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From piano parts to aircraft

by Jani Gonzalez Coeur Voice Writer
| April 5, 2018 3:09 PM

The name of Josh Johnson’s company - Objects Unlimited - speaks to the diverse, creative nature of his work.

Johnson, of Spirit Lake, began his career as an entrepreneur at just 10 years old, when he started a paper route. That first job sparked his interest in finding and fixing things to resell. Using his pay from the paper, he bought an old bike that he fixed up and traded for a motorcycle.

When he reached middle school, his shop teacher influenced him to pursue the trades. He learned class metal casting, woodworking, and welding—lessons that would carry him throughout his career. It was then he realized that he could earn a living from things he could make. As a high school senior, Johnson earned a certificate in welding and machining and continued his education through the jobs he’s held since.

“At 14, my dad told me to look up companies in the phone book that I thought I’d like to work for and he offered to drive me around. So I did. I knew I wanted to be a machinist back then, but didn’t want to make parts day in and day out,” he said. “Doing one-off work—I would still feel free even if I was working for someone else.”

After high school in Utah, Johnson worked for a company that replicated fossils and architectural details. He would take home broken fossils, glue them together, carve and stain them for resale. He did the same with the cast-offs from a company that made glass holograms. What other companies deemed imperfect, he could restore and find a market for.

“In making things, there is this myth that everything that we have is complicated. I learned that anyone can make anything if they put their mind to it,” Johnson said. “I tested that theory–that I could make anything I wanted to. When I worked at a piano tuner, they had lots of pianos missing parts. Something would need to be made, and I would sit down and figure it out. I would make the part that was needed and give the instrument new life.”

As he grew older, a job took him to the East Coast, where he met his wife and started a family. He worked as a crane operator at a building parts recycler for several years in Philadelphia, then as a facilities manager and machinist for the Piasecki Aircraft Corp, where he applied his construction skills and honed his machinist capabilities.

When he was laid off, he pursued his ability to make custom parts and devices with his own company, Objects Unlimited.

He continued to make aircrafts parts for Piasecki and also the American Helicopter Museum. Working for himself, the jobs varied from aircraft to architecture.

A contractor he had met had an invention to protect electrical outlets while buildings were under construction. The contractor knew nothing about design, but Johnson designed and made numerous molds of his prototypes. He even helped him in researching patents and in making patent drawings.

“I have found that industry is DIY at all levels. Many things in factories are frequently made there from scratch,” he said.

Because of the historic aspect of Philadelphia, many of his projects involved classical architectural designs. He often designed what contractors envisioned for a building rehabilitation that an architect would vet.

He then got involved in an online community called Maker’s Row, and worked for designers and artisans around the country, on projects like a titanium belt buckle, a children’s puzzle that resembled a smart tablet and a sound room diffuser for a music recording company.

He also experimented in building his own CNC (computer numerical control) machine out of used machine parts that incorporated a router, hot-wire cutter, 3D printer and scanner. Johnson exhibited his machine several years ago at the Maker Faire in New York City.

“It was another learning experience, and it helped me get a job to move out here,” he said.

He and his wife decided to move to Idaho after becoming disillusioned with big city living. They were raising two kids and had been renting an apartment plus a workspace; space was an issue. They had a hard time seeing the ability to progress beyond the day-to-day grind.

“I had wanted to move to the country for years, and I wanted to come back out west. We visited Coeur d’Alene while visiting my dad, who had moved to the area,” he said. “There’s a lot of space out here to make and store things, lots of natural resources, lots of people who are talented and/or retired, so they have time and interest. There’s a lot of ingenuity to living out here.”

Nowadays, Johnson spends his time designing or modifying and manufacturing anything from drone parts to roller coaster train cars. He’s helped create several iterations of new drone prototypes for xCraft in Coeur d’Alene. In one week, he made life preservers for the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture’s Titanic Exhibit in Spokane and parts for a roller coaster that Creatable Studios in Hayden is fabricating.

Last summer, he helped construct some of Scarywood’s Planet Zombie haunt. He’s also nearing the end of a year-long project making a replacement life-size elephant sculpture for the White Elephant in Spokane. The list goes on. Not a week goes by that he doesn’t get a request for something - with little more than a rudimentary design - that he must delve into and make a reality. Every project is completely different from the previous one.

He also divides his time with Zagi, an RC combat wing company he owns. There too, he works on making new wings for inventory in addition to working on a new model. He’s in the process of gaining a NASA license to develop a new product using their Prandtl technology. In a recent trip, his aircraft design was featured at NASA’s booth at the Academy of Model Aeronautics (AMA) Expo in California this past January. He also presented to Zagi pilots at Scaled Composites and toured the facility.

“All the work I’ve gotten has been through word of mouth. If there’s an opportunity, I jump on it and learn it,” he said.

But, Johnson doesn’t want to stop at simply making a living for himself and his family. Just as he has learned from people and jobs he’s had, he too wants to help anyone interested in learning what he’s learned.

“Ideally, you spend part of the day working at making a living and the other half improving everything else around you.” he said.

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objects-unlimited.com