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Thread: Liability for small shops?
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13th April 2014, 08:03 PM #31
I'm always incredibly impressed by your knowledge sound man. I don't know who you are, but ing hell. You must have more wires crisscrossing your brain than most.
Thats were I question you. Its not reasonable……….. most actions/reaction/discission from the majority are impetous. (including myself) Just need a key word,, like 'hate', 'death', 'danger', or clever string of them,,,,to hook plenty in one shot without thought.
Its, (just an opinion) is/will be the main reason for the destruction of man and the planet (thats deeeeep. no I'm not on medication)
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13th April 2014, 08:19 PM #32
And the Felling shake was running out ?. not straight grain? Grain not parallel with side of timber. I tried to google image it.
This is just an impetuous comment as I don't know all the facts, but I fear one of the problems was the timber. Red cedar just always seems too light duty to me. Which will off a group of blokes somewhere no doubt. (Especially the traditionalists that work it exclusively, and have been accumulating it, being treating as gold, have paid big dollars for it, lots of effort milling it, feeling wonderful that they have the best stuff. etc etc over years ….sorry for voicing my opinions. Better look for some problems with my chairs and spread that about. )
If you think insurance people are A$$$holes, wait until you get involved with the legal profession. When you meet a good lawyer, shoot the barstarted before he turns bad!
If it was me, I would see someone about your fantasy. As a front rower, what you would be facing would be a horrible sight. Now five eighth is a very different matter indeed! The rules of the game would also have to change. ie "Props must bind to the jursey of the opposing player." And if you think I am going to recommend you as a prime candidate for the Rules Board, you've got another think coming!
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13th April 2014, 11:21 PM #33GOLD MEMBER
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Im not sure if you are confusing heart shake or star shake with felling shake. Felling shake runs across the grain.
As for grain run out, in that design of chair , having a curved rear leg, there is going to be grain run out some where. As for cedar as a chair material, you are quite right. Some cedar is very soft. Particularly cedar from high fertility soil and high rainfall areas. I am one of those cedar specialists. It has been my main timber for over 40 years. I prefer NSW cedar to QLD cedar. And I prefer hard grown trees to "cellery."
Getting back to the faulty chair... The fracture was directly across the grain. It was a clean break,extending about two thirds across the leg. The remaining solid timber splintered.
Over the years, I have worked many pieces of timber that have eventually exposed a shake that wasnt evident earlier. Particularly turning, where an otherwise sound looking bit of stick will take a sudden "turn" for the worst and fall out of the lathe in two pieces once the shake has nothing supporting it.
Another point to consider on the liability angle; starting out in business is usually the time were most mistakes are made. As you said, you have changed designs as you have progressed. Just because strong heavy timber is used, doesn't necessarily mean a chair, or any other piece of furniture won't fail. The three most important qualities for chair timber are integrity, bondability and stability. I like to refer to these as the three titties. You are probably not the best bloke to share that with. Most other short comings can be overcome by design. Many of our heavier timbers are notoriously unstable, difficult to season and hard to glue. All very important for a decent chair. But this still doesnt remove the abuse factor. Chairs are often mistreated in such a way that it is nigh impossible to be able to prove it. Tilting back on the back legs would be one case in point.
Fifteen years ago, I made a cedar dining room suite for a policeman. He is six foot seven and weighs twenty six stone! They call him Tiney. The chairs were designed accordingly and continue to give good service.
Even if they do break, both he and I are covered. That lets me sleep at night. Probably one of the reasons he gave me the job in the first place. Customers seem to warm to the fact you carry insurance. Its a handy selling tool. And an honest one.
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13th April 2014, 11:39 PM #34
Hi,
I must be dim, I have had 3 chairs collapse under me and the front leg break off one with out landing me on the floor, and I never thought of suing anyone.
RegardsHugh
Enough is enough, more than enough is too much.
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14th April 2014, 12:15 AM #35
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14th April 2014, 12:51 AM #36
I guess if we knew that we would not need insurance.
This may give you some idea http://www.hassandlass.org.uk/ Hard to drill down to specifics but Table 4 gives some idea of injuries for 0-4yo like a national estimate of 300k injuries per year in the UK for "Lounge/study/living/dining/play area." How many 0-4yos in the UK??
Very hard to quantify unless you are an actuary with the data - but as others have said fear is a powerful motivator and insurers know that and promote the fear factor wrt to the quantum of damages. Realistically most subbies are required to carry at least $10m and more like $20m cover these days to have any chance of getting work.
Honestly I have particpated in and facilitated continuing professional development seminars for surveyors about risk minimisation and insurances. It can be quite stressfull for small business owners facing any form of liability litigation. A lot of surveyors have been down that road, and in most cases it was not their error that lead to the damages claim. Often it is another deflecting blame and liability. Most surveyors insure through an industry specific insurer managed by their business council SIBA which represents their interests with specific industry knowledge and litigation experience. This is why VWA insurance would most likely be a good choice (not a recommendadtion as I have no specific experience with their product etc). Best to go with an insurer with specific industry knowledge and experience.
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14th April 2014, 07:52 AM #37GOLD MEMBER
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14th April 2014, 08:36 AM #38GOLD MEMBER
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Pity to have to turn down the work. Mind you, furniture making is a bit like acting...never work with kids or animals.
At around five to six hundred bucks a year, its pretty cheap peace of mind. Even if you only make six sales a year, it represents a hundred dollar surcharge. Divide that by the number of pieces in the sale and it looks even better.
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14th April 2014, 09:13 AM #39
I know it goes across. Thats where I'm confused. Cross grain flaws stick out. I'd like to be shown a piece of cedar with a near invisible shake line. Not suggesting its a fib. Be interesting for me. Something to learn. These flaws would be found quickly with steam bending.
As for grain run out, in that design of chair , having a curved rear leg, there is going to be grain run out some where.
As for cedar as a chair material, you are quite right. Some cedar is very soft. Particularly cedar from high fertility soil and high rainfall areas. I am one of those cedar specialists. It has been my main timber for over 40 years. I prefer NSW cedar to QLD cedar. And I prefer hard grown trees to "cellery."
Getting back to the faulty chair... The fracture was directly across the grain. It was a clean break,extending about two thirds across the leg. The remaining solid timber splintered.
Over the years, I have worked many pieces of timber that have eventually exposed a shake that wasnt evident earlier. Particularly turning, where an otherwise sound looking bit of stick will take a sudden "turn" for the worst and fall out of the lathe in two pieces once the shake has nothing supporting it.
Another point to consider on the liability angle; starting out in business is usually the time were most mistakes are made. As you said, you have changed designs as you have progressed. Just because strong heavy timber is used, doesn't necessarily mean a chair, or any other piece of furniture won't fail. The three most important qualities for chair timber are integrity, bondability and stability. I like to refer to these as the three titties. You are probably not the best bloke to share that with. Most other short comings can be overcome by design.
I still question the odds of these unforeseen things happening because their 'invisible' at the time of construction. I would suspect its more blurred into the realm of ' overlooked ', due to pressures of production.
Many of our heavier timbers are notoriously unstable, difficult to season and hard to glue.
..but we can't dump on cedar. We just can't ! Its beautiful, its traditional, its used by the people in the know...
Which is bizzar, because don't we care about danger !
All very important for a decent chair. But this still doesnt remove the abuse factor. Chairs are often mistreated in such a way that it is nigh impossible to be able to prove it. Tilting back on the back legs would be one case in point.
Fifteen years ago, I made a cedar dining room suite for a policeman. He is six foot seven and weighs twenty six stone! They call him Tiney. The chairs were designed accordingly and continue to give good service.
Even if they do break, both he and I are covered. That lets me sleep at night. Probably one of the reasons he gave me the job in the first place. Customers seem to warm to the fact you carry insurance. Its a handy selling tool. And an honest one.
But I suppose a fear word must be floating around ones head first for that to be considered….. So MUST NOT MENTION ANYTHING NEGITIVE.
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14th April 2014, 09:46 AM #40GOLD MEMBER
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No Brainer!!!
Get a couple of quotes on the insurance, then look at them this way....
So you have to pony up a couple of hundred bucks a year to carry insurance for a "thousand to one" shot?
Is it really a "thousand to one"? All chairs break eventually... usually when someone is sitting on them. Or standing on them to change a light bulb. Or conducting "adult activities" on them. My point is
You as a manufacturer cannot control what activities your chair may be subjected to.
You as a manufacturer cannot control what stress your chair is placed under. You might be able to place a sticker saying Max Load... kg on them - and maybe that's something you should do anyway because the issue here is not build quality, but rather is limiting your liability. But proving your chair failed under "normal" usage conditions can be quite difficult.
You insure your house and contents right? Odds of the house burning/ getting hit by earthquake/ cyclone/flood are...???
Probably less then the odds of a chair designed for children failing when the 300lb parent uses it for a stepladder to get to the top of a cupboard.
Odds of you getting sued are???
Probably not good, and getting worse. You see all those "no win no fee" lawyer advertisments... they this kinda thing. My client was using a chair as a stepladder as every one of us has done before and the chair failed and he now suffers permanant back pain and...
Odds of you having a house after the lawyers finish with you if you aren't insured?
Lets say that by my calculations you're more likely to lose your house through not having business insurance of some form or other then you are to lose it to natural disaster. So you'd do better to not pay the house insurance and insure the business instead.
Yes, it's going to hurt the bottom line. Yes, it might be enough to tilt your business towards being unviable. But there's a reason your bank manager insists you have house insurance while they carry your mortgage too. If you can't afford the premium you can't afford the house: or in this case can't afford to operate as a business.
it's not fear it's common sense. Like not using a condom if you're in the habit of having drunken monkey sex with random strangers; sometimes the risk ain't worth it.
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14th April 2014, 11:51 AM #41GOLD MEMBER
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Morning John, The thought of having sex with a strange drunken monkey does not appeal to me at all.
On a more serious note; Your comment about concealed felling shake would be appreciated, as I guess both you and I would have seen more timber in a week than most would see in a life time.
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14th April 2014, 12:30 PM #42GOLD MEMBER
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Apricotripper, Im having trouble seeing your logic with steaming showing up a partial felling shake. As an apprentice, we did a lot of steaming. The way I see it, steaming swells the fibres, this closes the shake even tighter. Then, if the partial shake is on the concave face of the bend, it is closed even tighter still and remains so as the piece dries out. Does that make sense?
Customers like to buy with confidence. They like warranties. They will even pay to extend warranty. Guarantee is even more appealing to many. That is what insurance becomes. Even more so. The insurance covers them personally. Warranty covers the product only.
The customer who is concerned about your insurance being an admission by you as a producer of inferior products isn't really a customer. He's a tyre kicker. Tyre kickers are the greatest waste of time to any manufacturer. Time spent with them is lost production. If my having an insurance cover leads them to believe I'm sus, thats fine. Its been automatic and no time wasted.
I dont have a blind felling shake on hand to show you, but believe me it is quite common. In light coloured sap timbers, they are nearly always invisible.
Weight to strength ratio is very important factor in many areas of manufacture. Woodworking is no different. One of the reasons cedar was used for furniture is exactly that.
Back in the old days, everything was moved by horse and cart. The lighter the better. The more you could get on. There is nothing nicer than to be able to pick up a chair with one finger, but yet know that same chair will carry the weight of some over fed human.
In design, strong is good, heavy is a burden. If maximizing the former overly increases the later it is not good design.
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14th April 2014, 01:01 PM #43
yes it makes sense what your saying. But from my experience with shake, when it compresses it doesn't disappear. Being a weakness of concern, it folds. Tends to be a compression failure. It reveals itself more. It darkens not disappears. I bend turned timbers mostly. round stock. With those types of bends most of the force is right on the inner most area of the bend. Not distributed over a flat surface. If there's a flaw on the bend of the round stock, it will fail, imo, no mater how blind it is.
What sort of radiuses and timbers did you bend as an apprentice ? Are you taking into account that different timbers fail differently.
Regarding the cedar, I would like to see a blind felling shake before a bend and one after. And then I would like to see a failure it causes. And then I want to know how often this is the cause of failure. And I want to know what timbers are prone to it. ..(cedar ?)
I don't mind being wrong.
Customers like to buy with confidence. They like warranties. They will even pay to extend warranty. Guarantee is even more appealing to many. That is what insurance becomes. Even more so. The insurance covers them personally. Warranty covers the product only.
The customer who is concerned about your insurance being an admission by you as a producer of inferior products isn't really a customer. He's a tyre kicker. Tyre kickers are the greatest waste of time to any manufacturer. Time spent with them is lost production. If my having an insurance cover leads them to believe I'm sus, thats fine. Its been automatic and no time wasted.
I dont have a blind felling shake on hand to show you, but believe me it is quite common. In light coloured sap timbers, they are nearly always invisible.
Weight to strength ratio is very important factor in many areas of manufacture. Woodworking is no different. One of the reasons cedar was used for furniture is exactly that.
Back in the old days, everything was moved by horse and cart. The lighter the better. The more you could get on. There is nothing nicer than to be able to pick up a chair with one finger, but yet know that same chair will carry the weight of some over fed human.
In design, strong is good, heavy is a burden. If maximizing the former overly increases the later it is not good design.
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14th April 2014, 02:54 PM #44GOLD MEMBER
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Warranty is insurance. Death doent have to come into it. It is a form of protection to both parties at all levels. How good's that!
I thought you would come up with the obsolete horse theory. I used to export chairs to Germany. Freight by weight. It doesnt matter what the mode of transport, the greater the weight the greater the cost. Unless of course, if its a volume based contract.
We could debate all day the pros and cons of different timber species and their suitability for specific uses. Suffice to say I have had one failed chair in forty years and that was glue failure. I have never had a claim made against me or my product.
Yes, I know. Why do I have insurance? Simple, its always possible. I have no control once my product leaves my workshop. There are people who specialize in litigation. The customers Evanism mentions would be prime suspects, cashed for a fight.
Try this for size; A mate of mine was sued few years back. He had no insurance but the plaintiff didnt know that nor did they care. To overcome them incurring any legal fees, they went to the police with the complaint. The DPP decided, on the strength of the police report, he had a case to answer. The trial went ahead and my friend was found not guilty. His legal fees were about $40,000. To recoup those costs he had to either sue the DPP or go the plantiff who of course had nothing. The Dpp said they were working on evidence supplied by the plaintiff and as the evidence was proved fraudulent the plaintiff should pay the costs. He got a judgement in his favour but is still trying to get money out of a stone.
Another friend, who I have mentioned earlier, is about to have to go down the same track.
Please excuse me for not sharing your enthusiasm for taking risks. My premiums are low and my A$$ is covered.
Your questions re cedar: The more spring timber has the less inclined it is to felling shake. Felling shake in cedar is not common in my experience. The importance of strength to weight ratio is a very important factor in design. You ignore it at your own peril.
My first trade was as a coach builder. We restored museum pieces. Steam bending was in many different timbers and configurations. Cedar was not one of them. Though it was used extensively in coach work. The main area for failure caused by shakes was in draw shafts. Thankfully, due to their springy nature, it was very rare.
I gather you would like to see things before you believe them. This is often not a bad thing.
In the case of a legal suit, that does not apply
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14th April 2014, 04:39 PM #45
Fair enough.
The world you live in, is much different to mine. I'm not large production. Majority of things you've mentioned will never be a concern to me. (thank god). And I doubt will be for most small businesses(which is what I thought evanism was talking about).
Guessing…
- you'd have a much greater money flow to just cover insurance quickly like any other bill. Bigger business must drain all your time.
- Weight to strength ratio….. never need to be a consideration for one piece work like I do. Never will have to consider transport big shipments of chairs overseas. So, I can ensure my pieces are stronger (and put more effort into each one).
- your steam bending experiences differ to mine. Stuff I need to know, you don't and visa versa.
What would be an interesting figure though is ……. how much in premiums would have you paid over your career. Total……And then compare that to a ruff loss that would be incurred from one lawsuit . That would at least give some guide, since true odds will never be allowed to be public knowledge.
in anycase. All the best with your business.
Jake