What would you do if you needed a 300k truck but only had a 60k budget?
It’s unlikely that you’d try to find a bargain where you’d spend 60k and somehow get a 300k truck. You wouldn’t say “we really need a 300k truck, so that’s what we’re going to get, even if we can only spend 60k”. You wouldn’t say “we’ll buy two broken trucks for 20k each and spend an extra 20k on clever hacks that will make one of them work with spare pieces from the other”.
You could try to do some clever hacks, and some people do, but this is not the kind of thing that helps you build a thriving trucking business. Most likely, what you’ll do if you need a 300k truck but only have 60k is to change your plan. Do something else until you are able to spend the 300k. Wait one or two years keeping the problem at the back of your head, waiting for the right opportunity.
This is more or less what you should do with automation. Use the five times more rule. If you don’t have much experience with automation and from your discussion with potential suppliers it looks like a serious solution will cost 60k, assume it’s going to cost 300k. If you don’t have that much, change your plan and keep the problem at the back of your head.
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