need advice for inventing billiards products

[jay helfert]

I admit this conversation is way over my head. I can read the words but i don't know what they're talking about. Too much time in the poolrooms I guess :wink:.

I do agree that there is a limited market in the pool world for almost any product. I've seen a lot of guys come up with some really cool stuff (bridges, extensions, cue holders etc.) and never really make any money when it was all said and done. Sure, they made a lot of pieces and sold them everywhere they went, but it never caught on to where they were taking orders all over the place (and in quantity too).

Joe Porper (Creative Inventions) is probably the best innovator of new pool gadgets that we've had in this business. Did you know he also created and manufactured many tricks that are popular with magicians? Several of his products are still available today. Did he get rich off any of them? Doubtful. Did he make a nice living? Yes, for years!

I'm guessing the single most successful pool product/gadget ever invented in the last forty years was the Tip Tapper, a little piece of steel that was indestructable (sic). For many years, every serious pool player had to have one and they sold for $10 retail ($5 wholesale). The guy who invented them was a machinist friend of Lou Butera (I forget his name) and he did make some serious money off his little gift to the pool world. They continued to sell for well over 20 years!

The invention of the Predator shaft made Allen McCarty a rich man and he sold his company years ago for a princely sum. These are two of the rare success stories in the pool world. There are a lot more failures. Both of these products eventually got copied and then copied some more. Patent or not, there was no stopping the imitators.

I'm no lawyer either but I see what I see and hopefully learn from it. There is a shelf life to new billiard products and if you have a good one you can sell if for a certain period of time before you get copied. Even high dollar pool tables get knocked off overseas! I would suggest that your best bet is to just go ahead and create whatever product you think is good enough to sell. Make a prototype, create the packaging and give it a name. Then make them and sell them, with or without a patent (I don't think the Tip Tapper every had a patent. It said Patent Pending on them). Being the first one to the marketplace is your best bet for success if you truly have something that pool players want. You will garner name recognition and be identified with that product. Retailers will want to buy from you, at least initially.

Like someone else said on here, you may have about a one year head start on the competition. And that can be enough to secure your product the edge in the marketplace for a long time (like Predator enjoyed). In conclusion I say make it and sell it....fast! Don't even bother with a patent. It will eat up too much of your cash that is better spent on actual manufacturing of your widget. And don't reveal what you have until you actually have product ready to sell! Maybe not so many at first, but enough to take orders and deliver them. Nothing will hurt you more than to have a prototype and no widgets ready to sell. People want what they want NOW!

Good luck to you. I hope you can come up with the next great thing for the billiard world. It's been done before! Ask Allen McCarty. :smile:

 

[chefjeff]

Patent Attorney Stephan Kinsella Presents On Why We Need To Rethink Intellectual Property
from the good-for-him dept

If you've got a spare 40 minutes to an hour, it's worth watching patent attorney Stephan Kinsella's presentation: Rethinking Intellectual Property Completely, as given in March. The video is embedded below, and it fits in nicely with my ongoing (yes, there's still plenty more) series of posts on intellectual property. It's pretty rare to see a patent attorney explain so lucidly the problems with patents (and copyrights):​

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080504/2229041029.shtml

Jeff Livingston

 

[iusedtoberich]

That's quite amazing since G Code is used to turn on and off machine tool functions and to drive servo's, none of which are needed to print a 3 dimensional digital file, but if the hobbyists find it usefull, then more power to them. We've been doing it in Aerospace for years without G Code.

I just talked to the head of our RP lab at work. He said the RP machines we have (about 15, which is quite large for an in-house facility), do have code that is similar to G-code. Its hidden from the user by the software, but it is there if you really wanted to see it. Remember, at their core, RP machines are still motion control machines that move in the x,y,z space, using servo or stepper motors. So after the software slices up the 3D files into hundreds of layers, it still has to direct the motors where and how to move to build the actual part.

I have no idea what happens on the hobby side of these machines, but perhaps they use Mach 3 as their motion control, which of course means G-Code. That would make a lot of sense, as Mach 3 only costs $100.

 

[iusedtoberich]

3D printing is a tool to make a quick prototype but it has it's limitations. The most important thing to work on when designing an injection molded part is the actual geometry of the parts. You can 3d print almost anything but it doesn't mean that it is practical to mold or machine.

It's important to understand the limitations of molding to keep the cost of the mold down and the quality of the molded part consistent. You need to have similar wall thicknesses and features that will shrink at the same rate when cooling.

I run a cnc machine shop/mechanical design service and make prototypes all the time. My advice for someone thinking to design a new product is to lean on someone with the skills and experience to bring a concept to a completed design. The documentation you submit to your vendors is very important also. If you don't tolerance your drawings you might get crap and not have any way to reject the parts. Making a complete drawing package with correct tolerances is the only way to protect yourself. If you ask for tolerances that are too tight this will also be a problem as the cost will go way up.

More often than not when someone has an idea for their own product and talks with me about it they think it is simple but when I get into the details there are some major issues to work through.
It's very frustrating making something that has unneeded complicated features or looks cool but is completely impractical from a manufacturing standpoint. Anything can be made but at what cost. Time spent at the cad station saves money later.

If you don't have machining/mechanical design experience you will not understand what makes things difficult/expensive to make. Be prepared to hire someone to finish your design.

A mold will run in the 20,000 range in the us market. (roughly) It really depends how complicated it is.

A patent is at least 10,000 just to file. Hiring a patent attorney will help greatly as it is a lot to learn to do it on your own.



There are sites out there that focus on inventing and they might be a good resource if you don't already have the connections to help.

This is an example that I found on a 1 minute google search. (I have no idea if this is a good link)
http://www.inventioncity.com/manufacturing.html



Dudley

Lots of good info in this post.

 

[cleary]

don't invent another bridge or cueball with mumbo jumbo on it...

 

[iusedtoberich]

The thing about buying prototypes is that if you are spending $100-$200 a pop then you can easily end up spending what you would spend on a desktop 3d printer. And you have to wait for each version for days deal with the postage and can't tweak on the fly.

With a desktop printer you can literally make your own bridge heads in as many configurations as you want as many times as you want without waiting for or dealing with anyone else.

I own a laser engraver/cutter, for me this thing has paid for itself a dozen times over just with the ability to make parts and jigs not to mention the pattern making and decoration.

I make stamps on the laser engraver until I am sure that they are what I want then I send them off to be made in metal. Same thing with rubber parts, I mock them up with the laser cutter using layers of wood or eva foam rubber until I am sure of the right size and shape and then when it's done I give that to the mold maker.

These days I am constantly amazed at what is available to any person for making things. I have seen someone convert their 3d printer into being both a 3d printer AND a laser cutter. The plans are online. Any grade of resin is available for those who want to do their own casting. Low cost cnc milling machines - really these days it's entirely possible to have a shop capable of making a vast array of top quality things in a garage.

About the only thing I haven't seen yet is 3d printing in metal at the individual scale but I bet someone has either done it or is working on it. I think you would be surprised at the quality and complexity of the stuff people are putting out now.

I think in the hobby space, if someone wanted to futz around with 3D printing technologies, then more power to them. It would be a lot of fun. I'd personally probably go after a CNC machine first to futz around with.

But one thing to keep in mind, is the material these printers use (including the commercial ones), is not like the real thing. That's where your laser cutter is much different. You can cut "real" material on it, such as your leather, and get real parts. Once happy, you can send the files to a toolmaker to make you a die and make them by the thousands.

The RP machines produce many different types of materials. We have about 15 of them in-house at my workplace. Depending on where I am in a project, will determine which one I will choose.

Some materials print very quickly and cheaply, but are very coarse (low detail), and brittle.
Some are very detailed, but extremely brittle.
Some are truly as strong as real nylon parts (SLS), but are very costly, rough, and low detail.
If you need multiple strong parts, one way is to use the detailed but brittle type, print it, sand it and prime it to a glass finish, and then use that to build a silicon mold. You can then get about 10 parts from that silicon mold before the mold deteriorates.

If you need hundreds of parts, you can even build an aluminum tool.

Lots of ways to go, depending on the qty, strength, and detail, and cost you are after.

RP machines are a compromise. Yes, they can build any shape imaginable. But that is also a liability. As Dudly pointed out, if you don't know "how" do design a part for manufacturability, making a one off prototype in a 3D printer won't be of much use, if that would later be impossible or very expensive to manufacture by mass production methods, such as injection molding.

You can't learn that in school either. I took a semester class on injection molding as part of my mechanical engineering curriculum. Then, I got a job making consumer goods, where the materials of choice are plastic and metal. That class in school covered only the most basic concepts. I'd say it took me a good 3 to 4 years of working side by side every day with other more experienced engineers, toolmakers, and manufactures, to really be able to say I know how to design a plastic product. Ten years later, I still seek the advice of toolmakers to help design a part.

Best to all, designing and building things is a lot of fun

But screw the patents! lol. Even at the corporate level, I believe patents are worthless. I have 10 or so on my wall, and they are not even worth protecting becaues it costs more to defend them in a court of law, than the competitors make by possibly infringing on them. Patents are like a poker game. 8 guys play 40 hours straight of poker. 2 broke even, 6 went bust, and the house got the rake. Lawyers and patents are like the rake. No one wins but the rake. That's my patent opinion and I'm sticking to it

 

[OnTheMF]

That's quite amazing since G Code is used to turn on and off machine tool functions and to drive servo's, none of which are needed to print a 3 dimensional digital file, but if the hobbyists find it usefull, then more power to them. We've been doing it in Aerospace for years without G Code.

That's exactly what it's needed for in 3D printers... you take your 3d model, usually an stl file, feed it to a slicer which breaks it down into layers, and then translates the layers into a tool path. The tool path is then converted to g-code which controls the x,y,z axis motors, the feed motor, and the nozzle heat element.

An actual 3D printer is rather simple, it simply moves the head and platform to various positions while extruding a preset amount of material (usually PLA or ABS).

 

[cardit]

Inventing products

Having been through the product development cycle on my own: from idea to patent to trademark to having tooling developed to prototyping to actually getting orders, I can share that it's a challenge at times and certainly a learning experience. In my opinion the further you are along bringing a product to market the greater your potential is for reward. Ideas, in general are not worth much, a working prototype might get some attention, a developed product from temporary tooling together with packaging and actual sales bring more value to the inventor. Jay's reply has some good thoughts, too.

Refining the product is important but defining the market is critical. It all starts with an order. No matter how neat the investor thinks his idea/product is if the market doesn't embrace it there'll be no revenue. The actual design of the product may need to take a back seat at the onset of
the process to understanding the market for it.

At the very least develop a working prototype and armed with some non-disclosure agreements visit some large retailers and/or merchandise managers at the major distributors to gauge interest. If the reception is good then you can approach a known manufacturer in the billiard space for a licensing deal or decide to manufacture through another source or on your own.

You must also learn how the billiard industry buys products. Does the retailer buy only through distribution or also manufacturer direct. What discounts off MSRP are standard? Are there quantity /price /volume schedules? If you intend to sell through distributors what discount structure is standard? Are the key distributors accepting new vendors or will you have to sell to them through one of their current vendors? Do distributors/retailers have allowances or charge backs? What margins do you need for profitability? Will you compete with your reseller channel by your own web presence?

A bit wordy, sorry. Lots of work to do before the cash register rings! Enjoy the journey!

Mike
Cardit

 

[Frii]

Email the Patent and trademark Office.

Email the Patent and trademark Office and ask them is there any way to protect an idea without a patent so you can talk secretly with colleges or machine shops with out them stealing your idea while your trying to develop it. What are the fee for that.

 

[OnTheMF]

Email the Patent and trademark Office and ask them is there any way to protect an idea without a patent so you can talk secretly with colleges or machine shops with out them stealing your idea while your trying to develop it. What are the fee for that.

The patent office will not help you with that. He will need an NDA between him and any third parties, which is a common thing for people in that line of work.

 

[MFB]

Email the Patent and trademark Office and ask them is there any way to protect an idea without a patent so you can talk secretly with colleges or machine shops with out them stealing your idea while your trying to develop it. What are the fee for that.

You protect your idea by documenting it in a written format. Signing and dating every page and having it 'witnessed'.

If anyone steals your idea, you now have 'prior art'.


If you happen to produce your product, and it's not a money maker, no one will copy it. However, keep in mind, if it is copied, and you now have competition, it can help your sales by 'growing' the market.

 

[the kidd]

I had a dozen patents which are time expired now

Back then they cost about 3m each now about 25000. They were mechanical patents not just design patents. The best think you can do is make your product and label them" Patent Pending" to see if you can make a profit. You will be knocked off by all those countries that disregard US patents anyway.

OK, heres the situation.

I am a full time business partner, so the more hours I put in at work, the more money I make, and I like to make money.

On the other hand, I am not happy with my life if I can't spend time with the family and play competitive pool. So I do both.

My mind is also constantly racing about different ideas, jokes, stories, math questions, etc. and I have thought of a few product ideas only to find that they were already patented.

Now I have a product idea for pool. I am buying a 3-D printer so I can make the product for myself and my friends if they want one. I don't really want to invest time/money into a second business because it would be smarter to make the first business more successful. Although I don't really want to make a lot of money with this idea, I don't really want someone else make money I should be making, so I am in a bit of a pickle.

It would be a relatively simple product to make once the mold was prepared, and it would fit in one of the pockets of cue cases.

I've heard it costs $75,000 (is that correct?) to patent something, so I need help with the economics. I'm assuming it would cost the same (or up too twice the cost) to make as a plastic bridgehead, possibly with twice the plastic. If someone makes and sells bridgeheads, how much is the initial investment, cost to make, and selling price?

If someone makes and markets a cue rest that allows you to lean your cue against the table, do they have to pay q-claw or anyone else? Someone makes a bridgehead with tip shapers in the middle. Did they have to pay someone because they make a bridge head or a tip shaper in one? My product would be multifunctional, but it may incorporate elements of items already in use.

Is there anybody the buys ideas and takes them over? I would never know who to trust, how much to ask, etc. I think a lot of the invent-assist companies may be screwballs, but I don't know.

I do not want to get into selling or marketing these things and I would drop it if I didn't see value to myself and my friends near term, and maybe it will help the pool world long term. I think you could take this item out of your case and prove to someone why certain shots are fouls, and it would allow you to make shots that are otherwise a foul. If it can do that and it can perform the same tasks as a few $5-20 items, it seems like a good idea to me.

Any help is appreciated. This is not intended to be a commercial post, just need advice. If it is inappropriately posted, I am sorry.