Baffling economics of metal sales

Perhaps you found someone who already had the right tooling left over from a previous job.

Welcome to the messy world of the build-or-buy decision that confounds small outfits developing new products. One of the reasons I first learned machine shop practice was to better understand production engineering. I inventoried the punch collection for the shop's Strippit press and tried not to specify hole sizes outside it. I wish electrical engineers would similarly bother themselves to learn the standard resistor values and tolerances instead of calling out 5K and expecting it exactly.

jsw

I suspect it's simply a reflection of the broader market for the pieces cut to a whole number dimension. I'd also bet the price goes up more the finer the fraction you want whole->half->quarter, etc.

Just my guess, --Glenn Lyford

A high price is the quickest, easiest way to tell a customer,"No". I do it all the time when a tire kicker calls me.

Karl

I have no real idea, but possibly some one was paying for 3 inch diameter holes in some 3/16 material.

Dan

How about engineers who design for 1/16", 1/8" or 3/16" steel sheet metal when the sheet metal industry uses 16ga(.059"), 11ga(.119") and

7ga(.180")?

David

No different than the construction businedd, designing for 2X4 or

2X6, or 1/2" plywood - when they are 1.5X3.5 or 1.5X5.5 and 12mm

That'll be effected by where in the world you get your supplies and the materials concerned. In the UK I used to be able to buy 16swg sheet steel (0.065") and it was, and now that is normally 1.5mm for steel and it seems a lot of mills are rolling to bottom tolerance to get a few more sheets out of a ton and I've seen it down to 1.4mm or just below.

A company I used to work for had a part with a spacer dimensioned at

0.065" and that was made from 16swg sheet and had not caused any problem when made in the UK for many years but when it went to be made in China they couldn't get it as the sheet thicknesses they used were either US gauge or metric and not close enough.

I can remember talking to an old gent at a lumber yard on Long Island, NY, and he said he could remember the days when a 2x 4 was a 2x4 and he was referring to planed and prepared, then they started to shrink to what we have today. He reckoned it was a ploy to get a few more pieces out of a log and make a bit more money. Do they really need to take a

1/4" off each side to clean up rough sawn to a 2x4 planed and prepared.

I'm an old enough gent to remember my father buying full dimension 2x4s to remodel my grandfather's ~1890 house. When he needed modern (1950s) dimensions the yard hand would run it through a planer on the end of the sales counter. IIRC the accepted spec was 1-5/8" x 3-5/8".

I fell, saw, dry and plane my own oak lumber. With the warping and cupping

1-1/2 green barely cleans up to 1-1/8". I had hoped for 5/4". They are 10" wide which is more susceptible to cupping than a 2x4, but for construction all widths need to have the same thickness.

we really are Metric, they just haven't informed the carpenters yet.

19mm = 0.748".

jsw

The discs are all supposed to be supplied by Wagner The very same disc in the same quantity is sold by Wagner for $1.85.

I can see the other vendor saying *no* by sticking on 550% markup - but why? It took 3 e-mails to get to that point. Somebody got paid for that. Just say no!

I am beginning to believe that this "bad economy" is a figment of my imagination and I do not just base it on this episode.

I asked 4 companies to give me an estimate on a $1000 job. Two did not turn up. One did and never sent an estimate. The last one took 3 weeks to phone in the estimate. After I asked for it in writing I never heard from him again. I did the job myself - for half the price.

On another job three estimates ranged from $450 to $900. I recognized the last contractor: he is a complete pillock and I would not let him do the job for free (the reason I called him is that unbeknown to me he changed companies - again). Did he really expect to get the job or was it just another way of saying "no"?

I need a tree cut down. So far only one returned phone call after 24 hours.

And so on.

It seems that at least locally one can make comfortable living without paying too much attention to one's business practices.

Michael Koblic, Campbell River, BC