Wow, 203 days since my last post. So long that Pinside warned me before posting. This will be long, so buckle up.
Just like this thread the project is not dead. It is in fact very much still alive, so let me update you on the progress. I know this is a little "Inside Baseball" but I've tried to be as straight forward and honest about this project so I'm sharing all the details.
I have not really been on Pinside very much in the past 6-8 months. There have been a couple issues that have caused this long delay. The main one was losing my job in July and not having the extra income to move forward and the other was issues with applying art to the face of the target.
First, the money situation.
I owed my machinist a balance on the targets he had already designed and produced for me. While I'm sure he would have done what he could to help me, I wasn't about to ask. We had been continuing to talk about idea's etc but I had run out of materials and the next step (Stern targets) was going to be alot of design time and prototyping and I just couldn't afford to move forward at the time so everything was put on hold.
Last month I cashed in my 401k to pay off my debt and get my monthly payments down to a reasonable level. I still have not found a job and really haven't put a lot of effort into finding one. I'm sick of the rat race and working for corporations that care more about the monthly report than they do about the people. I've been fixing computers and pinball machines and using the skills I have to make money over the past 6 months. It's not much, but we are getting by and by paying off all these bills we should be in good shape. Fortunately I have a great wife who understands that I can't sit at a desk all day clicking on shit and need to do something where I utilize my skills and interests to support myself and the family.
Some of my savings went into paying off the machinist and paying in advance for the next batch of design and tooling for the Stern targets and production of the Williams style targets. The William's flat and rollover targets are finalized and will be manufactured in the coming weeks. I am going to get the Stern prototypes made first so I can get them into testing and the William's will follow.
Issue #2, Artwork
My first prototypes (from the first pictures) were engraved while the target was being machined. This created some potential issues with with contaminates from the polishing getting stuck in the engraving and the durability of the powder coat over the engraved area. I decided to try the engraving after the powdercoating. Once the target was powdercoated we had issues with engraving through it. The engraver has to be very precise to go through the powdercoat but not too far into the aluminum. Because I powdercoat the whole target this caused variants in the thickness of the front and the back and made it very difficult and time consuming to get a good result and it became cost prohibitive.
So I started looking into laser engraving. I had some samples done and while the results were great the cost per target was too much. I want to revisit this in the future but until I own a laser engraver this method is off the table. I also had some concerns with the edges of the powdercoat on the engraving deforming. I have not done any impact testing as the engraving shop did not put the sample high enough on the target for the ball to impact it.
This was a previous prototype that I used to test the engraving and not the current design
On my way to pay the machinist I had an idea that I think will work, won't cost much and should be just as durable as a blank target.
I didn't want to sell just a blank target because I didn't see what it offered over a stock plastic target if you were just going to apply a sticker to the front of it. If there is interest in the blank targets powder coated in a choice of color let me know as I will be able to fill those orders as I work through the artwork issue.
I know you all have heard this before but I hope to be taking and shipping orders by the end of the month. If you sent me an email requesting to be put on the waiting list I will reach out to you and make sure you are still interested and take your order. If you don't hear from me it's because your targets are something I don't make yet. Send me a PM with your email address or any questions and I will get back to you. Including 'Drop Target' in the subject will help.
Currently 4 targets will be available.
Normal flat William's type (system 11 era and various other games),
William's Rollover type (Sys 11 era and others)
Stern target with the flat back (World Poker tour and some older Sterns have them)
Stern Rollovers (ACDC and Metallica have these).
Once I have more to show I will update with some pictures and pricing. Thank you for your interest and patience, won't be long now, really, I mean it this time!
-Mike