Too Late

You know the old saw "he who hesitates is lost"... well I hesitated for four years. I wish I had the time to devote to making my hobby a business like I intended.

Below is a picture of my front suspension, very similar to the one I've posted before numerous times, but from a slightly different angle. The difference is that if you look closely at the upper control arm, you can see that the shaft has an extension such that the bolt that mounts to the frame is raised, effectively dropping the UCA without the need to drill holes in the shock towers. I even considered filing for a patent. It's too late now. In the latest issue of Mustang Monthly, there's an article on the SEMA show. TCP has figured out the same thing and came out with one that drops the same way. Of course theirs is not nearly as elegant as mine :D I had 50 of them made and still intend to put together a kit for sale some day... just not sure when that day will come.:(
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Why not just sell the arms you have now instead of trying to make an entire kit ? Maybe if you saw some cash flow from sales it would motivate you more to get the rest of the kit finished.
 
You know the old saw "he who hesitates is lost"... well I hesitated for four years. I wish I had the time to devote to making my hobby a business like I intended.

Back in highschool, I had friends who were talking about how easily they could install a POP (point of purchase) mechanism allowing you to use your ATM card to purchase gas at a gas station. this was 1984, about 10 years before it came online.

Carpe diem.
 
when i was in high school and delivering pizzas i came up with an idea for a breakfast pizza, with bacon or suasage and eggs. about 5 or 6 years ago someone decided to market it......:notnice: i also came up with an idea for an air powered car and now there is some guy in new zealand working on one......:bang: i've had other ideas as well and a lot of them have become reality too but never with me as the "inventor". i have an idea i've been kicking around for a while now but i'm not telling anyone what it is
 
Patents are a good way to protect yourself from getting sued by someone who may have the same idea (or stolen yours), but as a method of preventing others from copying your idea - they're only as affective as your ability to enforce them.
 
Patents are a good way to protect yourself from getting sued by someone who may have the same idea (or stolen yours), but as a method of preventing others from copying your idea - they're only as affective as your ability to enforce them.

Very true, but in my case I had a legal team ready to defend it... albeit it at quite a price. I sold my soul to the corporation when I hired in. I had to sign an agreement stating that any patent I obtained while in their employ would belong to them, regardless of whether or not it fit within the domain of any of their business units. Since it did not, they were willing to allow me to put it in my name but they wanted a cut... 10% of all licensing royalties and 2.5% of the profit from sales. That was one reason I procrastinated so long. I hate lawyers.
 
Sorry to stray off topic on this one.....

69GMACHINE - can you please tell me more about your front brakes, I noticed that they are C5!! I love the C5 brakes-I think they are by far the best bang for our buck! I put them on my '92 Vette, and I would love to be able to put a set on my '65.

It looks like you used an aftermarket C5 rotor and just redrilled it for the 4.5" bolt pattern, but what about mounting the caliper? and what spindles are you using? etc

Thanks
 
Sorry to stray off topic on this one.....

69GMACHINE - can you please tell me more about your front brakes, I noticed that they are C5!! I love the C5 brakes-I think they are by far the best bang for our buck! I put them on my '92 Vette, and I would love to be able to put a set on my '65.

It looks like you used an aftermarket C5 rotor and just redrilled it for the 4.5" bolt pattern, but what about mounting the caliper? and what spindles are you using? etc

Thanks

The Spindles are from a '77 Granada, The hub is a forged aluminum piece from Wilwood, purchased from Hot Rod USA. I believe it was originally for a Mustang II spindle which shares the same dimensions on the pin.

The rotors are 12 x 1.25 from Coleman racing. There are several rotors ranging from light weight to heavy duty, straight vaned or directional that will bolt on these hubs as the 8x7 pattern is common in the industry. Prices range from $71 to $110 each.

The calipers were bought used from a Corvette wrecking yard for ridiculously cheap, something like $50 for the pair with the baskets and even the OEM pads that were practically new. I designed the bracket that mounts it to the spindle. For the price, performance, reliability, low maintenance and availability of pads and replacement parts, the C5 calipers are pretty tough to beat.
 
The Spindles are from a '77 Granada, The hub is a forged aluminum piece from Wilwood, purchased from Hot Rod USA. I believe it was originally for a Mustang II spindle which shares the same dimensions on the pin.

The rotors are 12 x 1.25 from Coleman racing. There are several rotors ranging from light weight to heavy duty, straight vaned or directional that will bolt on these hubs as the 8x7 pattern is common in the industry. Prices range from $71 to $110 each.

The calipers were bought used from a Corvette wrecking yard for ridiculously cheap, something like $50 for the pair with the baskets and even the OEM pads that were practically new. I designed the bracket that mounts it to the spindle. For the price, performance, reliability, low maintenance and availability of pads and replacement parts, the C5 calipers are pretty tough to beat.


Thanks for all the info. The key piece to this equation seems to be the mounting bracket that you designed. Do you have any drawings or details on your design? I would be very interested in duplicating it to put a set on mine(if you wouldn't mind) You can PM me if you don't want to post everything up on here.
 
Who do you work for?

Very true, but in my case I had a legal team ready to defend it... albeit it at quite a price. I sold my soul to the corporation when I hired in. I had to sign an agreement stating that any patent I obtained while in their employ would belong to them, regardless of whether or not it fit within the domain of any of their business units. Since it did not, they were willing to allow me to put it in my name but they wanted a cut... 10% of all licensing royalties and 2.5% of the profit from sales. That was one reason I procrastinated so long. I hate lawyers.
 
A lawyer is like a gun; only as good or evil as the hand that wields him.

I disagree with that completely. A gun can't look for a hand but a lawyer can. A gun has no control over the hand that uses it but a lawyer does. It takes a crooked lawyer to go along with a crooked deed. There may be a few honest lawyers out there but they would be the exception rather than the rule.

I had an idea about inventing the internet but Al Gore beat me to it.
 
I disagree with that completely. A gun can't look for a hand but a lawyer can. A gun has no control over the hand that uses it but a lawyer does. It takes a crooked lawyer to go along with a crooked deed. There may be a few honest lawyers out there but they would be the exception rather than the rule.

I had an idea about inventing the internet but Al Gore beat me to it.

If you are saying that the contractual terms imposed on 69gmachine were patently illegal, then any lawyer who drafted such a contract would have committed an ethical breach. But you know full well that the commercial terms 69gmachine had to comply with are pretty standard and it was not the company lawyer who imposed them but the corporate suits who did. These are not illegal terms. They might not be fair but it is the bargaining position of the company vs that of the employee. If the employee cannot live with them, he is free to decline a job offer. But again, the fact that the company did this is irrelevant to you. You only see the hand of the lawyer in it all.

You see these terms imposed by universities on students and professors. If they invent something in a university lab, the U gets ownership. These are terms that the board of regents decide whether or not to impose but in your eyes, it is the lawyer who is to blame.

It is like when a Dr. gets sued for malpractice. 12 ordinary citizens on a jury decide whether there was malpractice or not and if so, how much the Dr. should pay. And yet you would simply ignore that and blame the lawyer who sued the Dr.