CNCKing.com 2013: Laying the Foundation

Jon Off CNCKing.com News,

I started this business in 2007 so it may sound kinda odd to call the 6th year a “foundational” one but I did a tremendous amount of work before the major CNCKing.com rebrand in the tail end of 2012… so much so that people are STILL searching to this day for WoodMarvels.com!

With the rebrand, I lost tons of search engine love along with years of SEO link juice, got ramped due to duplicate content and my the entire e-commerce foundation changed as well… if you had an old “woodmarvels” link, guess what, it no longer worked and nor did the image links you use to have going to my site! Not good.

I was also heavily promoting my “old” books whose domain… you guessed it, was the wrong one! This is why it was VITAL that I release a new book in 2013, vital that I release a bunch of new projects and most importantly, vital that I just push through getting all my ducks in order.

Financially, I lost a third of my revenue due to all of these changes and they’ve only started to recover in the last quarter to pre-rebrand levels. The server going down several times for extended periods of time didn’t help either. Thankfully, all of that is behind me and I can now look forward instead of finding solutions to salvage what I could from the past.

If you haven’t read my past yearly reviews, please do so at the links below, it’s quite fascinating (to me at least).

CNCKing.com 2013: Laying the Foundation

I released a book but originally, my plan was to just have it feature about 250 pages of table routing projects but as I started working on it and realizing how little I had evolved on the publishing end from Volume 2 to Volume 3, I decided that I just couldn’t release another SAME book so I threw away most of the old idea, threw in some new ones and took a few chances. The result was a 450 page behemoth! This publishing project sucked-up a crazy amount of time… the second thing that ate-up almost a month of my time is the Wooden Big Wheels… wow… not doing something like that on a small format CNC router! Other than that, the biggest surprise is how CNCKingdom.com came about and finally found it’s legs after years of trying to do something that just didn’t gain traction. I also taught myself to efficiently design for a 3D printer too… lots of time! So, the foundation was set, CNCKingdom.com for “CNC related” stuff that doesn’t fit within CNCKing.com’s blog, a massive book and a crap load of new projects!

Let’s review my initial goals for 2013 I set forth in January of last year. I’ve color coded it for easy reference, Red = not met, Orange = sorta met, Green = met.

Need to acquire a 3D printer – 3D Systems just released their CubeX 3D FDM printer which allows support materials to be printed at the same time as the main material using a different material (can be dissolved) so that’s a major front runner. I’d love to get a ZPrinter though… 3D printed projects are design, print, release without needing any assembly instructions or other steps so given enough rendering time, a lot easier to produce and release than table router, laser or plasma projects.

I ended-up getting a 3D Systems Cube… wonderful little machine and have learned heaps of stuff! It’s quite impressive what can actually be accomplished with such a little machine once you learn how to design for it while being willing to throw away A LOT OF SCREWED-UP PROJECTS! Now that I’m proficient, expect a lot more to come in the following year. It’s also a great way to learn how to design for higher-end machines which are basically the same but with less limitations.

I’d really really like to get into plasma cutting – either acquiring my own machine or through a partnership with a leading world manufacturer.

I do think I will get a plasma cutter in 2014 and if you’ve been following me for a while, you already can guess the manufacturer I’m establishing a relationship with to make it happen but I still don’t know where I’ll put it! My 3D printer is great in the living room, you can’t put a CNC plasma in a living room! My router is great in an industrial garage but there isn’t room in there for more equipment and I’m already contemplating a full-sheet CNC router! So, I’m in a bind – laser will have to wait of course but that’s on my list too! Stay tuned… there are a lot of other balls in the air that I’m trying to juggle as best I can but I am outgrowing many things that were fine a year ago very quickly!

Releasing 50 models across all four CNC types on CNCKing.com would make me happy

How many models did I release in 2013? Here’s the run-down.

22 CNC laser projects
1 Plama project
7 Router projects
13 3D printer projects
7 relief projects

So we got a total of 50 projects! Considering I don’t keep track of these things throughout the year, I’m pretty impressed by this prediction!

Release CNCKing.com Volume 4: Rise of the CNC!

Yep, this was done, almost 2x bigger than I envisioned! I’m also happy I predicted the final name of the book as well.

Resolution wise, I’ll stick with 1080HD but I would still like to get into a third-party 3D visualization system on the site, so although it wouldn’t be a 3D animation, you could still manipulate the model on the site within a 3D environment.

I wrote about wanting to do this since 2009 and it looks like it may be a few more years… the problem is bandwidth and processing power required to make it happen by people with computers around the world. It will happen, just not in 2013 nor do I doubt it will happen in 2014 either. Maybe 2015?

Expand CNC offerings into new CNC types, there are 5-axis machines, waterjet and the list goes on… all fun machines to play with and design for! That will necessitate another workstation or two to keep-up rendering wise! New computer has already been going 24/7 most of its life as is my old laptop.

Actually, I don’t need to expand into other CNC offerings as what you can do with a CNC waterjet is similar to what you can do with a CNC router and I don’t see those in every garage anytime soon. On the 5-axis front, I have designed a project for a 5-axis router, just waiting to hear the results but even then, it’s similar to designing for a high-end 3D printer where you just can’t go too deep resolution wise. I’ll give myself a pass on this one as I’ve learned quite a bit in 2013 regarding other CNC machines types and design benefits/limitations.

Develop some sort of automated system for files, I don’t mind curating the best out there but it’s a limiting factor I’d like to reduce

This is a double-edge sword as well, if you visit other CNC sites – mostly 3D printing sites – their catalogs look like an absolute mess. Every person has different renderings and screenshots and it looks like somebody threw-up on the screen if you look from afar. I don’t want that for CNCKing.com. I have stopped 3D animating projects that don’t really need it or I have the time to but I do still want a site like this – just under a different brand.

Become a regular contributor on industry-leading informational resources online and off for the CNC world.

Wow, editors really want to keep things close to their chests… may have a column or two open-up in 2014 depending on how negotiations go – if it happens, great, if not, so be it. I’m over it as I’m having so much fun doing this myself with CNCKingdom.com.

Major achievements in 2013

Released two massive projects, for the laser, my meter and a half tall Eiffel Tower, for router (which can be laser cut as well), my Wooden Big Wheels – I learned an incredible amount from both projects… so much so… that I can pretty much design anything now for a 3D printer, router or laser.
Started CNCKingdom.com with over 30 interviews thus far with 41 posts in total!
Became proficient in tiling projects… allowing me to greatly expand the size of my CNC router projects!
Removed physical kits from CNCKing.com – was a long time coming and happy I did it along with completely redesigning the site to work with mobile phones.
Short of a major announcement, I’m no longer sending-out monthly newsletters, instead, when you subscribe, you will get newsletters every few days… it’s a more efficient way to keep in touch with customers and enthusiasts alike which gives me time to focus on other things.

Goals for 2014

Get LightningSource issues resolved so libraries, book stores and other book sellers have easy access to copies of my book… still working through the proofs for V4 and it was released a few months back on Amazon.com.
Get my books in a bunch of schools, colleges and universities… they are already in a few but there is no reason why each school board doesn’t have a copy for their woodworking or technology shop – now you know why I’m putting in the LS direction!
Release CNCKing.com Volume 5: Design, Knowledge & ROI
I’ve build-up an impressive catalog teaching myself how to design for all these CNC machines, now it’s time I share that knowledge. I’ll start a design firm shortly – time to go beyond just books and websites for companies and organizations needing unique or custom pieces designed, cut and shipped right to their door.
I tried in vain to get onto a TEDx talk – will try again for 2014!
I would like to attend a few international conferences and start meeting people in person that I’ve only been talking to virtually for the past few years.
Time to diversify into hardware sales on CNCKing.com.
Partnering up with a few software offerings is in order.
I’d really like to get a new CNC toy… but now this will be a far bigger jump as I’m done with the “home” models, I got to move towards industrial sized stuff with equivalent requirements.

Parting 2013 Screenshot (wished I did this each year!)

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Jon