Merged: Old Shapeways-related announcements

[uncletony]

Bertl pointed out to me off-line that the HGW shutters are pretty far off scale. So rethinking that a bit.

[uncletony]

Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about it... (I have all the materials I need for the alby d.v chin project)

[Jamo]

A new oil tank with the correct shape would be great:





An how about an oil collecting tank for behind the engine?



Cheers
James

[uncletony]

great ideas.

The magneto should be easy for me to adapt from the mags I've already done -- my hunch is that they are essentially the same in RL (Bosch ZHC)

[uncletony]

Last October, Shapeways changed the way they calculate base prices for products for shop owners like me. The new pricing instituted a (high) per part minimum price along with general increases for material volume, etc. However at that time they assured us our existing products would continue to be sold using the legacy pricing model. In other words, the old pricing for existing items was grandfathered.

Well, we are now told that as of Feb 4, that is no longer the case, and the new pricing model will be applied across the board.

Unfortunately, the new pricing model hits folks like myself particularly hard; it seems pretty clear that Shapeways is no longer interested in dealing with small detail parts for the modeling community. Which is their right! And honestly, from talking to industry insiders I knew that their pricing for these things was at an unsustainable loss leader level.

So anyway -- if you were seriously thinking about buying any of my parts, you'll want to do so before Feb 4 2019. The only item that is going down in the new pricing structure is the Fokker D.III fuselage in "Smoothest Detail Plastic" -- so if you were hankering for that, you can hold off -- it's actually going to be $6 cheaper.  But otherwise, prices are going up up up -- after Feb 4, the Albatros Teves & Braun radiator will be almost $20; the "drop in" fuel tank for the D.V/a will be nearly $100! And so on.

At this point I'm not really sure what my next move is. The Shapeways model provided a way for busy folks like myself to design (insanely small niche market) products and have them handle the order taking, finances, and fulfillment -- all of which I have absolutely zero time for -- at an acceptable cost. Desktop SLA machines like the Form 2 are getting increasingly affordable and offer the resolution needed, but even at $3500 it's still a pretty huge leap -- that would take years to recoup in this tiny niche market and almost certainly be very obsolete long before it is recouped. So... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ stay tuned...


Thanks for your support,

--Bo

[Borsos]

Order placed; thanks for the warning!
Andreas

[bobs_buckles]

Hi Bo,
 Have you ever thought about doing a Kickstarter to help purchase a high end duplicator?
I'm sure you would more than repay your backers with state of the art products.

Put me down as one of your backers if you do...Happy to invest as I'm sure many of the family in here would.

vB 

[Jeff K]

two questions:

does the total cost of the D.III go up or down, and by how much?

and,

would you consider selling 3d models to end users to print under a 'personal use' license? the idea is there are probably more mugs like me that would be delighted to print the parts locally...

[uncletony]

Hi Bo,
 Have you ever thought about doing a Kickstarter to help purchase a high end duplicator?
I'm sure you would more than repay your backers with state of the art products.

Put me down as one of your backers if you do...Happy to invest as I'm sure many of the family in here would.

vB 

Hey vonBob I'm not sure what this high-end duplicator you speak of refers to? If you mean like one of the new generation of desktop SLA machines like the Form 2, yeah, I've thought about getting one of those...

[uncletony]

two questions:

does the total cost of the D.III go up or down, and by how much?

Total cost of the D.III parts goes up. Most of the increases are relatively modest, but Sprue A (which contains a lot of small loose parts) goes up to insane levels.

Example:

part......................................................	old price.......	new price......
Fuselage Early, Smooth	59.99	60.86
Wings Early/Mid, Smooth	62.49	69.05
Acc Sprue A, Smoothest	69.49	92.18
Acc Sprue B3, Smoothest	39.99	42.43
Acc Sprue B4 & B5, Smoothest	26.99	28.51

so the total cost goes up by about $34, or a little less than 20%.

would you consider selling 3d models to end users to print under a 'personal use' license? the idea is there are probably more mugs like me that would be delighted to print the parts locally...

I won't rule anything out, but I'm pretty meh about this idea. Honestly, you know that for every one that is legally licensed, ten or more will be passed around by well meaning "enthusiasts." This is a tiny niche market to begin with. I don't see how you make the numbers work.

[Jeff K]

hmmmm seems like my best bet will be detail parts now, D.III later?

slowest time of the year for me so no extra $$ ><

i know you've got no free time Bo but i do hope you still plan on doing that Albatros book...

[Bughunter]

Jeff, you have then also the shipping costs twice ...

@Bo
Thanks for the hint, just ordered some tooling.

Cheers,
Frank

[krow113]

When this stuff came into the model world ,I remember that majority thinking had this service for printing masters , which could then be moulded. Maybe bringing that thinking back into focus could be returning.

[uncletony]

When this stuff came into the model world ,I remember that majority thinking had this service for printing masters , which could then be moulded. Maybe bringing that thinking back into focus could be returning.

The real beauty of the tech is creating parts that cannot possibly be cast. Like my Teves & Braun radiator with see-thru fins.

[uncletony]

i know you've got no free time Bo but i do hope you still plan on doing that Albatros book...

Thanks Jeff -- yeah, it was supposed to be my summer 2018 side hustle project. Then I got slammed with two simultaneous
 work projects and there was just no time, let alone psychic energy, to work on it. But I will get back to it. My curse is too many interesting things to work on...