On Fri, 13 Aug 2010 12:01:51 -0500, Ignoramus19069
wrote:

I personally have never seen anyone who is able to successfully make
money (after adjusting for costs of electricity, raw material, tooling
etc) in a garage, making stuff in their free time. Not that it is not
possible at all, just rare.

I just bought some of the tooling from Nicholson Performance which
made at least two pistol related tools. I didn't ask the owner
whether he made a decent living primarily from those two, but he's
selling his shop and moving south where the cost of living is lower
and the weather warmer than PA. Apparently he's getting out of the
machining business entirely. His shop was all manual. No CNC. He
doesn't look like the usual retirment age, so my assumption is that
it's difficult to earn a living in a small home shop.

I don't want a new career when I retire from my daytime job, but I've
wondered if I could use my shop to make a few bucks to support my
hobby.

Not to hijack the thread, but what was interesting was talking to him
about import tooling. Most of his was imported and he talked about
buying on price in the beginning and being disappointed by the
quality. He learned that there were good quality and low quality
imports. Much of his stuff was from Enco, MHC Industrial, MSC, and
Grizzly. The lathe and mill were both from Grizzly and he was
satisfied with their performance although he did replace the lathe
bearings with Timken bearings. Both machines are currently available
on the Lancaster or Harrisburg Craigslist, I forget which. I think
his prices are a little on the high side for the machines because he
hasn't been following the used machine prices, but they may drop in
time.

RWL