Can you save time (and money) with Auto-Pass?
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- Опубликовано: 8 сен 2024
- This is a follow-up video to my recent rant video ( • Shaper Origin managed ... ), where I analyse how much time (and money) you can potentially save with the auto-pass extension, given it’s price tag of 200 USD.
Check out more positive videos about the Shaper Origin: • Shaper Origin How To, ...
More about the power tools and materials I use: bit.ly/401tKyv
Welcome to my woodworking channel. I am passionate about taking the most wonderful woods mother nature created and turning them into beautiful objects of day to day use. This is not a DIY channel about teaching the woodworking craft, showing you new and nifty techniques about how to build wooden objects or anything alike. It’s about celebrating nature’s beauty and providing inspiration for projects of your own.
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As usually, you provide a great viewpoint. The most important point you make is that this is an individual analysis. Putting aside the “I won’t pay those robber barons a cent for their new feature” arguments, the guiding values will be time saving, stress savings, the “new shiny” impulse, and the relative value to a person based on their financial situation. In my decision process, the time aspect was not about the scientific difference in cut speed. It was the elimination of the slow down as I double-check and make sure each pass has the right depth. So, time was one. The second was stress. Now that I have the feature and have made some cuts, I find the process is less stressful. I use the device fairly infrequently, so my cautious pace and stress are factors. Finally, the new shiny outweighs my reluctance to spend my hard earned $$! Thanks again for your thoughtful posts.
I love your point of view, Paul, and I can totally see how - if this extension reduces stress levels - this can be worth the money. Nobody wants to be stressed when working with your beloved wood, so if I would have that problem, I might also spend the money. I just don't seem to suffer of the same, so that argument is off the table. And given this is my hobby and I am never in a rush (enough rushing for me in my day-to-day job), I will continue to chill while setting the cut depths manually :D
Looks like you’ve got their attention. Shaper is using its shaper session onThursday to counterpoint Your your displeasure. I’ll be 😊there focusing on the comments page. Look forward seeing you all thier
Lol... interesting, I am all ears...
The CEO of Shaper posted on the Shaper forum page that there were comments from the community about the price being charged for Autopass. He then attempted to justify this by saying that it had been developed to benefit the professional user in terms of time saved and ease of use. I would be prepared to bet that the majority of users are hobbyists, prototype builders or bespoke craftsmen, not high volume production workshops where a traditional gantry CNC is normally used. My argument is that if Shaper reduced the price to a more realistic amount, more users might be willing to purchase this, rather than targeting a small group of "Industry professionals". Do the math Shaper, 1000 users spending £50 is better than 50 at £200.
I 100% agree with you, Bryan. The SO is not suited for high volume production work, where a CNC is much more appropriate. I would have been willing to drop 50 bucks for this (although I think 25 would have been more appropriate). I agree with your math, 1000 users spending 50 is better than a fraction of that spending 200. Plus, you don't have to deal with the brand damage...
Is there a Shaper forum? I have been looking for it for my research prior to a purchase and could not find anything 😅
Oh found it! They deliberately hide the forum from Google resuls via robots.txt! O_o
I agree with all you have said in this video. However, one thing that autopass does do, I think, is reduce the number of cycles the plunge and retract mechanism undergoes, which could help to lengthen the life of the machine. It's just a thought. It would be hard to quantify, by how much, It reduces wear.
Hi Keith. I have never thought about that and I have no idea if that is really a thing. I also wouldn’t know how to figure that out. I assume the effect should be rather small. Also, what pieces wear iff? Maybe the plastic that holds the spindle?
@@Woodensoul There seems to be a stepper motor that drives a worm type gear for the plunge and retract. My guess is, that over time, there will be wear on the bearing that runs on the gear. Like you say, it’s not really possible to quantify the wear. It was just a daft thing that popped into my head. Thank you for your content. I really like what you do.
@@keithforster2615 Your theory sounds reasonable. I have one of the early generation SO and it still works like a charm, but who knows when that will change? Thanks for your kind words, I am happy you find my videos helpful :D
I completely agree. As consumers, we pay extra for convenience all the time and Autopass is a minor convenience improvement at best. I have a dust collection system blast gate located 9-1/2 feet (2.8m) above the floor that I have been manipulating with a stick for the past year. It was frequently operated and a nuisance so I spent about $60 in parts to provide remote pneumatic operation for the gate. The blast gate performs the same function as before but is a lot more convenient now and I am glad I spent the money for the upgrade. For my use, I just don't see the $200 Autopass feature as even remotely close to the value of the upgraded blast gate. Steve
That is an excellent example, and it's how we all must approach our decisions. I am sure for some people Auto-Pass will deliver $200 of value, for me it doesn't. The video tried to deliver data for folks so they can expand this calculation beyond just a "gut feeling"...
7.5 seconds is just about how long it takes for me to get a sip from my beer. $200 saved and spent on beer!
Ah... I like that kind of out of the box thinking :D
I'm dividing $25/384 pots and get 6.5 cents/pot to lose per pot, alternatively needing to increase the cost of the pot to BREAK EVEN. Again, that means having to make and sell 384 pots. Agreed WS, t'ain't woit it! Maybe someday I'd make a big, huge, massive project requiring 384 depth changes in that ONE project .... to save an hour overall? .. T'ain't woit it!
Yeah, ain’t worth it indeed 😆
I appreciate your videos...thank you! You've been very helpful to me...
Ah, thanks Mark, that makes me very happy 😃 Happy holidays to you and your family
I'm still on the fence about Auto Pass. It's convenient, but once you know the tool, how to navigate settings, and are doing repeated processes, I think it may be an unnecessary feature.
The good thing is, that you have time to decide, there is no rush... you could wait until you have projects that require a lot of manual settings and would justify the expense?
@@Woodensoul that's exactly my thought, wait until its justified. Good stuff as always. Cheers
Absolutely agree!
Welcome to the club, Klaus :D
I would like to see a test , Autopass vs. Manual. Think Autopass ist slower. But i totally with you, the price ist to high for the benefit you have from Autopass.
If they offer something that Origin can make real 3D, moving also the Z Axis while moving over my workpiece, than i will be willing to pay that additional price.
But Autopass is just a Helix Extension on lines .
And that was a simple programming , If start=end then go deeper, and 250€ is to much.
Man, I am fully with you! I would love to test this, but given I am refusing to pay for that extension, I can't test it. I would be curious to see if you really save time, and especially how it interacts with dust cleaning, given I have to do that regularly to prevent the entire thing from clogging. And yes, I would pay for 3D carving too :D
Than you - I fully agree, I also sent Shaper an email regarding the price of Autopass in regard to people that are retired and can not afford this expensive add on.
Judging from the comments in my videos, I think you are not along. Many upset customers wrote them, but it seems that they are not listening for now...
The one flaw that needs to be mentioned here is that you went about this test trying to prove a point that you are saving minimal time with Autopass. You knew all your depth adjustments and offsets ahead of time and had them preplanned. I know when I use the shaper and am making numerous depth plunges, its not quite as automatic for me as I have to stop and think about the next operation. I'm not a fan of the Autopass pay to play model and I wont buy this feature. It was all I could do to make myself buy studio but not knowing any other CAD program other than Sketchup It was a no brainer for me at 50% off the first years subscription.
Hi Dean. I partly agree with your argument. On the one hand, thinking about cut heights while working takes some time, and my simulation didn't include that, but the again that thinking will happen if you purchased Auto-Pass too, so not sure how much one would want to add for that in the calculation. On the other hand, if you use the new depth encoding that Jenner offers, you can remove most of the thinking.
Thanks. This is a good way of thinking about the ‘value’ of AutoPass. I wonder about the need to vacuum out cut paths between passes as well. I use a Festool Vacuum which is pretty efficient but I would still want to clear out cut paths and the general area including tape field fairly often so some of the benefits of automatic ramping would be lost. On complicated projects I find it helpful to prepare a ‘script’ of the planned cuts including bits, number of cuts, planned depth per cut and offsets. The script then becomes a checklist for when I’m cutting the project. The process works for me. So AutoPass is not worth £210 to me.
Yeah Paul, someone else mentioned this too in my last video. I hadn't even thought about it, but indeed, I often use the pauses to set the next cut depth to vacuum the work piece. I really wonder how that works with Auto-Pass, but given I won't buy it, I can't deliver an analysis of it. I hope one of my viewers can share their experience, if they bought it...
First you are correct in thinking that you must stop to clear shavings in a least some cases, I tried not clearing and ended up with a very hot bit. But the advantages to Autopass are not apparent until you work with it for some hours and this video does not address those advantages.
@@brianhood9088 Hello Brian, sadly I’m unlikely to discover the hidden benefits of AutoPass as the cost is too much for what it is,(IMO). Shaper Studio is much the same; too expensive for what it is and if the renewal date was tomorrow, I wouldn’t bother.
@@brianhood9088 Thanks for that information, that’s interesting. And please do enlighten us about those hidden advantages we aren’t aware of, I am genuinely curious…
Hello my friend! Absolutely agree. Great experiment on the time calculation. I think that sometimes people try to justify the next shinny new thing. I myself , at the outset of my woodworking adventure , have gotten caught up in this dilema. I’ve watched so many vids on how to sharpen chisels and blades for example. One in particular up to 16000. I had to really take a step back and ask myself am I trying to sharpen my chisel, or create a scalpel. All this to say, use a little common sense before jumping at the new shinny thing to see if you really do need it. Like you, I see no need to purchase the auto pass feature yet. But hey who am I to resist the call of precious. Lol.
The call of precious, haha. Good example with the chisels man. Sometimes one should just stop, breathe deep and think "WTF am I doing here?". It is so easy to get into a rabbit hole and continue without thinking. The funny thing is that I almost did this with Auto-Pass. If Shaper wouldn't have announced this well ahead of time, I might have just bought it when they announced it (because I was excited). Only after a few days I started to think: "Wait a second..."
@@Woodensoul I sort of think this was a lazy video, as it simply rehashes a couple of the arguments and then attempts to test them with some back-of-the-envelope calculations. Of more value would be to buy autopass and work with it for a week and then report back up or down. Someone could easily make a video about Shaper Origin and if it is worth the cost without ever buying or using an Origin, which is similar to what you have done here. We end up with your opinion not information.
@@brianhood9088 Hi Brian. I won’t dispute this, because I think you are right. I did the best I could, given I refuse to buy it, hence the value of this experiment is limited. But I really don’t want to buy it, because I feel disgusted about the business direction SO is taking, so it is what it is…
Great analysis. For someone using their Shaper Origin professionally to make furniture or other things in a production or semi-production environment, where their time is valuable (and $25/hour is probably much too low a value for their time in that case) I can certainly see buying AutoPass to save some time and (theoretically) prevent some mistakes. But for me, a retired hobbyist user, paying $200 for it just doesn't make sense. I *might* buy AutoPass if it cost $50, just to have it and for the "cool" factor. But for $200? No. There are so many other things I can use $200 for that are much more valuable to me. Everyone that has a Shaper should make that cost/benefit analysis and buy AutoPass or not based on how it comes out. For some people, it will make sense to buy it. For others, like me, it won't.
I feel exactly the same. I might have paid 50 bucks, even if I think this basic functionality, which is a standard CNC feature, should be free. But supporting such rip off prices is not something I do. That is why I also don't buy any of their router bits.
Shaper is choosing the commercial way and loosing the open source community feel of the product
Yeah, apparently that is the strategy 😩
You are a little OCD about this 🤣 You are right, It’s an insult to charge for this.
Totally OCD... but I think this was the last video about the topic, else I will go bananas... :D
It is not a new feature! It is a fix for a cumbersome slow manual approach to depth setting. The UI is clunky and slow. How can you save money if you just paid £210 for a fix for poor V1.0 software.
Hey Phil. Yeah, I get your point and it's certainly a way of looking at it. The way I see it: Every innovation has to start somewhere, and I won't blame SO for nat having this feature in v1.0, but I certainly have no appreciation for charging money for something that is table stakes for any CNC out there.
It’s a rip off. ShaperOrigin are going the wrong path. This was part of the original Kickstarter announcement features which they failed to deliver. They used up/ and burned that money. They increased the SO price and still need more money.
Hi Osamah. I didn't know that. Do you have a link to that announcement?
@@Woodensoul If you check their very first videos about the SO you will see they reveal the features so you can participate into the Kickstarter. They showed the on-device tools (which they never had until 2+years - ie, the finger box joints),. Also - what does a CNC do? cuts a series of paths at a certain depth, usually via a Gcode or GRBL or whatever interface / driver. So is that what they announced? A powerful tool like this was used to create bows, cut shapes all this time? Come, let be serious! They only gave us the Engine, no Windows, No Doors and as they moved forward, they claim to have upgrades and enhancements.
Furthermore, with this attitude, they will eventually kill the tool because none of the accessories they sell are within the acceptable budget. They are over pricing everything, bits, collets, software.
Instead of building a strong customer base, loyal and dedicated, we are debating it here.
For the past 2 years, I pull out my Makita Cordless battery router, and within a few minutes, using my Home-made Jigs, I complete it.. The SO can do it, but it lost its touch due to the many levels of steps to complete the task..
Mind you, I had a suggestion, and I made my own Prototype Workstation / slate. I made it from the plastic RubberMaid shelving liner. I stuck the Domino Tape and used it on my project. I suggested this to Shaper Team, and they cared less. Then a few months later they revealed the "Workstation". I bought the Workstation because its new hardware- and yes its worth it. But I dont think its the same for the software- it should be free and not this way.
@@iq0099 Interesting - I will go and look for these videos, I wasn't aware of that. Either way, it's not like they are honouring those promises, so the outcome is the same. Thanks for sharing your thoughts...
I have picked up some good information from your channel and it was very helpful in making my decision to buy. However, I believe you have missed the point on this.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not pleased with the charge for Auto-Pass. Your example is my issue. You expressed the time savings in terms of seconds saved on each piece and extrapolated over a large number of identical pieces. In my opinion, if you are using your Shaper to do production work you need to have your head examined.
Shaper is ideal as a creative tool or a prototyping tool or [my personal use] for making templates but if you're making dozens of the same object you should buy a "real CNC" and let the machine work for you. You can get a pretty capable CNC machine for little more than the cost of your Shaper and it would be incredibly difficult to make a reasonable wage doing production if you place any value on your time.
[BTW, $25 and hour is pitiful for a craftsman when you an earn $15/hr plus tips working a Starbucks with less training and in an arguably safer environment than a wood shop.]
Hi Al. I am very happy that you found some of my videos helpful, and glad to hear that helped you make the decision to buy.
I don't think you have understood my point in this video. I am not doing any production work with the SO, nor am I planning to do it. This was merely an example to tell people how they can calculate if Auto-Pass is worth it for them. If someone does production work or not, doesn't really matter. What matters is how often you need to manually adapt your depth, and how much time that saves. So I will repectfully accept your recommendation to have my "head examined", but not because of this video, juts in general, because that is always a good idea.
Regarding the hourly rate: I do agree with you and I don't. You have to understand that my audience is international. While I have many viewers in countries like the US or Switzerland, where the hourly wage is much higher, I also have viewers from India, Bolivia, Argentina, Mexico and so on, where hourly wages are lower. I did try to take an average, and I did explicitly mention that you should adapt it to whatever is right for you, so I don't know what else I could have done here. There was no "right" hourly fee to take. But you can do the math, you can exchange numbers and calculate it for yourself, not a big deal.
@@Woodensoul Just to clarify, I don't suggest that you are doing production of multiples but I agree that we all need our heads examined from time to time. My point is that in one off work there is virtually no value in Auto-Pass. I hear and understand the "avoid error" argument but in my experience [similar to your statement] that very rarely happens. Please keep on posting your views on SO.
@@alolme1540 Got you - then I think we are agreeing in all points, Al :D
I thought this video would give some quantitative analysis about time saving. Instead its just an opinion piece. I'll remember to pass on future videos by this author.
I am sorry you feel that way and wish you a wonderful life. Farewell Bob...
I agree with everything he says fanboy.
@@chrisparkinson9237 Haha... you are hilarious