Production runs on these small pieces PRICE?

[ibewolfer]

Im doing a quote on cutting these for a company....thousands of these a week...plus he said he had tons of other stuff I could do too....so how much do you think I should quote him each? the square piece is 2 inches square

[ibewolfer]

ooops....heres a pic of the pieces...how much each for production runs?

[grindergary]

You need to post some more information. Dimensions, thickness material?

These are easy to figure out with the information.

Gary

[ibewolfer]

just as a reference the square piece is 2 inch square....16ga....and he wants a few thousand of these at a time he said he would supply the material....so I just need to figure out a price for the cut...his shop is 3 miles from me so its steady work close to home...very convenient for us both...plus he said theres ALOT more he could get me to do but wanted to start with these first...he said its endless the stuff I could cut for him...so im wanting to give him a good price so I can get my foot in the door and get more work.

[Capstone]

You could quote this a couple of ways, but I came up with $275 roughly for 1000 (1 thousand) of the 2x2 pieces (8.5" cut length, 1 pierce, x 1000)

You could also quote based on time, and decide on Cost per Hour (or minute) for cutting time if $275 seems off. I used Dave Kearley's Plasma Estimator to arrive at the price. (he's a member here)

Which ever you decide, I don't recommend you discount one penny just because he promises more work. It's a suckers bet.

Better to look at how much money he'd spend doing this kind of thing manually with a hired skilled helper at $10-12hr and then couch it him as you are saving him hundreds if not thousands of dollars in man-hours.

[ibewolfer]

rgr that....that's really close to what I had in mind...anything less and it wouldn't be worth my time or the wear and tear on the table...what I was looking at was what it cost the guy to pay a worker 8-10 hours a day to make 1000 pcs a day "which is the quanity what he told me the worker produced" the way I look at it is that worker could be doing something more productive and not to mention the costs of keeping his stamping machine up and running...in which it looked to be on its last leg...lol

[little blue choo]

I would price them out at .35 each with him supplying the metal or .50 if I supplied the metal. As far as the line about have a lot more you could do for him, Don't get me started, everyone use's that line just to get you to bid lower. Even if he does give you more work don't come off on your price or you're just buying his work and that's what he wants you to do. just my 2 cents.

[natewelding]

man oh man, how fast are your machines cutting to be able to do that for 275-350? when I did my calculations I came out to almost 500$ for 1,000 pieces.

[Capstone]

man oh man, how fast are your machines cutting to be able to do that for 275-350? when I did my calculations I came out to almost 500$ for 1,000 pieces.

That's just what the pricing calculator spit out. I didn't run sheetcam to figure out how much time it would take. If it were me, I would definitely look at it from the time standpoint as well.

[Shane Warnick]

I would price them out at .35 each with him supplying the metal or .50 if I supplied the metal. As far as the line about have a lot more you could do for him, Don't get me started, everyone use's that line just to get you to bid lower. Even if he does give you more work don't come off on your price or you're just buying his work and that's what he wants you to do. just my 2 cents.

I am at about the same price as above, around $0.37 each just for the cutting, add $0.15-$0.18 if I supply material. If you don't buy material from me, you pay the shop labor rate to unload, rack, load steel on table, and unload skeletons or re-rack partial sheets for later use. That would be for parts straight off the table (or should I say the damn floor, because they will all be DOWN THERE). If you want me to tumble them etc, then it's shop labor rate for that as well. For this price, they would be in a bucket you supplied. If you want them strung on a wire add $0.05 each.

I gotta tell you, this is one job I would not really want, and would hate if I got it. PITA. lots of pierces on small parts, dirty nozzles, parts all over the floor / under the table, the steel is going to warp / bow like crazy as you cut it unless you leave 0.35" or more between parts, etc. etc. etc.

There is a reason he is happy you even acted interested. It's because nobody else will jack with them for cheaper than he can pay his knuckle dragger to stamp them out all day long.

This would be hard to actually make money on even long term (or at least it would in my shop), and I would make damn sure you account for your time and make it worth it. I also echo the comment about him stating he had a lot of other stuff for you to cut. Of course he does, and he wants the price for these by the gross, just like everyone else, but then wants to order 250 at at time, for the same price point. Check is in the mail etc etc.

Good luck, hope you get more than just experience out of it.

Shane

[wickedinhere]

I am with Shane on this one. That's a lot of pieces to deal with and i wouldn't want the job it's going to take up a lot of time. I would tell him 1.00 each(.50 each plus .50 handling charge)
unless you are starving but that's just me.

[bhamer62]

Little parts like that are better off Laser Cut. Assuming 1000 pcs., 16 ga. HRP&O, 2" square parts, 1/4 x 45 corners and a .125 hole in it somewhere you can blow them out for $.25 each all day long..... and within an hour, thats cutting them individually. If the tolerance isn't critical, you can common line cut them quicker and cheaper. I wouldn't tie my table up with them unless it was really necessary. I would throw em in as filler work on my Laser to use up drop, nest them in holes and cutouts.... pays better than scrap....

[Metriccar]

I don't do a lot of work like this, but it would make sense to me, if I did, to make some sort of tray/cart you can slide in and out from underneath the table to deal with these parts, rather than rummaging through a bunch of dropouts on the floor from previous jobs. I was thinking of doing that myself. That's assuming you have a downdraft. If you have a water tray I don't know of any way to avoid sifting through water, unless you do like I do, which is put the pierce point at the top of the part, and stand there with a magnetic pick up rod, taking them off one by one. Or some I heard leave a little tiny tab on it then pick them off individually... which would be another option for you, to give him back the sheet with the little tabs on it, then the guy working for him can pull them off.... that would still leave the dross issue. Would he take care of the dross or you?


I agree with the others though on not listening to the "I got a lot more work for you" comment. It's possible. But even then, when do you raise prices? On the second opportunity?