What's Taking So Long?

Hehe, I'm glad you asked! :)

Sorry for the endless delays folks. I've been working my butt off these last few weeks and yet nothing ever seems to get to the completed stage. However, this week coming will see a raging torrent of activity as several projects come to a finish pretty much all at once.

Shiners will be back from heat treat any day now. I thought they might be on Friday's UPS delivery but they weren't. So maybe Monday in which case Tuesday would be the earliest release date since I have to clean them up and package them. But I have no way of knowing the actual day they will be back so that is just a guess.

The 3V MicroSpuds will also be coming back middle or end of this week coming. They looked fantastic after the first tumbling so after heat treat and a finish tumble I think these are going to be absolutely gorgeous. I'm really looking forward to adding one to my own collection. ;)

BigShot stainless steel shot glasses are finally coming up. I have been thinking about this project for two years now. We worked up a prototype last year but I was very dissatisfied with it. The design was too top heavy and unstable and I wouldn't be able to get my favorite knurling on it in a way that was pleasing me. So I went back to basics and totally redesigned the piece. I started pushing a couple of weeks ago to see if we could squeeze a run into the schedule (no small task) and lo and behold it is actually going to happen. I've spent the past several days scuttling back and forth to the shop and having a blast tweaking the design and watching the whole machine setup. I now have the final proto in my hot little hands and the actual run will start today or Monday. Should have some product by the end of the week. Pics of the proto and a sign up post so I can get a rough idea of how many to make will be coming later today.

SuperBugs are all ground and at the tumblers right now for the first stage of tumbling. I'll be getting them back this week for name stamping and then they will go out to the heat treaters. Two weeks or so away on those.

Fixer Knives are rough ground and all I need to do is the finish grinds and clean up the edges. Then they can go out to the first tumbling. So we're getting quite close on them and maybe have them ready by mid April.

Ti Rulers came back from tumble and half of them have burrs on them still. I can't tell you how pissed I am that this stupid little project which was supposed to be a very easy one has turned into a never ending nightmare. The hex openings were all cut undersized so I've had to ream them and then broach them by hand which took forever. Then we had endless problems with the drawing because we couldn't figure out how to get both Imperial and Metric scales on the same drawing. Finally resolved it by doing two drawings and I still have to find out if the laser marking place can deal with it. What a pain in the ass. I'm tempted to trash what I have and just start over but I really wanted to salvage enough to at least pay for the cutting and material. We'll see...

Ti Keyfobs came back from tumble yesterday and they look great. This is a very small batch of only 3 dozen. They will take a little while to decorate and do rivets. Most will probably go via the lottery and will be released in dribs and drabs as I get to it.

Cookie Wrench is coming! Got the second revised drawing finished for this yesterday and they will be cut next week. This is a titanium disc shaped wrench tool based on the old fashioned lantern wrenches. Really neat looking piece, almost like a iron cross or throwing star sort of a thing but no sharp edges of course. Kind of reminds me of the Bermuda Triangles a little bit but an entirely new tool. They will be done in 1/8" titanium for the first run.

A school of Shiners right before they headed out to heat treat last week: