I am very remiss in not posting sooner but the tribulations of retirement, old age and a really busy summer have distracted me.
My "Project" was/is a rubber casting, actually polyurethane, of an extinct Pioneer turntable foot part. Three specific turntables, manufactured in the '70s, attained the ultimate level of performance for the media just before CDs came on the scene. Competitors such as the Technics brand continued production up to the present day... at sky high prices. the Pioneers were an excellent alternative but the feet broke off. The culprit was an insulator in the foot assembly that was no longer in production and totally unavailable.
There are bazillions of LPs still available through used record stores, thrift stores and the like. There are modern digital computer programs at a very reasonable price to convert these LPs to a digital format very easily. There are also many audiophiles who prefer the analogue sound and swear to it's fidelity. I was in the audio business in the '70s so I had a sense of the marketing possibilities.
I submitted a request to 100K Garages and over a period of a month or so received a number of bids and emails of interest. I went with 'Confounded Machine" , owner Curt Filipowski in Canada. We proceeded to hash out the design from drawings I made from measurements of one (1) good insulator I had. There were some teething problems but we settled on a price and quantity, which I put up for sale on eBay. After some fits and starts I got the eBay site set up to my satisfaction and waited to see what happened. It took a month or so to get the viewings up but after a bit, I started to get some sales. The volume of sales went up to the point where I was selling an average of 12 pieces a month where it has consistently stayed. My original production run has run out and I am awaitng my second run. I am very pleased with the results, have received many positive reviews from customers but to be honest, eBay is cumbersome and it is frustrating to have to deal with with some of their procedures. ie. Some customers make mistakes in their ordering quantity and it is very difficult to resolve these mistakes. But that is a problem with eBay...
Curt has been the model of a good supplier and I am very pleased with his product. Works great!
This has been a lot of fun! I am not getting rich with it but the satisfaction of producing a product and successfully marketing it at a profit has been a wonderful experience. I have already started thinking about other projects. EEEHAW!