What a great soap box topic, allow me to climb on!
> "In this disposable world it is becoming more difficult to find any real
> artisans any more. "
If you do find someone really good it's likely they'll have a waiting line
several miles long, and be totally fed up with "wing-nuts" and all sorts of
unreasonable customers.
A fabricator/welder/ex-sprint car driver/friend only accepts work from "proven"
customers, tired of not being paid, beat up over what he needs to charge, and
harrassed with demands for next day service from walk-in's, and this is a guy
with IRL level fabrication experiance.
After over 20 years of fooling around with (now) vintage race cars I enjoy doing
a majority of my own work, engines, paint, fabrication work, and very little
for anyone else. Partly because of liability concerns, mostly because the world
wants to pay wages I'm not working for. If you do this sort of thing you know
what it really takes to make stuff, the skills needed, tooling, and how much
time. All it took for me was a few "special" people, and I forgot about trying
to do this for fun and profit. I wonder why my friend stays in business, it
takes something I sure don't have, sainthood maybe, or eating I suppose...
Jumping of the soapbox now, and
Doing my thing in CO.
Mike
|