Industrious-Stands

"Industrious Stands" refers to a design methodology and products created by Studio617 for the construction of modular vertical stands with and without telescoping tube, post and/or pole systems as well as other three dimensional structural systems.

The idea hatched when a Mechanical Engineer with a rabid full-stack programming habit wanted to construct a 6 monitor computer workstation, but there are many other uses.

This system can be used to build stands for lighting, sound, cameras, and antennas -- as well as free standing towel holders for a bathroom. It can be used to build cantilevered work surfaces, 3-D pipe structures in general, and a wide range of telescoping pole applications.

A low-cost telescoping post system for a basketball backboard for infants and kids that can grow with them as needed and a 2 story dusting pole are two examples unrelated to monitor stands, for example.

The methodology originally revolved around the use of EMT Tubing, EMT Tubing Accessories, and modified accessories for raw materials. The goal was to limit components to the re-purposing of those to eliminate application specific manufacturing and supply chain issues.

An added benefit of such a design would be assurance that products were available to a global audience at costs dictated only by their local economies.

Some may categorize this an example of "inclusive engineering" vs "exclusive engineering", others may see it as a good challenge.

EMT stands for "Electric Metallic Tubing". It is galvanized tubing used for sleeving electrical wire. It and many of the accessories and fasteners we use are available at every major hardware store and electrical supply house around the world.

During the development process it was realized that Black Iron for gas, Galvanized pipe for plumbing, PVC, CPVC, Polyethelene and Copper for plumbing also work with the EMT Accessories, and that greatly expanded the application potential and options.

For monitor stands, this is ideal for fabrication facilities, factories, industrial offices, BUT it is also ideal for constrained work spaces like small desks, college dorm rooms, computer labs, tight office spaces and bathrooms (because everyone needs one on the bathroom too!).

It's also good for exterior spaces where temporary, movable or permanent outdoor mounts are needed. It also is a fit for retail spaces and finished offices interested in Modular Solutions and/or an industrial look, as well as everyone in the travelling entertainment industry.

Monitor with mounting plate and bracket attached to a post for telescoping applcations...

Can be used indoors and in various desktop applications...

Can be used outdoors and in free standing applcations...

We sell components and assemblies, but if you think of this more as an "open source engineering project" -- inclusive of free and fee based literature and consulting services in addition to a product offering, that will help frame our offerings better.

For designers, if you like the idea but aren't sold on the galvanized silver look of EMT, colored EMT exists and/or painting can be done (although think about scratching). Heat shrink can be used to color the tubing (but be mindful for changes in dimensions). You can even use copper pipe and patina that. There are many possible variations. And then we get into the other pipes too...

There are many possibilities and surely there is something for everyone looking for a little more function over form one way or another.

Basic Product Line with EMT Tubing and Monitor Stands in Mind...

This showcases the components when used in a telescoping stand application for two computer monitors. These stands have a 3/4 axis combo bracket without and with a multi-use slide bracket, a 3 axis bracket, a telescoping coupling, monitor mounting plates, and mounting flanges at the bottom. This is just an example to inspire.

A Telescoping Post Assembly with a 3/4 axis combo bracket, a 3 axis bracket, and two monitor mounting plates and a mounting flange.

Multi-use Slide Bracket

3/4 Axis Combo Brackets

3 Axis Brackets

Telescoping Coupling

Base Plates and Connectors

Monitor Mounting Plate

A Telescoping Post Assembly with a 3/4 axis combo bracket & multi-use slide bracket, a 3 axis bracket, two monitor mounting plates, a double street 90 mounting offset and mounting flange.

End Plugs

There are many ways to mount a post for purposes of Monitor Stands. We break those into 5 categories.

Edge Mounting on Desks
Through Mounting on Desks
Base Mounting for Desktop use
Wall Mounting
Floor Mounting
Other methods

There are ways to do each of the mounting methods above in an expensive and artistic manner with custom fabrication and manufacturing. There are also ways to do them in a low cost and functional manner.

We provide ideas for all methods. We currently only sell items related to lower cost, functional solutions.

A Telescoping Post Assembly with a Multi-use Slide bracket, a 3/4 axis combo bracket, a 3 axis bracket, two monitor mounting plates, and an 8" blue plate special for a base cover.

Desk Edge Mounting - Light Duty

Multi-prong Steel Bases - Smaller for desktop or larger for floor mounting, with or without wheels

Desk Edge Mounting - Heavy Duty

Multi-prong PVC Bases- w/o or w/ decorative cover for load appropriate applications

A way to call home.

Full Offerings by Market Sector

Business to Business (B to B) -- Education, Product Sales, and Support Services -- This is for Small Business Owners, Corporate Contacts, and Government Employees interested in using Industrious Stands in your work Environment (or Personal Life)

Free Educational Documents - We offer free documents to help with methodology understanding and initial design suggestions for use as a monitor stand and other applications. This will benefit both B-to-B and B-to-C customers.
Mail Order - We are currently offering mail order for components and Monitor Stand assemblies. We publish Pricing and Order Form documents to facilitate that. No shopping cart at this time. For B-to-B customers, if you don't feel the need to setup your very own purchasing, fabrication processes and assembly bench first, our mail order should be ideal for initial samples and your initial product needs . Orders over $150 can are custom quoted and minor discounts may apply. We also may be able to help with orders to create a design studio and/or to establish or replenish an assembly bench if needed. In that capacity we'd be acting like a purchasing department and consolidating multiple shipments and deliveries into a single delivery.
Paid Resource - Consulting Services - We will offer paid consulting services should those be of interest. If you have questions that can be answered via email with a sentence or two, they will be provided. Otherwise you would need to schedule a fee based consult. As the interactions transpire we will build out FAQs to help others.
Paid Resource - The Purchasing, Fabrication, Assembly Bench, Advanced Design, and Engineering Guide (and Sponsorship Club) - For a one-time fee (currently deeply discounted to $99), you will get lifetime access to a private website with documents, photos and possibly some videos that would allow a small business, company or government entity to quickly create their own Purchasing List, Fabrication Processes, and Assembly Bench. We also intend to include some information about advanced design concepts and engineering facts as we accumulate them.
1. 1. Purchasing - We provide a google spreadsheet with full list of all parts required to produce components and assemblies. The spreadsheet includes all our current vendors with pricing and quantity breaks, and details for all the items we buy in bulk. As we add vendors and components, the shared document(s) will be updated and available for the life of this business. You can either use the public copy when needed or download it as your own from time to time. There are currently over 60 items in the document. It's the small fasteners needed for this that are hard to keep up with. This document alone is worth the price for admission.
  2. Fabrication - We provide information to show how we cut, drill and modify EMT accessories for the components/systems.
  3. Tools - We provide information on a few tools we suggest for part modification and/or assembly.
  4. Assembly - We provide assembly instructions, tips and tricks.
  5. Design and Engineering - We provide more complex design suggestions and we will provide system testing results and more complex design feedback as we accumulate them.
  6. Intro to ACM and CNC Routing of Small Parts - We provide information on the material and general method we use for fabricating monitor mounting plates from Aluminum Composite Material (ACM) with a CNC Router.

NOTE: At this time we do NOT provide you with very specific CNC router settings, programming techniques, machine configurations or bit details. We worked a long time to get those right for small part manufacturing in mind. It was far more of a trick on a CNC router than most using CNC Plasma, laser or water jet might imagine. If you want to fabricate monitor mounting plates instead of purchasing from us or others, you will need to 1) figure out how to cut them on your CNC router yourslf or 2) come up with alternative material for mounting plates. NOTE: It's unknown if ACM can be cut with CNC Fiber Laser at at this time. It can not be cut with any CO2 lasers as far as we know.

1. 1. Shared via Private Website - The Documents and information will be shared with you via a private website url. No user names or passwords are used, making it easy to share the URL with those you need to share it with properly and mindfully.

The URL will be in the form of: https://sites.google.com/studio617.com/industrious-stands-xxxxxx

"xxxxxx" is replaced with an alpha numeric key to keep some people from just guessing a URL and really easy memory.

We believe this paid resource is worth 10x what we are currently asking, or far more, for those who need to put this to use. We've priced it low because we wanted a far larger consumer base a lot faster, and we're hoping sales volume for this resource will make up for the discounted pricing.

Business to Consumer (B to C) -- Education, Product Sales, and Support Services -- This is for Consumers interested in using Industrious Stands in your life.

Everything offered in Business to Business Product and Services is currently available to you for now as well, but that is subject to change.

This is in fact a technical product and something like this is not always made available in a direct to consumer fashion due to technical nuance that may result in too much support for too little benefit for one off sales.

For business to consumer sales, it's believed this would be much better in a retail setting, like a Kiosk at a mall, or via computer repair shops, or via a face to face sales process like at a local market. For that purpose we are going to try to explore sharing this as an Entrepreneurial Opportunity for those who may be interested in filling that need in their own communities and possibly online as well.

Business to Entrepreneurs (B to E) -- For those interested in fabricating and selling industrious stands in your community or elsewhere.

We may offer an Entrepreneur and/or Entrepreneur Apprenticeship program to support others who may be interested in engaging in the fabrication and sales marketplace. If this transpires it will likely be sold via a website, like the Assembly Bench Support. This could lead to a decentralized fabrication and sales network but that is a projection at this time.

Commentary

Below you will find comments about the design methodology, our thoughts on marketing and other relevant information...

It looks DIY, but it is not really economical to go DIY unless you have a need for 10 or more stands, and even then, fabricating them may be a little unsafe for some...

This is not a system where you can just go buy the parts from Home Depot, put them together and duplicate this.

It requires some saws, drills, taps, and grinders to modify purchased items, and a CNC if you want a lightweight professional looking monitor mounting plate.

And for best pricing on components many need to be purchased 10 to 30 at a time from several vendors.

There are also some edges than can be sharp during fabrication, so you have to work carefully.

Load Understanding and Technical Components will lead some retail consumers to poo-poo the vendor for their own ID 10T errors...

This product line has turned into something that is "more engineered" than anyone might imagine when looking at the pieces or photos.

Often times screws and bolts are serving multiple purposes in otherwise simple looking systems.

Sometimes they have to be just the right length or thread to make it all work -- and that does not make it great for a consumer product where non-technical consumers may not always pay attention to detail.

image courtesy of:
https://www.redbubble.com/i/sticker/ID10T-error-Tech-Support-Joke-by-Mistreena/148735089.EJUG5

Many options for monitor stand bases and mounting...

There are many ways to mount monitor stands. We provide many recommendations for expensive and artistic solutions as well as lower cost clever solutions, some of which look artistic as well.

We only sell parts for a few of the lower cost options at this time. Others in the Carpentry, CNC, and/or metal fabrication industry can likely offer some very creative custom bases for those seeking to spend more money on custom bases.

image courtesy of: https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/8nf6pj/missing_some_parts_only_the_body_of_the_car_is/

We envision scaling production on the monitor mounting plates a little -- until such time as we decide to try to bring others up to speed on those too.

One requirement for using the methodology for monitor stands was developing a low cost but scalable system for monitor mounting plates

That has now been done with a CNC Router and Aluminum Composite Material (ACM) . ACM is used as a substrate in the sign industry. We are re purposing it because it seems well suited for light commercial loads. It's plastic deformation characteristics and easy drilling for modification are exceptional.

If you check out CNC Router communities online, there is low engagement for ACM cutting dialogue. What is there will show you that many people have problems making small parts out of ACM efficiently and consistently. The challenges and concerns are valid in many ways, but we feel we've found a few trade secrets that may provide a small sweet spot that should work for at least a little while.

Summary for now...

Our initial goal has been to develop a robust product line for many needs along with free and fee based publishing material, and consulting services that might allow for making a little money while inspiring more people to engage in a more creative manner with their Computer Monitors -- and anything else they can hang from a sturdy pole or put on the end of a sturdy pole, in a more satisfying and creative manner.

Developing this system required a need, an understanding of Loads, critical thinking skills, an understanding of EMT offerings, clever thoughts, the use of unique tools, the creation of some non-intuitive jigs, a minor amount of space to work, some "spare time" that many people can not carve out of their lives -- and a lot more -- but given what has come of it, it's been worth it so far.

Hopefully that feeling will continue as we attempt to take this to the marketplace.

We feel this is a like a new world where Erector Sets and Round tubing collide. A place where Lego Lovers get to build structural stuff too.

For background on Studio617 and other offerings please visit our full website .

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