry in my beer but I am on a low salt diet so I shouldn't

What got me started in doing this in my spare time was making stuff for our small buisness. So I guess you could say I was a manufacture, not a job shop. The small bluishness is now closed and I work a full time job for somebody else.

I have kept that first machine and I am expanding my inventory of machines so that when things get better out there I will be in a position to make money. Luckily I own everything in the shop and since my shop is in my backyard, I don't have a huge overhead (rent) every month. Even heating the shop is trying because of the very cold weather we are having.

Keep the dreams alive but don't quit your day job.

Mike