CNC Manufacturing

[MikeinSC]

Believe it or not, the 2023 pen show season is fast approaching. The first show is right at 60 days away.

I am opening up a few more positions in my schedule to manufacturer kitless pens for other makers. For just over a year now, I have been quietly manufacturing for other makers on occasion. I've machined a few thousand pens for my own business at this point. And approaching 1,000 for others.

I have this machine to help others. So if you are a maker that needs or wants more time in their schedule or to increase inventory, let's see what we can do to make that happen.

Here are the details below. For anyone interested, please send me a message to discuss further.

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$500 cnc setup. Includes designing and maintaining cnc programs for your project. Includes designing, building, and maintaining mandrels and tooling as needed. All tooling and files remain here. The setup fee includes unlimited revisions.

No information about your design, business, or any other information will ever be shared with any outside person or entity. I won't share, and the dogs won't share. But there are no guarantees what Socks the cat will or won't do.

Customer must approve final design before production begins.

Customer supplies sample prototype pen to be manufactured to be used as a reference. Customer supplies material to be used. Customer pays all shipping.

The cost per manufactured pen is $25 USD. The minimum quantity per job is 25 pieces.

The cnc setup fee will be due up front and is a one-time fee per design. Each job will require a 50% deposit of the total for that job and the remainder 50% due when completed. For example, if the first production run is 25 pieces, a total of $812.50 would be due up front ($500 setup fee plus $312.50 deposit for manufacturing) and $312.50 plus shipping due when completed. Any subsequent jobs for the same pen design would not include the setup fee.

Surface finish. The pens will have a high quality machined finish and washed before delivery. It will be the job of the maker to finish sand, buff, and polish.

Current materials being accepted are Alumilite, standard pen blanks (acrylic acetate, Erinoid, etc), and certain ebonite. If there are any questions about unique material, please ask first.

 

[Dalecamino]

Interesting. Not something I would venture into, but curious if you might have a photo of an example finished product? Hope this works out for you and others.

 

[MikeinSC]

Interesting. Not something I would venture into, but curious if you might have a photo of an example finished product? Hope this works out for you and

Sure. Here's a post from earlier this year of finished pens.

Demonstrators

After years of making kitless demonstrators, I still get annoyed when making them. They take too long and are frustrating. But all that goes away when they're all finished and looking good.

www.penturners.org

 

[Dalecamino]

Sure. Here's a post from earlier this year of finished pens.

Demonstrators

After years of making kitless demonstrators, I still get annoyed when making them. They take too long and are frustrating. But all that goes away when they're all finished and looking good.

www.penturners.org

Thanks Mike, Nice pens!

 

[PatrickR]

I have nothing against automation. All commercial pens are made using it, but as someone who sells handmade "kitless" pens I hope that all involved with automated production are upfront with their customers and never misrepresent what they are selling even through omission.

 

[heymatthew]

You gonna finish the Kickstarter pens as part of your new venture or you just gonna leave the rest of us hanging and run with the money?

 

[heymatthew]

For just over a year now, I have been quietly manufacturing for other makers on occasion. I've machined a few thousand pens for my own business at this point. And approaching 1,000 for others.

All this time, you have been creating pens for yourself and others while you are ignoring the 392 backers that pledged over $64,000 for you to procure a CNC machine. Anytime anyone has asked about timelines or gently inquired about the status of the project, you have lashed out, belittling and shaming them — myself included. You took money from a small community that believed they were helping you take your next steps as a pen maker, and now you've eliminated your Instagram account and your website so that you can't be contacted. You're a liar and a thief.

I have this machine to help others.

You have this machine because you duped 392 people into paying for it so you could help yourself. You're not helping anyone. Your claim that your machine is 'to help others' is nothing but a pathetically veiled attempt at salvaging what little bit is left of your dying business so that you can justify the machine in your garage, and remove any stigma attached to it as a result of your theft of $64,000 from a community that trusted and supported you.

Anyone that does business with you is a fool.

 

[jttheclockman]

Interesting!!!!

 

[KenB259]

So this guy wants to sell premade kits to the kitless crowd? Am I missing something?

 

[PatrickR]

Why am I not surprised by this?
looking back at the older post of his pens there was no mention that they were CNC products. A maker not being up front with other makers.

 

[PatrickR]

So this guy wants to sell premade kits to the kitless crowd? Am I missing something?

he is trying to mass produce "kitless" designs for established makers. Send him your design and materials and he sends the parts back to be finished (sanded, polished, etc.)

 

[McKenzie Penworks]

Please do your research. This particular individual ran a Kickstarter to fund the CNC and then left people hanging and didn't deliver. This is NOT the individual you'd want to depend on to build a brand. If you're really interested in building a pen brand, I can make better recommendations of professional companies that will work with you.

 

[PatrickR]

I have never payed attention to kickstarter but wouldn't they have some recourse? Bad for their reputation if they can't make people whole in a case like this.

 

[Aurelius]

@PatrickR Unfortunatley, no. The way Kickstarter is structured, you are basically guaranteed nothing for your money aside from the warm fuzzy feeling you get from helping out a small business. It's almost become a meme that you never see anything you buy on Kickstarter (there are obviously a lot of exceptions, but it is prevalent enough to have taken on a life of its own).

 

[heymatthew]

I think @MikeinSC's silence here is pretty telling. And yes, unfortunately, Kickstarters aren't guaranteed to produce a product. Sometimes they do fail for myriad reasons (supply chain, manufacturing impossibilities, funding increases, etc.).

However, in this case, it failed because @MikeinSC has just decided not to continue producing the pens for people.

He is self-centered, arrogant, and dishonest. A friend of mine and I went in on a 2-pen pledge which was a couple hundred bucks. We're both out our share of the pledge.

I live in SC, as does Mike, and I'm considering contacting the AG's office to file a formal complaint against him. Other KS backers from other projects have done this with mild success to nudge the creator to complete the project, but at a minimum, it would be on record that he took his funding and left a lot of people without the product. And there's sufficient evidence that he was clearly able to produce the product so it really is a matter of theft at this point.

 

[Cwthree]

I live in SC, as does Mike, and I'm considering contacting the AG's office to file a formal complaint against him.

Do you happen to know where in SC Mike has his workshop? I found a recent (April 2023) obituary for a Michael Allen, and I wonder if that's @MikeinSC. It would explain why he hasn't responded to queries in the last few months.