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A low cost router helps a Rochester, New
York man run a profitable woodworking business in the time he has
left over after working a 40 hour per week job and running a store
evenings and weekends. Ron Gatz has long had a talent for designing
and building novelty items from wood. One of his most popular
creations, for example, is a cat’s head that holds food and water
bowls and sells for $12. However Gatz, who has a fulltime job as a
trainer for a Fortune 500 corporation and also owns a small bait and
tackle shop, had difficulty finding time to put his talents to work.
Previously, he had to cut each item by hand on a pin router so there
was never enough time to make enough products to satisfy demand.
Then he heard about a new low-cost router that produces wooden and
plastic parts up to 4 feet by 8 feet under computer control without
requiring a person’s attention. At only about $14,000, the router
costs about half of what a machine that with similar features would
have cost a few years ago. "With the new router, I can produce 20
times as much in the same amount of time," Gatz said.
Gatz exhibits his woodcrafts at upstate New York shows such as the
Naples Grape Festival and the Spencerport Canal Show. He makes 150
different items strictly out of pine ranging from a two-inch high
tulip to a six-foot wide cabinet. The prices of the items range from
75 cents to $60 but the majority cost between $8 and $15. "A lot of
people come to the shows just to buy from me," he said. How does
Gatz find time to operate this business in addition to his other
activities? He has his woodworking shop in his bait and tackle store
which he keeps open in the evenings and weekends when he is not at
his job. On the weekends that he travels to crafts shows, his father
keeps the bait and tackle shop open. In the past, Gatz built all of
his creations with an inverted pin router. This machine has a
retracting spindle and a pneumatically retracted guide pin. Gatz
first built a template using conventional power tools, then used the
template to guide the motion of the router in producing copies of
his design. The problem with this approach was that the pin router
was slow and following the template required his full attention to
avoid an error that would detract from the appearance of his
product. With all of his other responsibilities, he only had enough
time to produce a fraction of the amount that would have been
required to meet demand for his products.
Looking for a machine that could help him expand
Gatz had long been aware of routers that
operate under the control of a computer, also called computerized
numerical control (CNC). These machines are capable of producing
complicated designs to a high level of accuracy without the
attention of an operator. |
The problem was that these machines were
more expensive than he could justify for what was, at this point, a
very low volume operation.
"I saw plenty of machines that could do
a beautiful job of producing my products," Gatz said. "These were
machines with servo motors and ball screws that provide high levels
of accuracy and also with large tables that make it possible to
produce big parts. The problem is that these machines cost $30,000
or more, which was more than I could justify, especially since I
could only use the machine during off hours." But Gatz continued
looking and the price of these machines gradually fell. One day he
heard about Techno’s new low cost LC series CNC routing system.
"This machine has all of the features that I was looking for at an
affordable price," he said. "I also like the fact that it has a
vacuum table (purchased feature, not part of the $17995 price),
which usually eliminates the need to make fixturing to hold the
wood."
Techno’s LC Series machine provides a number of critical features
that allow it to deliver accuracy at a level that has previously
only been available at a much higher cost. Ball screws are provided
on all three axes, offering smooth motion, a high level of accuracy
and repeatability, and minimal maintenance. A closed loop servo
control system provides constant position feedback, higher power,
and smooth continuous motion that eliminates the possibility of
losing position in the middle of a part. The LC series machine
includes a heavy steel ground stress relieved base and an aluminum
T-slot table that can be easily converted to a vacuum table by
installing the Techno vacuum table accessory kit. The machine comes
fully assembled and includes Techno’s Windows-based CNC G-code
interface with free lifetime software upgrades. Best of all, the
4-foot by 8-foot model sells for only $17,995, a fraction of the
cost of purchasing this capability just a year ago.
New router helps increase production
Gatz sets the machine up in his store.
He took a course in computer-aided design at Techno free of charge
and he now designs all of his parts using AutoCAD. He saves the
design as a DXF file and imports it into Enroute, a program that he
uses to create the CNC toolpath. He now spends his free time in the
store designing new products and setting up the machine. Meanwhile,
the machine is continuously producing parts to a much higher level
of accuracy than he was able to achieve with the pin router. When he
is ready to make a new part, he puts the wood on the table and
actuates the vacuum clamp. Then he selects the proper program in the
computer.
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The Techno machine then goes about its
job and he goes about his. "I can make 1 copy or 1000 copies of any
part that I wish at a speed that is much faster than what I was able
to do by hand," Gatz said. "For example, I make an 11-inch diameter
soccer ball with octagons for decoration and a dado that serves to
support a shelf. It used to take about 15 minutes to produce one of
these on the pin router and then another 10 minutes to engrave the
octagons. The Techno machine cuts and engraves the balls in about 4
minutes each and I can program the machine to make as many as I want
while I am doing something else. For example, I often put a 1-foot
by 8-foot board on the table and the machine will cut eight balls
out of it with no further attention from me. I can make 24 of this
item on the CNC router in about 90 minutes, a job that would have
taken a day and a half the old way."
Gatz’s best-selling item consists of a
board shaped in the face of a cat with two cutouts to hold water and
food bowls. "This one used to take 15 minutes to make on the pin
router," he said. "With the Techno CNC router, I can put a 4 by 8
foot sheet of medium density fiberboard on the table and cut out 50
of them in 75 minutes. I also have a black Labrador puppy with a
bandana and a stand that sits up vertically. It used to take 25
minutes to make one but now I can cut out 73 of them in 43 minutes
while I am doing something else.
The neat thing about the Techno CNC
router is that it frees me up to do other things, such as designing
other parts or running my store, while it is cutting. It has given
me the ability to increase my production by at least a factor of 20
without spending any extra time on the business. Now that I can
actually produce enough to meet and even exceed the existing demand,
I finally have the opportunity to start looking for other outlets
for my products. I am working right now to find someone who can
exhibit my products at additional shows and am also thinking about
setting up an Internet site to sell them. My brother, who lives in
Germany, has offered to help set up distribution in that country.
The new Techno router has raised my productivity to the point that I
can run a profitable business in just a few odd hours."
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