I'd like to share a little bit about my friendship with Tim. I actually never met Tim in person, but we talked for many hours on the phone over the last 20 years. So I suppose I knew Tim about as well as you can know someone without having met them. 20 years ago, this forum was in it's prime. A bunch of contributors who no longer frequent this site were having deep and lengthy discussions on topics such as manufacturing philosophy, software, CNC technology, etc. Tim of course was a part of that, and he and I talked at length outside of this forum about those same topics. Some of you who were around then will recall that Tim was a huge advocate of Lean manufacturing. I was (and still am) an advocate for TOC, and so we spent many hours debating the 2 philosophies. But the topic that Tim and I discussed the most was his direction towards a retail market vs. my direction towards a wholesale market. Basically, Tim wanted nothing to do with architect's and general contractors, and I want nothing to do with homeowners. Of course, we are both forced to deal with all three in our daily business, but it was an interesting topic to discuss. It was an ongoing conversation and an ongoing experiment, his philosophy vs. mine, and I'm sad that it has ended. I'm sad for Tim's family, I'm sad for his employees and I'm sad for this industry. I will miss him.
Derek