I been hangin round here for a while. Readin this and readin that.
Now, I own two Haas machines. I know the good stuff and there is a lot, and the bad stuff. And there's a bit of that as well.
But what I'm curious about is the business thinking that goes into a machine purchase decision.
Are the majority of buyers making this decision on price alone?
I get the impression that is the case a lot of the time.
This may have something to do with years of experience also.
I was talking to a fellow the other day that was interested in getting a machine in his garage and starting to make money. Said he had some customers lined up. Wanted to go at it.
I asked him what kind of material he was going to cut. Didn't know. What ever the customer wanted him to cut.
Asked him if they would be fourth axis parts. Didn't know what one them was...
So, I asked him what kind of machine he thought he needed. "Oh, I think I'll get one them tool room mills" he tells me. Tool changer? I ask. No, that's be too much money.
Well, what about holders? Well, he thinks about 5 ought to be plenty.
Now, about this time, I'm getting curious as to how he's going to pull this off. So I ask him about how much he has to spend and what the ROI would be. He tells me he don't want to spend more then $25k. I ask him about the ROI and get a blank stare....
I explain about return on investment. Ask him how many hours a day he'd have to run that little tool room mill to pay it off in 18 months.
I told him to think about the feeds adn speeds on that machine and how fast he could make that part for his customer when the shop just doen the street has a whiz bang really fast one and can undercut his price....
He started to look a little glum
Now Haas makes a great machine that enables a lot of guys to open a shop and do ok and grow into a larger shop and buy more machines, hire a couple more guys...You know the picture.
Now I know what it's like to start a shop. I started one with a little Mini Mill. Been there done that. But what I'm curious about, is the thought process involved in making that machine decision...
I was told by a good friend a couple years ago, he bought a prototype shop from his boss who was retireing. The guy told him to go buy a five axis Mori. Larry told him he didn't have the money to buy a five axis Mori and didn't know how to run one if he did.
His boss asked him where he wanted to be in two years. Larry told him. In terms of income, customer base and types of parts. His bos told him, "Then don't waste three years...go buy the Mori"
You see, we all know that buying the first machine is the hardest. But I'd like your thoughts on why some shop owners refuse to see the advantage in faster machines. We can obviously all get a lease. We are obviously all smart enough to figure out that working for ourselves is better than working for someone else...
What is it about expanding our business's that we have such a hard time seeing what it is that we need to do.
I've heard the argument about, why do I need a Ferrari to make parts when a Pinto will do. Well, if you want to do the same parts you're doing now till you retire, you don't need that Ferrari.
But if you want to grow. If you want to be the shop that your customers allways, ALLWAYS call when it needs to happen and happen right, You might want to think about it.

So, What are your thoughts. I'm curious
This was all prompted by my ordering a twin spindle live tooled lathe to replace my SL10. That got me to thinking about moving ahead on a Horizontal...

So, What are your thoughts.