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Liesl Dexheimer
05-22-2010, 9:11 AM
I have a customer who needs (80) 4" x 6" pieces of plastic with two holes drilled on left & right sides. I will be engraving 3 characters on them & the letters must be 2" high. Does $6.50 each sound reasonable?

Joe Pelonio
05-22-2010, 9:23 AM
You didn't specify the plastic, nor who is providing it. That would be a great price for you if they provided the plastic, and still pretty good if your
cost for the plastic works out to less than a dollar each.

Liesl Dexheimer
05-22-2010, 9:28 AM
Sorry, yes I would be buying the plastic stock. Typical 1/16" thick stock, blue/white.

Mike Null
05-22-2010, 2:08 PM
I would be closer to $12 each on those.

Larry Bratton
05-22-2010, 2:22 PM
I would be closer to $12 each on those.
Would be good work if you could get it. I would be tickled to get them at $6.50 in 1/16" acrylic right now.

Joe Pelonio
05-22-2010, 2:35 PM
Would be good work if you could get it. I would be tickled to get them at $6.50 in 1/16" acrylic right now.
I agree, in better times maybe, but now days more than that they will shop around and get a better deal elsewhere. I would charge $12 for a few, but not for that quantity unless I was really busy and didn't really need the work.

Liesl Dexheimer
05-22-2010, 5:42 PM
Just to verify, it would be Rowmark plastic not acrylic. I will probably be doing a few other sizes as well. I'm pretty sure the customer has contacted other engravers in the area. I would like the job but I also want to get a fair price and not "low-ball it" as the saying goes.

Larry Bratton
05-22-2010, 6:26 PM
Just to verify, it would be Rowmark plastic not acrylic. I will probably be doing a few other sizes as well. I'm pretty sure the customer has contacted other engravers in the area. I would like the job but I also want to get a fair price and not "low-ball it" as the saying goes.
Well, if you used something like Laser Max at about .05 a square inch plus freight, your going to have over $1.20 a piece in the material. So, lets say $1.50 each x 80 that's going to be $120.00. At 6.50 each that's $520.00 or $400.00 to cover your labor and overhead. Gosh, I would still do it in my shop because I think I could probably do it in a couple of hours. If my overhead was $50, that's still $175 an hour. Beats flippin burgers for sure. (some of your competition might take it at $60 an hour for the machine time)

Liesl Dexheimer
05-22-2010, 7:32 PM
Yeah, I think I will quote the customer that price. Also have to take into account that I have to mask the sheets of plastic too.

Mike Null
05-23-2010, 8:48 AM
You are working for $0.25 per square inch. That means you would do a 1 x 3 for $.75 or a 2 x 4 for $2.00. I am getting commercial re-orders at $0.50 per square inch and wholesale to a sign shop at $0.40 per square inch.

My 1 x 3"s, of which there are many, are a minimum of $2.50. I do bevel the edges for that price.

Albert Nix
05-23-2010, 8:49 AM
Thats about the same squares as a desk name plate (2 x 10). There are office supply place around here that will do those for $7 or $8 bucks apiece, one at a time for regular customers. So yeah I would do 80 for $6.50 each or maybe a little less if it was going to lead to more. If the detail was not super fine to speed things up I would use a lower resolution and my 2.5 lense for better coverage (less chance of banding with the lower res.). You will have to consider the lay and design. I buy laser max in 12 x 24 sheets which would be 9 peices. If it was all text with a lot of gaps it may not take long, maybe 15 - 20 minutes per sheet for example. If they wanted a border around the text and there was a lot of detail (if you had to use 500 dpi) raster time would go way up to maybe 30 minutes. At 9 sheets it could take 4.5 hrs. Open the door and do a test run. Lay out one row horizonal, which should take longer that a vertical only lay out and see how long it takes.

Dan Hintz
05-23-2010, 9:30 AM
No need to do a test run with the door open... the ULS drivers give a pretty darn accurate estimation of run time with the click of a mouse (though you may have to wait a couple of minutes for it to run the simulation).

Chuck Patterson
05-24-2010, 10:55 AM
How do you do run a estimated run time with the ULS driver?

Dan Hintz
05-24-2010, 11:29 AM
In the design view tab, there are 5 buttons on the right-hand middle side of the screen... one should be labeled "Estimate" or something of that nature. It takes some percentage of actual time to run, like 5% of actual... waiting 30 seconds for it to estimate a 10 minute run is worth it.

Chuck Patterson
05-24-2010, 11:43 AM
I must not have it. Can not find it.

Dan Hintz
05-24-2010, 1:39 PM
Ah, Chuck, I just noticed you're running an older system... they may not have the same functionality as the VLS, PLS, and ILS systems.

Ed Maloney
07-06-2010, 3:05 PM
No need to do a test run with the door open... the ULS drivers give a pretty darn accurate estimation of run time with the click of a mouse (though you may have to wait a couple of minutes for it to run the simulation).

Right now I when a get an RFQ I put the artwork together, fill a sheet with the design, and then with the hood open I run the job and note the time it takes. Then I add in marked-up materials cost and then overhead. I do this even if the customer is requesting 20 pieces and the sheet holds 100. I sure waste a lot of time doing it this way since sometimes it can take an hour.

Does anyone have a simulator for Epilog or some other costing technique that takes less time? Or am I just crazy doing it this way?

Ed

Ron Chapellaz
07-06-2010, 4:16 PM
Liesl, when I take orders such as these my price per sq. inch drops according to the size of the area. I charge my customers a price for the engraving sheet stock and a price on the engraving. If you want more info PM me.

Nancy Laird
07-07-2010, 7:38 PM
How do you do run a estimated run time with the ULS driver?


In the design view tab, there are 5 buttons on the right-hand middle side of the screen... one should be labeled "Estimate" or something of that nature. It takes some percentage of actual time to run, like 5% of actual... waiting 30 seconds for it to estimate a 10 minute run is worth it.


I must not have it. Can not find it.

Chuck, the M-series ULS machines don't have that feature. You can run it with the door or top open so it isn't firing but it will give you your run time.

Martin Boekers
07-11-2010, 10:51 AM
Are they supplying artwork that can be directly import into Corel?

How much text and are they bordered or are there graphics?

I learned my lesson a long time ago just quoting a job on size and not content;)
Some of these colors may take an extra pass or slow down engraving to get it clean.

Also timing depends on your laser power.

For those who want to estimate timing, I suggest laying out one row all the way across. Run that then multiply it by the number of rows. That will get you close if they are similar.

Also I may suggest a log book with a copy of the layout, then record your settings as well as the time it took to run, clean-up etc, This will allow you to
get a decent estimate without running the job first.

I keep my pricing pretty much on the lower scale, I do have customers that get quotes elseware, but more often they end up back with me.

Some shops run lower resolution to save time, but it does show in quality. When you quote make a sample at different resolutions so they can see the difference. Explain how some shops can bid lower by running the job at a lower res. Lower res. may be fine for their application and then you can give a more competative bid. I find the customer is appreciative when I help
by doing this.

Customers do tell stories to try to get it cheaper, sometimes they lead us down a path and we tend to follow.:o

Also there are many types of plastics available, make sure what you pick fits
their usage.


Marty

Chuck Patterson
07-29-2010, 12:33 PM
I just laser engrave 8.5" x 11" and two 8" x 5" on textured plastic (text only). Do you charge .50 sq/in for these larger sizes as well? The 8.5" x 11" would be $46.75.