Shopsmith Forums

interesting post,, I was just at a craft show last weekend , something I seen was a lot of crafts are not hand made now , they are made by cnc machines , I am referring to scroll work ,pop in a program change out the wood when its done and set back and watch the thing pop out the work until you get bored ,,, myself I couldn't spend 4-5 hrs doing detail work on a scroll saw and finish sanding for a sign that sells for 20.00 but that's just me . it seems to me to you would need to do a lot of work to pay for the cnc machine and their bits and buy the wood making these thing at only 20.00 a pop .

Amen brother, that’s one of the reasons we stopped.

Laser Cutting is another one Hobbyman. I've seen a lot of that too... But the CNC I'm building will cost me less than $500 bucks so I'm not going to be out a ton of money building that.

When it comes to selling wooden craft items at shows I have found that I do pretty well at growing pumpkins and selling them here on the farm...
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Horse boarding is not bad if you can convince people that they should pay their bill. House rentals tend to fall in the same category.

One nice thing about the woodworking hobby is that it is often a lot less costly than antique tractors as a hobby.
I have heard of boats as being a hole in the water into which you pour money... The antique tractor hobby and owning horses are both a lot like that.
My other time consuming hobby is genealogy. Traveling around the country to stomp through overgrown cemeteries isn't too expensive but may soon require a block of time in England and Scotland, mostly northern England. I always told myself that I wouldn't go until we could drive there but that may not work out.
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I once had a renter that had almost free access to pallet wood (new stuff, mostly about .5 inch thick). He reported doing pretty well making and selling about 4'x8' playhouses and forts.


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