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[Tvoivozhd <tvoivozd AT infionline.net>]

Home Manufacturing Business, recent post #3.


http://www.motherearthnews.com/index.php?page=arc&id=5472  (Mother Earth 
News on he busineses in small Emporia, Kansas, notation of rural 
manufacturing on the rise---almost no homesteaders relies on ag-related 
income, though it is a good one if you set up a PYO near a town of ten 
thousand or more---no more than fifteen miles from the city limits.)

http://www.startups.co.uk/Yd28xvhoS63Ijg.html  (U.K. has same rural 
problems and opportunities as the U.S.)

http://www.countryside.gov.uk/WhoWeAreAndWhatWeDo/pressCentre/rural_economies.asp  
(U.K. rural statistics---rural manufacturing is where it's at.)

http://www.cfra.org/resources/strategies_2.htm  (REAP a prinipal sponsor 
of rural entreprener activiies)

http://www.bankrate.com/brm/links/business4.asp  (large link library on 
rural startup needs and their fulfillment.

http://www.gov.sk.caetopics/keyword/keyword?topic=business-economics&keyword=349  
(Saskatchewan startup help---believe me Saskatcewan government. industry 
associations, private businesses, and newspaper editores, columnists can 
be conned--erh, induced to support a startup with a good business plan.)

http://www.chinabusinessreview.com/public/0101/gregory.html  (the most 
relentless entrepreneurs in the world are Chinese)

http://www.arc.gov/index.do?nodeId=294  (Appalachian manufacturing 
startups---my down-the-road machinist buddy, has almost no overhead and 
an unbeatable electric power rate---he can kill any Northeastern or 
Mid-Atlantic job shop on job bids, while still maintaining a very 
profitable margin of profit.  The only trouble he has had recently has 
been American Electric Power bumping up the voltage with no notice 
whatsoever---kicked off the machine switches and caused him to spend 
$1200 to have a local electrician build him a new supplementary 
transformer to drop the voltage back where it should be.)

http://www.alliedfoamtech.com/Appconc.htm  (if I could look forward to a 
few more productive years one of the products I would manufacture is 
BBTBB (better than Butler buildings).  K-D two-foot wide foamed and 
fibered lightweight sections to bolt together at the building 
site---pre-assemble them if they are fairly small, like for storing 
lawnmowers, lawn tractors, tools, and take them to the building site on 
a tilting flatbed trailer.)

Sell them to flea market dealers at a larger-than-normal discount---and 
put them on a rretractable-wheel trailer to haul in and out on a 
towbar.  They can use the foam-concrete structure both as a display 
booth for their other wares, and as a highly visible model passers-by 
can look at and buy---have some literature printed for handouts, print 
the dealer's name and address on it---you must assure them they will be 
paid for their efforts and you will not steal the sales commission from 
them.  For a small startup manufacturer, honest is not just the best 
policy---it is the ONLY policy.

Make fiberglass molds and spray the foam in them with a cheap Tirolessa 
hopper-sprayer to start, shift to higher-capacity foam-sprayer after a 
couple months in business.

If cheaper and better than Butler, this is a hell of a 
business---year-around sales and a huge market.  Fiberglass molds would 
be your chief investment to kick up production.  You first make a "plug" 
(wood or molding plaster) pattern, hand layup glass fabric and polyester 
resin on it (use a parting compound on plug surface), when cured lift 
the mold off the plug.  If it is hard to hand-strip, leave some tiny 
holes in the plug and use compressed air to blow the mold away from the 
plug.  Do the same thing with the molds when pulling lipped-foam 
concrete sections out of the molds.The purpose of the lips, beside 
creating rigidity ane more strength is to seal out rain---you use either 
a commercially-available flexible plastic cap-strip or buy a cheap metal 
mold you can take to a plastic extrusion shop and extrude a UV-resistant 
plastic cap-strip. 

Again, can speed up fiberglass mold-making by using a fiberglass/resin 
and catalyst-spraying chopper gun---we used to have one, think it was a 
Binks, but can't remember what we did with it when making fiberglass 
tanks lost its charm.)

You should use hand-retractable waxed wooden pins inserted in the 
lip-mold---locate them accurately and pull them when the foam concrete 
is pretty well set.  You can drill (or better, use a hot piece of metal 
rod (propane torch insert) to melt holes through the cap-strip through 
which assembly bolts are thrust.

Figure out the cubic feet of foam fiber, the weight factor.  Ideally the 
individual sections would be light enough for one man to sdt them up and 
bolt them together, but in any event don't build them so heavy two men 
can't easily handle them. 

http://www.baustoffchemie.de/en/db/concrete.htm  (chemistry of foamed 
concrete)

Don't think it is the above, but be sure to incorporate pozzolans in the 
concrete mix if it is available.  Pretty cheap stuff from a coal power 
plant ash residue. Also incorporate acrylic for stronger, tougher, more 
shock-resistant polymer-concrete.  Lots of fiber additives, aramid, 
polypropylene, alkali-resistant glass---just be sure it is 
alkali-resistant for long life.

http://johnvillegas.tripod.com/new_page_1.htm  (Elastizell is a 
principal foamer supplier)

Mearle was the first foam chemical supplier in the U.S.---forgot who 
bought them out.  Was pretty pricey, so I analyzed the foam chemical 
once, mostly cheap hide glue.  I presume there are equally cheap foam 
ingredients now.  Had a five horsepower gasoline engine foamer made in 
Waukesha, retailing for $800 that worked fine, but they couldn't sell 
dollar bills for fifty cents, so sold out to a Canadian firm which did 
nothing with it either.  such units at quite low prices now come from 
Europe---Czechoslovakia if my memory is correct.

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:KqSVIhcvxhcJ:www.civil.columbia.edu/meyer/pdffiles/booklet.pdf+foamed+fiber+concrete&hl=en  
(Columbia University concrete research---HTML because I couldn't 
download the pdf version.

http://home.att.net/~gallgosp/architec.htm  (FINE third world cheap 
housing website---most concrete small home manufacturing prodects in the 
U.s. would be better classified as third world projects, third world 
tooling and manufacturing techniques coupled with the limited capital 
available to most homesteaders.)