[OT] I'm celebrating!

[mac davis]

Damn, Lew... IMHO, the only think almost as good as sex is more sex.. lol

mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

[Father Haskell]

Here's to telling OPEC to go f*ck itself. Cheers.

[Mike Richardson]

Morris,

Hang on to that priceless feeling of elation and accomplishment - you deserve it. It will also sustain and lift your spirits in the bad times that may follow, giving you strength to get through - to more great times.

Warm congratulations - I remember well our first big sale - and the smile that lasts for soooo long :-)

Mike

[Morris Dovey]

Mike Richardson wrote: | Morris, | | Hang on to that priceless feeling of elation and accomplishment | - you deserve it. It will also sustain and lift your spirits in | the bad times that may follow, giving you strength to get through - | to more great times.

I'm not out of the woods yet. It's been a long five years and there have been plenty of times when I found myself wondering if it'd really be worth the all the grief. There's an oversupply of scepticism about solar energy that stems from a lot of really primitive stuff done in the 70's. The advent of lower-priced photovoltaics has helped some, but people are still generally wary - but energy prices are engendering a willingness to re-examine solar for heating.

| Warm congratulations - I remember well our first big sale - and | the smile that lasts for soooo long :-)

Many thanks! It is a good feeling.

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Morris Dovey]

Island Teak wrote: | Hello Morris, | | I ship from Canada to the U.S. and use Roadway (or their | affiliates) most often. The rates vary considerably, but you should | receive their standard 68% discount. If not, tell them you are | going with UPS Freight if you don't get their best rate.

Ken...

I'm taking a middle road - by letting a third party who knows their way around do the negotiating. They take a cut, of course, but they claim that the amount I pay will almost certainly be less than I'd pay if I were dealing directly with the freight companies. My view is that their cut provides me with a low-cost shipping department. :-)

| Be careful, especially from 'overseas' requests, like from the | Ukraine. One scam is, at the last minute when the truck is loaded, | the overseas payment arrives by 'certified bank draft' , which | takes several weeks to clear. They will apply pressure to get your | product . Just hang tight on the shipping until the coins are | nestled neatly in your pocket.

It's not yet a problem. At present orders don't even go into the production queue until the full prepayment check has cleared. It hasn't so much been a matter of trust (or lack thereof) as it's been a matter of necessity - the first use of the funds received is to purchase the raw materials for that order. There haven't been any bad checks so far - and the amazing thing is that there haven't been any complaints about having to prepay.

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Morris Dovey]

mac davis wrote: | On Tue, 19 Jun 2007 01:03:57 -0500, "Morris Dovey" | wrote: | | | Morris... This is a dim memory from my days as a driver, but... | | Talk to a few independent drivers and get the names of a couple of | local "brokers"... | They're the middle men between the shippers and the truckers and | they almost always have either some space left on a truck or one | coming back empty from somewhere...

Will do.

| Also, a friend claims that UPS also delivers crates and pallets, | but I have no idea if it's true..

A local UPS person warned me that UPS would be "the high-cost option". I like your first suggestion better. :-)

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Morris Dovey]

Doug Miller wrote: | In article , "Morris Dovey" | wrote: || Neither gloat nor neener, exactly - but a milestone for my shop. || Today I loaded a pallet with three of my passive solar air-heating || panels and sent my first out-of-state order off to warm a home in || Oklahoma for the next couple of decades. | | Congrats, Morris -- hope this is the first of many.

Thanks, Doug. Me too! :-)

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Morris Dovey]

| Congrats, Morris!!!

Many thanks, Mike!

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Lew Hodgett]

If this stuff ships common carrier, then FOB, Point of Shipment, Freight Prepaid and billed or freight collect makes a lot of sense.

Lew

[Morris Dovey]

Stephen M wrote: | ..... | - and he was tickled by the too-pretty pallet assembled with || precisely-spaced and counterbored square-drive washerheads. | | They have recently become a favorite fastener of mine.... but the | guy in the other end will probably not have made the conversion to | square drive and be cussing and your %$#@!!! pretty pallet that he | can't get apart ;-)

Steve...

If so, it'll be because he's really desperate for wood - all of the wood used for this pallet was recycled (at least once). The skids were from the first (and last) pallet I disassembled in the current shop.

The deck is OSB, so all he'll need to do is leave it out in the rain a few times. :-)

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Morris Dovey]

| Here's to telling OPEC to go f--- itself. Cheers.

Let's hold off on that one until we don't need their oil any longer - and then let's not forget which members of OPEC have been willing to act in /our/ best interests.

I'm willing to bet that as we replace petroleum as a source of energy, we'll find new (and possibly better) uses than just burning it.

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Jim Behning]

I thought you were going to announce a birthday. Pretty cool being an interstate vendor now.

[Stephen M]

My bad... I was thinking crate not pallet. That is, you have to get into it to get your product.

[Mark Jerde]

Congrats! May it be the first of many!

I probably had a similar feeling cashing my first computer consulting check. It was income I got because I hunted, stalked and captured business in the marketplace. Roaring Lion It's a totally different feeling from "skills whoring," that is, getting paid for a 9-to-5.

It happened 23 years ago. I haven't forgotten it, and it still isn't silly. ;-)

On another topic some of us know how to use a glue bottle and we don't need much of an excuse to get longer clamps if we need them. Have you considered DIY kits?

-- Mark

[Morris Dovey]

Thanks! I hope it is - and I hope it insires at least a few woodworkers to build their own so they can enjoy their shop more in the winter.

|| I'm reasonably certain that at some point in the future today's || excitement will strike me as being silly - but that won't happen || for a while. | | I probably had a similar feeling cashing my first computer | consulting check. It was income I got because I hunted, stalked and | captured business in the marketplace. Roaring Lion | It's a totally different feeling from "skills whoring," that is, | getting paid for a 9-to-5.

Yuppers. Belated congrats to you, too. It takes more than just a little bit of courage to let go of a sure thing to go it on your own. I respect that.

| It happened 23 years ago. I haven't forgotten it, and it still | isn't silly. ;-) | | On another topic some of us know how to use a glue bottle and we | don't need much of an excuse to get longer clamps if we need them. | Have you considered DIY kits?

I have, but there are significant difficulties involved. I did a quick count and the Madison County panels had a grand total of somewhere near 600 parts. The kit would not be a quick/easy/simple build, and by the time jig/clamp (and _increased_ packing and shipping) costs were figured in, the purchase cost advantage would be pretty well eaten up. When I considered the amount of time I'd end up spending on the phone being verbally abused by people who won't read or follow directions, it didn't seem like such a good idea.

My next thought was to sell plans and absorber/heat exchanger kits - but that'd play much like trying to make a living selling a well-documented software source code package, and I'm just not into being ripped off (did that once and won't repeat the mistake - over

100K downloads, two thank you emails, and no grocery money - see for _your_ free copy). There have been even more downloads of the tarballed executable at and I've actually gotten hate/flame e-mails from Dr FSF's disciples for not providing the source for that package online (AFAICT, no one has succeeded in decompiling/reverse-engineering it ). All in all, it just seems to make more sense to sell the product and offer encouragement to DIY types wherever I think it might do some good.

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Tom B]

Well done Morris.

Many threads here have some sensible advice from you. I know I've appreciated them. I followed one of the threads to your website and saw how you heated up a pretty big space with your solar heaters - impressive. Glad to see that "the little guy" can make inroads where the "big guys" don't bother to tread.

Keep it going!

Regards.

[Scott Lurndal]

You mean like a feedstock for the chemical and plastics industries?

scott

[Morris Dovey]

Tom B wrote: | Well done Morris.

Thanks, Tom.

| Many threads here have some sensible advice from you. I know I've | appreciated them. I followed one of the threads to your website and | saw how you heated up a pretty big space with your solar heaters - | impressive. Glad to see that "the little guy" can make inroads where | the "big guys" don't bother to tread.

As soon as the "big guys" figure it out, I'll probably be toast. I've played this role before - but /somebody/ had to get the ball rolling before we ran out of time.

| Keep it going!

Thanks for the encouragement. On my honor I'll do my best.

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[J T]

Mon, Jun 18, 2007, 9:26pm (EDT-1) [e-mail] (Morris=A0Dovey) doth gleefully exclaimeth: Today I loaded a pallet with three of my passive solar air-heating panels and sent my first out-of-state order

Good goin' Morris. And, for when you start shipping over the ponds.

a man does his best, what else is there?

- General George S. Patton

[Morris Dovey]

| Good goin' Morris. And, for when you start shipping over the | ponds.

I'm hoping to need a bit more cargo capacity than the Solar21 provides.

IMO, that was a gutsy crossing. Even with two hulls, a 10m boat seems pretty small for a trip like that (although I once met a guy who did a solo crossing in the other direction in a 17' sailboat).

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA