New Product Idea - Shooting Stick Platform - PoleX

[FREAK]

Thank you all for the orders.

We updated the promo code to "Randy" for 20% off. We are interested to know the sales generated through the HT crowd and really appreciate Randy letting us post it here.

We've had a pretty good level of interest in the product for minimal advertising so I'm starting to look at mold quotes to see if we can get costs down as well as help increase capacity.

 

[Jbotto]

Thank you all for the orders.

We updated the promo code to "Randy" for 20% off. We are interested to know the sales generated through the HT crowd and really appreciate Randy letting us post it here.

We've had a pretty good level of interest in the product for minimal advertising so I'm starting to look at mold quotes to see if we can get costs down as well as help increase capacity.

Awesome to hear! Been playing around with it here a bit. Missed my chance to bring it out shooting this weekend but I’ll try again soon!

 

[44hunter45]

I got mine already. I haven't had time to play with them

 

[EastTNHunter]

Just placed my order. I’ll be trying it out in WY this year, then hopefully back in TN for later season, as well

 

[Farz-U-Know]

Nice! Great idea and the ability to use for the center pole is excellent.

 

[WVmike]

I will be purchasing one of these before rifle season this year.

 

[Big Sky Guy]

Curious if anyone has the wiser precision quick stix and to hear how they compare to those. I got those for Christmas so waiting to try them out this season. If I am not satisfied will sure to give these a go.

 

[WVmike]

Curious if anyone has the wiser precision quick stix and to hear how they compare to those. I got those for Christmas so waiting to try them out this season. If I am not satisfied will sure to give these a go.

I have the quick stix and they work great. They look like they are about the same setup, just look a little different.

 

[Dsnow9]

Curious if anyone has the wiser precision quick stix and to hear how they compare to those. I got those for Christmas so waiting to try them out this season. If I am not satisfied will sure to give these a go.

I have had quick stixs for two season now. Mine make a ton of noise now and I bought a set of these. Both have their advantages but I think these will win out. They will be my go to this season for a minimum of 3 elk tags, an antelope, and 2 deer. Should be able to put them through the wringer with that.

I would say the only thing that I would give the wiser unit an edge on is that you could adjust it while the rifle is on the sticks. That may or may not be a desired trait for people but @FREAK said he was working on it.

As I said though, I really liked the wiser and had no complaints but noise and after getting this in my hands the wiser will stay at home.

 

[WVmike]

I have had quick stixs for two season now. Mine make a ton of noise now and I bought a set of these. Both have their advantages but I think these will win out. They will be my go to this season for a minimum of 3 elk tags, an antelope, and 2 deer. Should be able to put them through the wringer with that.

I would say the only thing that I would give the wiser unit an edge on is that you could adjust it while the rifle is on the sticks. That may or may not be a desired trait for people but @FREAK said he was working on it.

As I said though, I really liked the wiser and had no complaints but noise and after getting this in my hands the wiser will stay at home.

I have not had any noise or anything with mine but I was looking at getting another set for another pair of trekking poles for my son that way we have two sets. I may pick this brand up just to compare.

 

[88man]

Great idea! I'm gonna order one or two. Good stuff!!!

 

[Cogreeny]

I missed this somehow. Just ordered one. Will order more if it’s as good as it looks. Thank you for posting.

 

[Jbotto]

I have had quick stixs for two season now. Mine make a ton of noise now and I bought a set of these. Both have their advantages but I think these will win out. They will be my go to this season for a minimum of 3 elk tags, an antelope, and 2 deer. Should be able to put them through the wringer with that.

I would say the only thing that I would give the wiser unit an edge on is that you could adjust it while the rifle is on the sticks. That may or may not be a desired trait for people but @FREAK said he was working on it.

As I said though, I really liked the wiser and had no complaints but noise and after getting this in my hands the wiser will stay at home.

This is good feedback. I still haven’t got mine out to use yet so I can’t say for sure, but the fact that you have to separate the two halves to change angle is my only concern for now but for me it might be that I’m just so used to my old Stoney Point sticks and this really isn’t an issue.

In the past few years I’ve found myself steadier when I can use sticks from the sitting position. I rest my rifle in them just in front of the trigger guard or under the action. That way I can pivot the rifle in the sticks better than when I was resting them out near the front swivel stud. Using sticks like this, I don’t see the concern i mentioned above being as big of a deal, it’s just going to take me getting used to a bit. This isn’t a complaint of the product in any way, just gotta modify how I might use it is all. So far playing with it at home, it hasn’t been a big deal at all.

 

[FREAK]

As I mentioned in my original post, I'd like to share some of the development process that went into the product. My business partner and I really just measured success with this one on bringing a product to the finish line. That proved to be more difficult than we initially thought, but we learned a lot along the way.

Below is the original prototype I built. This is the picture I shared with Randy (this was before I was even on HT). We got an encouraging response and continued down the development cycle:

INITIAL PROTOTYPE:


We went ahead and modified the teeth and used a larger push button. This was a final product version of the design above.

INERATION 1:



Notes: It worked pretty well but the design caused a decent moment arm due to the poles being far apart causing them to flex in when a rifle was set on the handles. The release button was also hard to get to and it would kind of lock up when you tried to release it.

I modified the design to the below. We thought this was the one. It worked pretty well but was still slightly difficult to engage/disengage. I also had the teeth break on me after using them in the field for a season. Snow and stuff would get stuck in the female side and the teeth eventually became brittle and cracked.

ITERATION 2:

Prototype v2





Pros: compact/light. Easier than original version to reach the button. We built up 10-15 of these and got them out to friends. Didn't get a lot of feedback but I used them myself for a season and thought there was more to be desired. I had an instance where snow got into the female side, and I couldn't get them together and some of the push button components were showing signs of rust. Also, the assembly process wasn't great.


I added some fingers to help the user pull the male side from the female more directly. This made it slightly easier to use.


At this point we weren't sold on the design as there were still questions with how easy it was to engage/disengage, and the assembly process wasn't super repeatable.

We shelved it for a while and I kind of just kept thinking about ways to improve both functionality and manufacturability. Eventually deciding to try a much larger stainless push button release.

Iteration 3:

Here is the initial prototype of the concept used in the final version:



The female/male teeth were much stronger. We had a through hole on the female side so we could easily clean out any debris that might enter. It was also much easier to assemble as a washer is placed on the backside of the female to secure the balls in the pushbutton.

Many 3d prints and integrations later we landed on the version we're selling now.


My engineering brain is constantly wanting to improve and tinker but eventually time/money have to be factored into the development cycle. We decided it was time to get it out there and see what the market thinks. As mentioned above, we're using fusion jet printing which is not as strong as molding.

We have other ideas we're considering and would like them implemented in the event we invest in an injection mold. A molded part would be stronger and bring our costs down to help us turn this project into an actual profitable business.

We really are selling these things for barely above cost to get them in the hands of users and have honest feedback of whether or not you think this is a product you'd recommend, if not what could we do to get it there. I don't have any of the competitor's product but would be interested in knowing from those that do how it compares.

There's also so many different trekking poles out there that I'm interested in knowing if there are certain ones that this product doesn't accommodate and why. I have probably 8-10 pairs between ski poles and hiking poles that I was able to test them on, but it certainly isn't all encompassing.

Any issues at all we'll gladly refund. We appreciate the business as I know a lot of you guys get out far more than the average hunter.

Anyways I better get back to my day job, I hope you guys enjoy reading through the cliff note version of our design process.

 

[WVmike]

As I mentioned in my original post, I'd like to share some of the development process that went into the product. My business partner and I really just measured success with this one on bringing a product to the finish line. That proved to be more difficult than we initially thought, but we learned a lot along the way.

Below is the original prototype I built. This is the picture I shared with Randy (this was before I was even on HT). We got an encouraging response and continued down the development cycle:

INITIAL PROTOTYPE:
View attachment 333358View attachment 333359

We went ahead and modified the teeth and used a larger push button. This was a final product version of the design above.

INERATION 1:
View attachment 333370
View attachment 333360
View attachment 333369
Notes: It worked pretty well but the design caused a decent moment arm due to the poles being far apart causing them to flex in when a rifle was set on the handles. The release button was also hard to get to and it would kind of lock up when you tried to release it.

I modified the design to the below. We thought this was the one. It worked pretty well but was still slightly difficult to engage/disengage. I also had the teeth break on me after using them in the field for a season. Snow and stuff would get stuck in the female side and the teeth eventually became brittle and cracked.

ITERATION 2:

Prototype v2
View attachment 333364
View attachment 333361
View attachment 333362
View attachment 333363
View attachment 333368
Pros: compact/light. Easier than original version to reach the button. We built up 10-15 of these and got them out to friends. Didn't get a lot of feedback but I used them myself for a season and thought there was more to be desired. I had an instance where snow got into the female side, and I couldn't get them together and some of the push button components were showing signs of rust. Also, the assembly process wasn't great.

View attachment 333365
I added some fingers to help the user pull the male side from the female more directly. This made it slightly easier to use.
View attachment 333366

At this point we weren't sold on the design as there were still questions with how easy it was to engage/disengage, and the assembly process wasn't super repeatable.

We shelved it for a while and I kind of just kept thinking about ways to improve both functionality and manufacturability. Eventually deciding to try a much larger stainless push button release.

Iteration 3:

Here is the initial prototype of the concept used in the final version:

View attachment 333372
View attachment 333373
The female/male teeth were much stronger. We had a through hole on the female side so we could easily clean out any debris that might enter. It was also much easier to assemble as a washer is placed on the backside of the female to secure the balls in the pushbutton.

Many 3d prints and integrations later we landed on the version we're selling now.
View attachment 333374

My engineering brain is constantly wanting to improve and tinker but eventually time/money have to be factored into the development cycle. We decided it was time to get it out there and see what the market thinks. As mentioned above, we're using fusion jet printing which is not as strong as molding.

We have other ideas we're considering and would like them implemented in the event we invest in an injection mold. A molded part would be stronger and bring our costs down to help us turn this project into an actual profitable business.

We really are selling these things for barely above cost to get them in the hands of users and have honest feedback of whether or not you think this is a product you'd recommend, if not what could we do to get it there. I don't have any of the competitor's product but would be interested in knowing from those that do how it compares.

There's also so many different trekking poles out there that I'm interested in knowing if there are certain ones that this product doesn't accommodate and why. I have probably 8-10 pairs between ski poles and hiking poles that I was able to test them on, but it certainly isn't all encompassing.

Any issues at all we'll gladly refund. We appreciate the business as I know a lot of you guys get out far more than the average hunter.

Anyways I better get back to my day job, I hope you guys enjoy reading through the cliff note version of our design process.

Like I mentioned before in this post, I have the wiser precision quick stix and I use them with the generic aluminum trekking poles from amazon. Their design is almost the same except that there are small screws on each of the pieces that you can adjust to allow the poles more of an angle vs less angle. These are removed with an allen wrench/screwdriver. They cannot be adjusted on the fly without those tools. They also don't have teeth for the adjustment that your design uses. They have worked well for me but I wouldn't mind comparing the two to see which one works best. Congratulations on the business and good luck in the future.

 

[Farz-U-Know]

Ok, just placed my order. Looking forward to checking them out. Thanks guys!

 

[CoHunter1991]

Those look great. I have used quick stix for the last 4 years and have shot all but 2 animals with them. Great tool and i assume these will be similar.

 

[noharleyyet]

Done, you can never have too many field rest options...

 

[nwihunter]

Just ordered mine. Looking forward to giving them a try.

 

[hank4elk]

Very Cool!