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Building and prototyping products for a few hundred bucks

Anything related to sourcing or importing products.

Johnny boy

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With my primary business running smoothly, I've got some free time and had an idea for another business that I want to start. I am building a product and to build it and purchase the tools and machinery necessary, I would need to go spend thousands of dollars. I do not want to throw thousands of dollars into something that isn't a sure thing yet, so I went looking for other options.

Many of you are likely in a situation where you would like to make a product or build things but cannot justify dropping so much money on equipment, especially for something with unproven demand. I always recommend getting proven demand first before even making your first prototype if possible, but what I'm building isn't a big time or money commitment and I want to build it anyways regardless of its commercial viability.

I was going to see if I could just rent the equipment and I stumbled across this awesome thing called "Makerspace", which is a place that has tons of useful equipment and tools for anyone to use for a low monthly fee. The place I'm at charges $50 a month. Apparently they have them everywhere.

Maker-Map-900-x550.jpg

The place I found (in Lacey, WA) has damn near everything I could need. Everything including woodworking, welding, electrical, 3-d printing, CNC machining, mills, lathes, etc. They just landed a million dollar grant to add even more things in the upcoming months.

If you want to prototype something, or maybe you just want to have access to tools and you don't have a garage, you should try out a makerspace. I was worried it was going to be lame and annoyingly "hypersafe" where you would be forced to have your hand held before using any equipment, as most things seem to be nowadays. Nope. "Here's how to use the table saw, don't cut your fingers off". And the people there are mostly all engineering students since it's ran at St. Martins University. So everyone there is incredibly helpful and knowledgeable in how to build things. I'll be in this giant high end shop with 3 other people and I'm the only person there who's not a staff member. It's awesome.

Now, if you've got your own shop, that's always better. And if you want to spend tens of thousands on your own cnc machines, welding equipment, etc. That's great too. But if you're new to building or prototyping things or you can't justify the expense, this is a great option. Highly recommended. Hopefully you guys can think of some better ways to make money than just copywriting now.
 
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Rauschmi

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I had to look up a makerspace near me. Found a few around. Now I will be checking them out to see what I can use. Greta idea. Thanks for the tip.
 

mdot

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Great tip!

If you don't have a makerspace near you or aren't skilled with machines, there are online prototyping services for many kinds of parts, like CNC, advanced 3D printing, sheet metal, etc that will take your CAD file and run small batches of parts.

Some examples are 3D Printing Service | Shapeways and [Formerly 3D Hubs] Rapid Prototypes & Low-Volume Production (I have no affiliation with either).

They can do advanced processes that Makerspace don't have access to, or could take you a long time to master if you were trying to learn to use the machines yourself, like multi-axis CNC, sintering 3d printing (metal, ceramic etc), and bending/stamping of sheet metal.

It will be more expensive of course, so it might be worth buying, or using a makerspace's desktop 3d printer to prototype the general form first.
 

Johnny boy

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how's the prototyping going @Johnny boy ? Do you mind me asking if this is a product related to your lawn biz, or something else?
totally different. lighting/photography space. it's going well. lots of time is wasted waiting to get small things shipped. Things like electrical connectors, double ball & socket joints, etc. It feels like trying to make a website work except you add in waiting for things to ship. Compatibility hurdles. (Could do it 3-4 different ways, each with their pros and cons)

I am no engineer, so this has been a learning experience just doing something basic.
 

mdot

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totally different. lighting/photography space. it's going well. lots of time is wasted waiting to get small things shipped. Things like electrical connectors, double ball & socket joints, etc. It feels like trying to make a website work except you add in waiting for things to ship. Compatibility hurdles. (Could do it 3-4 different ways, each with their pros and cons)

I am no engineer, so this has been a learning experience just doing something basic.
For hardware, I recommend McMaster Carr, and for electronic components/connectors Digikey. Both have next day shipping and a huge selection. Good luck!
 

ekateriv

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totally different. lighting/photography space. it's going well. lots of time is wasted waiting to get small things shipped. Things like electrical connectors, double ball & socket joints, etc. It feels like trying to make a website work except you add in waiting for things to ship. Compatibility hurdles. (Could do it 3-4 different ways, each with their pros and cons)

I am no engineer, so this has been a learning experience just doing something basic.
I've built hardware a few years ago and my best advice, if you're serious about prototyping and figuring out m-facturing, is to spend up to 6 months in Taiwan/Hong Kong/Shenzhen. Your iteration cycles will be lightning years faster and hiring qualified engineers is basically a fraction of the cost [or at least was back in 2015].
 
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Johnny boy

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I've built hardware a few years ago and my best advice, if you're serious about prototyping and figuring out m-facturing, is to spend up to 6 months in Taiwan/Hong Kong/Shenzhen. Your iteration cycles will be lightning years faster and hiring qualified engineers is basically a fraction of the cost [or at least was back in 2015].
What would I be doing in china though? Watching people's factories? Taking some classes? Meeting with engineers?
 

ekateriv

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What would I be doing in china though? Watching people's factories? Taking some classes? Meeting with engineers?
Prototyping your product. Because there’s no lead time for getting parts (check out Huaqiangbei), and you can get someone qualified to help you out things happen much faster, not to mention that piecing together part manufacturers and being able to visit them is plain easier when done on the spot. What’s hard though is validating the prototypes if your target market is in the West. Ideally you’d have one person on the ground to test the prototypes that you fedex to your core market and another that is focused on building.
Back in 2015 having an industrial student engineer part time was about 5000-7000HKD, hardware could be more expensive especially if you need someone do firmware on top. But the good news is that you can prototype various versions of a product in parallel and much more quickly so your total labour cost will still likely be very contained.
I’ve built both software (now) and hardware (where I started) and my personal impression is that hardware you need to do in person. Even for industrial design/plastics I wouldn’t just have someone send me the CAD files and have myself print them in person because unless someone is a domain expert and basically your target audience they won’t necessarily understand the “feel” you’re trying to achieve that well.
Anyways, my 2c. I’m sure you can do it all here, but my experience sort of echoes yours. Unless you do something very ubiquitous or modular like Arduino / raspberry Pi, prototyping can be a total b*tch.
 

AmazingLarry

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Subbed. Interested to see how this turns out.

Someone mentioned McMaster, and I don't know what standard parts you need, but Misumi is another good place to look. A lot of time's they're cheaper and have some different options.

Also, I don't know why you would fly to Asia for months to make a prototype. The point of a prototype is to quickly prove the concept. Maybe I'm missing something.

If you think you might need help with anything, feel free to send me a PM. I design custom machinery/products and do CNC programming for my day job, so I may be able to give you a hand with some things.
 
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G

Guest-5ty5s4

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Oh yeah - if any of it is electronic or needs moving parts, check out servocity.
 

Walter Hay

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Prototyping your product. Because there’s no lead time for getting parts (check out Huaqiangbei), and you can get someone qualified to help you out things happen much faster, not to mention that piecing together part manufacturers and being able to visit them is plain easier when done on the spot.


Asian manufacturers and retailers very often congregate in one city, or even in one street. This helps them quickly obtan suppliers of raw materials or components. Huaqiangbei was originally set up as the place where armaments were produced, and when that huge factory was moved to another location the empty buildings were put to another use.

A Chinese entrepreneur who had visited the Akihabara district in Tokyo copied the Akihabara idea, and the result is now that the road called Huaqiangbei (means roughly powerful China) was filled with retail shops and mini manufacturers of electronics. It is many times larger than Akihabara. It covers an area of about 40 acres in a building 70 stories high.

Like the vast Yiwu market, sourcing products there is very time consuming and exhausting. A large number of the market stalls are only 1meter wide, (Just over 3').

If you can last the distance, and endure being on your feet for several days you can find just about everything you could wish for if you are developing, such as technology introduction, technology exchange, product release, product development, logistics warehousing and distribution, information exchange, talent exchange, and capital exchange.

It can be a one stop shop, but in practice I know that some have not found it easy.

There are a number of other similar markets close by the Huaqiangbei market, so if anyone thinks of going there let me know and I will point you in the right direction.

Walter
 
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