Hi Bar,
Is there an option to have the Maslow 4 assembled and tested before it ships? I’d be willing to pay of course, and I would be glad to move to the last in line so as to not impact the shipping operations/others.
Thanks for considering!
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I would add an option for paying for pre-assembly of some sub-assemblies - especially the things that people find tricky to do.
I offered to do Martha’s because I’m pretty sure they would have a really tough time doing it on their own and we have this assembly day coming up so I have a good opportunity to do it along with other folks.
If I were to do more it would pull me away from fixing bugs for a day which is a tough sell at the moment, but maybe I could hire someone to do it.
What do you think would be a reasonable price for an assembly service? (like what would you be willing to pay?) I’ll look into if I can pay someone.
It also probably wouldn’t ship well assembled without a lot of very careful packing and a big box which might also get expensive.
I was thinking $200 would be reasonable. I need to know the shipping cost too. I’m not in a rush to get it. I think I’d end up just struggling vs spending time enjoying it.
Thanks Bar
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I’ll look into it and see what I can come up with.
Assembling just the arms is like 80% of the work and they aren’t so big that shipping would be an issue.
I’ll do some thinking on how to make that happen.
Long term the plan is do build a non-kit (fully assembled) version, but that’s like a year away.
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In a future revision, see if you can make it so the motor screws can be accessed
through the other arm (possibly rotate the bolt pattern so instead of being
square, and so symmetrical on both halves, rotate it by ~20 degrees so you can
have holes through the other half) and have a way to get at the setscrew to
tighten the gear
that way the arms can be fully assembled except for the motor and encoder and
they would actually take less space than the individual parts currently do.
David Lang
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there’s one company that probably will do this in a month or two. Bar and the owner of the MakerMade company are pretty much arch rivals at this point. I know that Bar wants that company to just go away so that there is zero competition, but i’ve talked with the owner and that seems very very unlikely since they’re working on their own version of something similar to the Maslow 4. I’ve seen a few renders and there’s a chance it might even be better.
I’m on my way to shenzhen to meet their R&D staff and maybe see if they could maybe i dunno employ me as a software dev. Always looking for a side gig 
I filed a provisional patent on the design before deciding that I wanted to stick with being open source. If I wanted no competition all I would need to do is click submit on the patent application and voila no competition…but I’m going to let that application expire because I think it’s a cool idea that I want to share.
My issue with MakerMade is that I don’t respect the way they conduct themselves and I don’t want to do business with them. If they can truly innovate and improve the design that’s great.
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in my experience, patents only make the patent lawyers rich. That’s actually something i was told from a former patent lawyer. I don’t know all the ins and outs of patents or the patenting process, but until someone is awarded a patent there is no patent. I’ve known a lot of people who put “Patent Pending” on their product. When i talked to them about the patent process they said “the Patent is Pending …patent application” LOL. wild.
I don’t have all the details of the spat between the two of you, but it really just seems like you don’t like them using the Maslow name. The Maslow CNC isn’t really that special, it’s a glorified Wall Plotter in FluidNC. I’m probably over simplifying, but in a nutshell, it’s a wall plotter with a router attached to it. Cool tech nonetheless.
Would Customers willing to pay for assembly might also want service option for support/consulting to learn and troubleshooting and repairs, similar to what commercial companies offer? E.g. A Small-Med business that purchased Maslow CNC(s) focused on ROI, wanting assurance of uptime.
Maybe this could come later by MaslowCNC, or, be provided sooner by a good intentioned licensed partner/reseller…
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@Bar, as others have said, I think you should file the patent, apply for copyright, etc., to protect the design, and then offer to license it to other manufacturers for free if they are decent folks, subject to it being revoked if they turn out to be jerks. You can issue a blanket license to anyone that wants to build their own as long as they don’t go into business, again subject to revocation if they act like jerks.
I’m sure there is an existing license format you can use.
Don’t forget copyright - easy to nail down, hard for them to fight, and it is essentially free to do. Copyright all drawings, files, software, etc., subject to the same terms as the license described above.
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Bar… i really appreciate your offer. This last week i have had very bad tremors both arms and legs. I think i may have taken too much medicine. Too much is just as nad as not taking any. I have decided i want to use my dewalt that i have for another use. So i have otdered anothee brand new router to replace the one you are swapping with me. I will give brand new for you in box. I am trying to find tools i might be able to use salely. Like a router sled and router table. I know keep hands as far away as possible. Use blocks and feather boards. Again thank you.
Martha
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Is anyone looking for an assembled M4? I might be able to help.
I am a HS Science Teacher and am building an Instructional Design Portfolio to get into industrial training. I spoke with Bar about using the M4 as my portfolio project and realized, too late, that it would have been good to have videos of the assembly steps. “Unfortunately”, I have already assembled my M4 and am in the calibration phase.
So, if there is someone looking at purchasing an M4 and DeWalt router and would like it assembled, please let me know and we can try to work something out.
Jay
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where are you? it makes the most sense for someone local to you to take you up
on this.
David Lang
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Good point! I’m in NW Indiana, not too far from Chicago.
Is there anyway you can make it open source to anyone except MakerMade?? 
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See the Addendum — Maslow
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loving it 
Richard McCoy wrote:
Is there anyway you can make it open source to anyone except MakerMade??
grin
however, that would not be opensource, you can’t limit who you can use the
opensource thing.
David Lang
wait, what? LOL. this is April 12th not April 1st.
i’m not sure how you can close-source something which has just had it’s source code published. Future versions of the sorftware/firmware could possibly be closed source but prior versions, highly unlikely.