How Many Projects are Too Many?

[Kirk Freeman]

Just spent 30 minutes arranging my Gun Kanban Board. I have . . . a lot going on.

How many is too many projects? Asking for a friend.

What is your project flow rate? One per month? Don't add any until one moves across the board? What do you guys do?

 

[Gabriel]

Kanban?

 

[MCgrease08]

Kanban board - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[55fairlane]

2 03 Springfield to build from bare receivers
1 03A3 to build from a bare receiver
Build action wrench for said receivers, because I will write an article about said build and get a paycheck for doing so.
Rebuild on a milling machine, so I can build the action wrench,so I can build the rifles.
Couple grand worth of cabinets for the machine shop, so I can organize my gun builds.
New rail & resight in on my 22-250
Cost & weight estimate on a new rimfire sporter rifle.
Look at the 2023 Camp Perry & CMP Alabama calendar to determine what matches I'm gonna shoot
Load 3k rounds for my match rifle, 2k for my service rifle
Develop a light load for my m1917 & my Smith Corona 03A3

Some of these are longer term some are back burner projects, some are done as parts show up.

Aaron

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Kanban?

Flow chart for project supervision. Think it was popularized by Toyota, part of their dozen pillars of production.

Thanks, MC, forgot to define.

 

[55fairlane]

Kanban board - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Kanban is also a "real time" inventory system of how much of what do I have, what is my reorder number......

 

[kennedy759]

being retired makes a difference, room for more projects, I divide my time between my garage and gun room
Garage:
74 VW dune buggy
Massey Ferguson sub compact tractor(currently welding on grab hooks)
building indoor .22 plinking range
Gun Room:
loading 16 ga for trap
loading .40 for the range
loading 223 for the range

 

[Bugzilla]

Enough so you always have 2 or 3 project to work on while you are waiting on things for the #1 project.

 

[jerrob]

1

 

[Skullglide]

I have a “gun room “ project going to better organize, think six sigma/kaizen. I am really trying to get things organized.

Plus this project created about three other house projects.

Add about a dozen ash trees to cut down in my woods.

 

[Leadeye]

I keep projects in jars or boxes, nearly all are waiting for parts to appear.

 

[NyleRN]

Too many projects at once will be different for each person depending on several factors. Are you single? Kids at home? Do they participate in extracurricular activities? Do you manage your property yourself during warm months? How much time do you prioritize time with your family? Do you work more than 40hrs/week? Etc etc...
For me I'm married and have 5 kids still at home ranging from 17yr old down to 6yr old. They are somewhat active in the summer with soccer. A couple used to do gymnastics. Boy played youth basketball for awhile. Plus I have 3 acres to mow and a garden to manage. I also work 6a-6p Monday thru Thursday and for better part of this year have also picked up 6-8hrs on just about every Friday. So managing all that leaves little time for me to tinker with much of anything. I really enjoy playing my Taylor guitars in addition to shooting and playing with my arsenal. But adult things and time spent with family consumes a lot of my time. Currently I have 1 project (Romy AK underdolder surplus kit build) right now. More than 2 projects for me would be too much
ETA: I actually have 2 projects atm. I have a complete P80 g19 that needs a complete top end. But that'll have to wait for awhile

 

[wcd]

Well not Gun related but 10 to 20 a season. So yeah my gun project is just maintaining my Goldilocks 1911

 

[gregkl]

I usually have a half dozen or so going on all the time. Have had this for years. I am very good at flowcharting so I can be sure I minimize or eliminate any "wait time".

My projects also allow me to move between them based on weather, finances or other external forces requiring my time and energy.

As far as firearms related, I rarely have any "projects" anymore. Once I have my firearms set up, I just shoot and occasionally clean them.

 

[Flingarrows]

I have 4 hobby areas that I juggle:
* shooting ( pistols, rifle, and reloading)
* deer hunting ( gun and bow)
* my 1969 Kaiser M715 ( resto-mod; interior and wiring done, axles swap done, in the middle of a 5.9 Cummins swap)
* lawn/yard plants/trees

I juggle those all 4 seasons. There are other projects that I would like to start, but no time. Plus regular trips to visit the kids and grand kids

 

[russc2542]

If you can keep track of them all, you don't have too many.

I can't even remember all the genras of projects much less all the projects, tasks, and subtasks.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

73. Unless one is a remodel that involves plumbing or any sort of car restoration from a state that sees winters. Then -3 and have a suicide prevention hotline on speed dial and/or copious amounts of coping fluids to imbibe.

 

[russc2542]

73. Unless one is a remodel that involves plumbing or any sort of car restoration from a state that sees winters. Then -3 and have a suicide prevention hotline on speed dial and/or copious amounts of coping fluids to imbibe.

Born in WI and spent much of my life in northern Illinois. When I was younger I loved winter. Went to U.P. Michigan to camp in Feb with the Boy Scouts in HS. Now that I have a couple rust free cars I kinda like, Arizona doesn't sound so bad.

 

[92FSTech]

I try to only have one intentional one at a time...this keeps me from getting too overwhelmed when something else unrelated breaks before the first project is done and I have to spend time to go fix that.

 

[Gabriel]

I actually have so many projects going on at once that I don't even know where to begin on my days off. I have a bad habit of working on one, then if I walk by another one I'll start working on it and so on. I'll actually spend an entire day working on each project randomly for twenty minutes or so It's a complete scatter brained way of doing things and nothing ever seems to get done. The flip side is if I get really excited on a project that will only take an hour or so. If I can run into the shop and pound it out in a short amount if time, it will get finished.

I've been meaning to set up some sort of way of organizing my projects so I can see an entire list of them, then make a plan of attack. It's something I haven't done as of yet. I need to research this kanban thing or something related that works for me. The biggest problem i really have is I need to know what to work on as soon as I wake up onmy days off, that way i can just get started instead of milling around forever trying to figure out what to work on next.

It doesn't help that I am constantly drawing up new ideas of stuff to make or modifications for other things... this is just a few rough drawings of the ten or so that are on my desk right now (and I have a couple bins full)...