Crispin Fabrications first product

So, on Monday, I said that on Tuesday I would be posting a product that would be quick and easy for me to sell.

Since I slept through Tuesday, I figured it was time to post our first product up now.

Williams Sonoma, Pampered Chef, and a bunch of different "design houses" etc... all offer high end wood and metal pot racks.

They're not bad products, but I've never really liked any of them; plus, the big ones often run to $600 or more (some as much as $2,000). The little ones can be had for as little as $200 (or their east Asian and south American copies as little as $100), but what's the point of a little pot rack. You can only fit a couple of pots on the little ones.

Even worse, all of them, even the $2000 ones; use substandard hardware. They're scrap metal quality, with iffy finishes, and tropical woods no-one has ever heard of.

I just don't get the appeal frankly. I wouldn't buy one.

So, I decided I'd build my own, of solid oak, and high quality stainless.

I started off with an 8 foot length of 1x6 red oak. I trimmed it to six feet, and quarter round routed the edge; then finish sanded the whole piece.

After wiping it down, I hand rubbed three coats of a light "gunstock" stain, and then three coats of a thinned out hand rubbed poly. That gave it a nice neutral gold, semi-gloss finish; to nicely match my kitchen woodwork.

All that was in the shop, and unfortunately, I didn't have my camera out with me while I was doing it.

Then I brought the piece inside, to mount the hardware, and hang it:

I started out by setting the three screw-eyes I chose to use as hangars, in the top of the ledger.

I chose to attach them to the anchor eyes (same as the hangers) with a single threaded quicklink, because I didn't need much drop from the beam; but I could have used any length of chain I wanted, to set the drop as low as I needed to. I also could have used a simple set of hooks for about 1.5" less drop if I needed to (or opened the eyes up, hooked them together, and reclosed them for that matter).

The hooks themselves are a decent grade stainless, and rated for 600lbs each; so I'm not exactly worried about the load carrying capacity of the thing (unlike some of the commercial models, whose hardware leaves me doubting their capability to hold a full load of heavy stainless or cast iron pots and pans).

Continuing in that theme, I used four of the same eyes as the anchors and hangars for the suspension chain.

You can see there, I chose to tighten the chain with a center turnbuckle. This keeps the chain nice and tight, and allows for as much adjustment as necessary. I also chose to use quicklinks to anchor to the ends of the ledger, and to thread through the hangars.

This allows the chain to slide through the hangars up to about 1.5" on each side (more than enough to tighten the chain up) without binding up.

The point of using the chain, is to give you infinite flexibility on the number of pots, and their positions. Most of the commercial models are somewhat limited. I don't know about you, but I have a lot of different pots and pans of wildly different sizes and shapes, and I need that flexibility.

The pots themselves hang from heavy duty "S" hooks, which are inserted into the individual links.

I could have used a cable, or a steel rod (and several commercial models do); which would let you slide the hooks (and pots) up and down etc... but I like the fact that the chain holds the hooks into one position. You still get the flexibility of moving the pots wherever you want, but without having them move on their own if for example, one end of the rack were to fall (or one end of the cable or rod etc...).

The hooks at the ends are angled out to reduce swaying by the way.

I think it looks pretty good up there don't you? And at six feet long, it's got enough capacity for as many pots and pans as I could want (I put 18 hooks up there, but I don't think I'll use all of them).

I can build this design, a variant with a cable or rod instead of a chain; or a variant with individual hooks and eyes. I can build a variant with a broader ledger, and hooks or a chain etc... on both sides of the ledger.

For the ledger, I can use just about any wood you like; though the wood selected does have a structural impact. I can make the ledger deeper (higher as it were), thicker, shallower... I can even use square section wood.

I you like, I can change the form of the rack from a straight bar, to a mitered square, triangle, pentagon, hexagon, or octagon.

I can also make the rack out of solid or tubular (circular, square, rectangular, or triangular section) steel, aluminum, copper, brass, or wrought Iron; with the hardware either threaded or welded (or brazed or silver soldered) into the bar.

As to hardware, I can make it with stainless hardware, galvanized, plain steel, painted steel, powdercoated steel, or brass (understandably, brass will have a little less load carrying capacity). I can also add a utensil grid, or some baskets pretty easily.

If you'd like the piece decorated, I can carve or rout decorative designs or lettering into the wood, inlay contrasting woods (that would be a very large upcharge. Inlay work is slow and painstaking), woodburn designs or lettering, even paint or tint designs or lettering into the ledger.

And of course, I can make it any length you want; with any length of hangar hardware you want (though I recommend keeping to six feet or under, to avoid excess shipping charges).

These are true custom pieces, so I can't quote a stock price. Each piece will be made and sold on a materials plus labor basis.

I can tell you that at todays material prices, a linear red oak rack (from 2 to 8 feet long) with a plain hand rubbed finish, no additional decoration, heavy stainless hardware, and a heavy stainless chain, as pictured here; would run you about $200 (plus shipping and handling).

Excuse the quality of the pictures, but I took them in poor light, with a compact point and shoot. I'm going to take some better ones with my "real" camera when I get some good light.

So, if you're interested, drop us a line:

Crispin Fabrication 1-855-CrisEnt (1-855-274-7368)

info@crispinarms.com (I haven't set up the Crispin Fab email or website yet).

So, what exactly is Crispin Enterprises?

Simply put, Crispin Enterprises is the umbrella for the business efforts of the Byrne Family.

What was originally several different small companies, with diverse names, was combined under one name when we reincorporated in Idaho in 2010, and of course, has just been added on to with Crispin Arms and Crispin Fabrication.

Those companies are:

Crispin Consulting - 


This is masthead for my consulting activities; primarily including information systems; physical, electronic, and information security; storage, archive, and HA/DR; architecture, administration, engineering, management, managed services consulting, and training.

Crispin Press - 


A small, special interest, and short run; publisher and printer. Offering editing, layout and pre-press, publishing, and distribution services on both a shared venture, and a custom published or contract published basis.

Crispin Press offers specialty printing, formatting, and binding that conventional publishers and printers can't, or that they charge prohibitively high rates for; as well as offering authors with a very small potential audience, an opportunity to publish and be distributed; that a larger publisher, with higher overhead, otherwise could not offer.

Crispin Fabrication -

A custom fabrication, repair, restoration, and finishing shop for wood and metal.

Services including custom machining, custom sheetmetal work, welding, custom electronics and electronics repair, wood and metal finishing and refinishing, wood and metal repair and restoration, and antique repair and restoration.

Crispin Fabrication has particular expertise in automotive, powersport and motorsport applications; aviation applications; boating and marine applications; guitar repair and fabrication; and furniture repair and restoration.

We also manufacture specialty tools and fixtures, and custom and reproduction parts, for all of the industries and interests above.

Crispin Arms - 

Crispin Arms is a small gunsmithing shop, and soon will be an FFL dealer, Class 3 SOT, and manufacturer of firearms and class III items (paperwork is pending on those); maker of custom knives; and manufacturer of high precision, custom loaded ammunition.

We specialize in custom gunsmithing, ammosmithing, bladesmithing, custom fabrication in metal and wood, and firearms repair and refinishing; including repair of class III items, and fabrication and fitting of hard to find and out of production parts for firearms and class III items.

Crispin Arms has particular expertise in 1911 type pistols, and long range rifles.

We specialize in custom gunsmithing, bladesmithing, custom fabrication in metal and wood, and firearms repair; including repair of class III items, and fabrication and fitting of hard to find and out of production parts for firearms and class III items.

Crispin Arms has particular expertise in 1911 type pistols, and long range rifles.

Why? ...and what's the history?

Basically... I prefer to work for myself, and I have a diverse set of skills and interests.

I'm an engineer by nature and by education; and a trained and experienced metal fabricator, finish carpenter, and cabinet maker (both by interest, and by periodic employment).

I have periodically worked professionally in firearms since I was 21, and in fabrication and restoration of metal and wood since before high school (I was 13 when I first apprenticed at my uncles furniture restoration shop, and 16 when I learned welding and machining at a local custom bicycle maker).  I started my first computer business when I was in high school. I've been doing all four since, on both a personal, and a professional basis.

Basically, the reason I haven't worked in gunsmithing or fabricating (or guitar repair, or publishing) full time; is because I can make a lot more money in IT consulting, for a lot fewer hours worked, and a lot less effort in developing new business. It has just made more sense.

My wife and I have these businesses, because they align nicely with our interests, and our passions.

We have all of them, because it gives us more opportunities for revenue; and frankly, because other than IT consulting, none of them individually can generate enough revenue to support our family at the scale we want to operate on (small home based or small shop based; with no, or very few, employees).
 
Why Crispin?

That's easy. I'm a big Shakespeare fan, and as it happens, my favorite piece of dramatic prose in all of history happens to be Henry V; Act 4, Scene 3:

This day is called the feast of Crispian:
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian:'
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.
And say 'These wounds I had on Crispin's day.'
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names.
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

The eventual goal of my wife and I, is to have a ranch and farm, as close to self sustaining as possible (not self sufficient, that's impossible these days. But self sustaining. We want to sell to everyone, and buy as little as possible, from as close as possible); up here in north Idaho. 

When we made the decision to move here almost three years ago, we decided to figure out the name for our enterprise. The name we came up with, was Crispin Ranch. From there, it was a simple extension to Crispin Enterprises as the overall name for our business, and Crispin Press for our publishing company.