A group of us recently toured some local spaces to see what’s working/not working for others.
A couple of things caught my eye as things for us to put on our radar. These are around the $4,000 a piece mark, especially if you include any accessories:
A fiber laser like the xTool F1. I know we have people that regularly try to engrave metal on our laser cutter despite the fact it won’t work. This even came up when I was at the gym a few hours before this tour, ironically.
We’ve certainly added expensive tools over time. I haven’t paid close attention to our finances since leaving the board, but $4k would be a chunk of change. I’m certainly not opposed to adding new machines like a fiber laser. But how would it be funded? There’s also the question that I get asked whenever I bring a new tool home- where would we put it?
I’m not going to go too deep into finances but no one’s effectively asked for “much” over the past year+ or in the current budget. We have plenty of reserves. Most months we are running surpluses. The biggest (like $1k+) recent asks off the top of my head:
Stained glass upstart costs
Jewelry casting machine (half fundraised)
Fablab put 2 new 3D printers and a resin printer in their budget
I believe we have plenty of room for both of these items, especially if we start reclaiming space that gets junked up with random stuff.
I like new stuff. A fiber laser would be a neat addition. I do think part of the discussion should be around potential use. So, the handheld CNC router feels pretty specialized. Would it be used, and used properly? I’m sure there would be an authorization for it, but would people know it was required if they just saw it sitting on the shelf?
We’ve spent money on the past on things that seemed cool at first but ultimately just ended up being wasted space. The ROI on stuff that’s discarded after a few years of non-use is usually pretty low.
We could institute a policy that anyone who wants to buy an expensive small toy has to build a home for it-- like, a cubby where it lives when not in use.
(IMO, we should already have labels on tools that require authorization-- preferably in blinding red or orange.)
