We've been very quiet online recently and we're sorry if this has caused any anxiety. DoyleFab (our CNC machine shop) and DF Kit Car have been keeping us very busy so I haven't had much time for posting updates. This isn't really fair to you guys, our early adopters, so I wanted to quickly catch you up, give you an idea of what is going on now and lay out how things are going to progress in the near future.
As many of you already know, our main business before starting DF Kit Car was DoyleFab. We CNC parts and fabricate tools for aircraft. Having this business has been crucial to starting up DF Kit Car because of the tools and funds it provides us with. Early this month, we had several very time critical projects come in. One of these projects was for NASA's Oceans Melting Greenland project. Here are photos of some of the parts we made for them:
We had planned to work mostly in the kit car shop during March but the CNC projects consumed our days, leaving only late nights and weekends for kit car work. From this point on, we are going to be scaling back the amount of CNC projects we take in so that we can focus on DF Kit Car.
Even though we were pretty busy with the CNC shop, we did still get some work done in the kit car shop.
We got the second of the three in-house cars driving without a body. The local customer has already picked it up and has been go-karting around for nearly 1000 miles so far. Having his car together and on the road is great for testing since we don't have time to drive a Goblin ourselves. Here's a photo of my dad in the car for the first drive:
One thing we wanted to do before starting the second production run was reorganize our shops. The main thing we wanted to change was to get the dirtier processes moved out of the welding, assembling and packing areas. We relocated the chop saw table and material rack to a separate building to keep the noise and mess away from the main shop.
Next, we wanted an area where we could efficiently pack all of the hardware for the kits. There are over 150 unique parts with quantities of each part ranging from 1 to 60 pieces and total kit quantities of over 2,000 pieces. To store and accurately pack this hardware, we assembled a long row of shelves to store each unique part in its own bin.
The bins are labeled and by using spreadsheets that can be customized to match your kit, the hardware can be collected by starting on one end of the shelves and working your way down. (these shelves were in the back of one of the buildings when we bought the property so it was a great bonus to be able to use them like this).
Preparing for stage 3, we've laid up a new nose to preview what you guys will be receiving. The nose/hood will be one piece fixed with DZUS fasteners at the front and bolts at the rear. We've already had a representative from a local vacuum forming shop come by to look into vacuum forming the body panels. Vacuum forming will make a more consistent product than laying up the body panels by hand. Here's a rough look at what the noses will look like (this one still needs to be trimmed to clear the control arms):
Material has been delivered for the next run of kits. We are going to be producing 25 kits that will be a mix of city and track frames of standard and extended lengths. Half of these kits already have owners lined up.
Last week we got all of the sheet metal models converted to flat drawings and the files are being sent to the laser cutting shop. There are over 80 unique sheet metal pieces to be cut. 200 individual sheet metal pieces go into each kit. We will here back from the laser cutter later this week to know when the parts will be ready.
Today we are shipping okneib's first stage. We are putting together second stage kits for cMatt, JayNess, Jkean, Restoman, Ben Jammin and BAR-AIR. These will ship as soon as possible but not all of the hardware has arrived yet.
The workload isn't going to lighten up any time soon but I will try to provide status reports regularly. We've found that Instagram is easy and quick for us to post to so that is the best place to see our progress: Adam's Instagram & Lonny's Instagram
As many of you already know, our main business before starting DF Kit Car was DoyleFab. We CNC parts and fabricate tools for aircraft. Having this business has been crucial to starting up DF Kit Car because of the tools and funds it provides us with. Early this month, we had several very time critical projects come in. One of these projects was for NASA's Oceans Melting Greenland project. Here are photos of some of the parts we made for them:
We had planned to work mostly in the kit car shop during March but the CNC projects consumed our days, leaving only late nights and weekends for kit car work. From this point on, we are going to be scaling back the amount of CNC projects we take in so that we can focus on DF Kit Car.
Even though we were pretty busy with the CNC shop, we did still get some work done in the kit car shop.
We got the second of the three in-house cars driving without a body. The local customer has already picked it up and has been go-karting around for nearly 1000 miles so far. Having his car together and on the road is great for testing since we don't have time to drive a Goblin ourselves. Here's a photo of my dad in the car for the first drive:
One thing we wanted to do before starting the second production run was reorganize our shops. The main thing we wanted to change was to get the dirtier processes moved out of the welding, assembling and packing areas. We relocated the chop saw table and material rack to a separate building to keep the noise and mess away from the main shop.
Next, we wanted an area where we could efficiently pack all of the hardware for the kits. There are over 150 unique parts with quantities of each part ranging from 1 to 60 pieces and total kit quantities of over 2,000 pieces. To store and accurately pack this hardware, we assembled a long row of shelves to store each unique part in its own bin.
The bins are labeled and by using spreadsheets that can be customized to match your kit, the hardware can be collected by starting on one end of the shelves and working your way down. (these shelves were in the back of one of the buildings when we bought the property so it was a great bonus to be able to use them like this).
Preparing for stage 3, we've laid up a new nose to preview what you guys will be receiving. The nose/hood will be one piece fixed with DZUS fasteners at the front and bolts at the rear. We've already had a representative from a local vacuum forming shop come by to look into vacuum forming the body panels. Vacuum forming will make a more consistent product than laying up the body panels by hand. Here's a rough look at what the noses will look like (this one still needs to be trimmed to clear the control arms):
Material has been delivered for the next run of kits. We are going to be producing 25 kits that will be a mix of city and track frames of standard and extended lengths. Half of these kits already have owners lined up.
Last week we got all of the sheet metal models converted to flat drawings and the files are being sent to the laser cutting shop. There are over 80 unique sheet metal pieces to be cut. 200 individual sheet metal pieces go into each kit. We will here back from the laser cutter later this week to know when the parts will be ready.
Today we are shipping okneib's first stage. We are putting together second stage kits for cMatt, JayNess, Jkean, Restoman, Ben Jammin and BAR-AIR. These will ship as soon as possible but not all of the hardware has arrived yet.
The workload isn't going to lighten up any time soon but I will try to provide status reports regularly. We've found that Instagram is easy and quick for us to post to so that is the best place to see our progress: Adam's Instagram & Lonny's Instagram
