Why is it so hard...

**spluppit** · 11-08-2013

Hi Matt.

Firstly, I am someone who is in your neck of the woods (ish) and may be interested if it works out to be cost effective.

This may give you some insight to why you are having difficulty:

You may be looking at the wrong types of company, rather than engineering companies you needs to look for ones that are either pattern makers or cnc pattern orientated and there are several in the area near my location. Very few of those companies will have a bed size of 8 x 4 to do big nesting work. To the next point.

You may be missing the fact that industrial equipment is a world away from the home DIY CNC, being hugely more expensive and very large initial outlay. I would think nearly all the people you contacted will have the much more costly industrial variant and probably will not have a small z height gantry machine as they are very limited in work cube they can take. Co's in industry will generally go for a much bigger machine so they can cater much larger work cube, these cost mega bucks! The next issue is when they can earn 50 to 70 quid an hour on one of these machines why would the want a job that that will earn them 30 quid an hour.

The guys in engineering proper as in machine shop will most likely not want to put MDF on there machines. The machines they use will be used with cutting coolants all day long, this means machines get caked up and sticky you then put MDF on the machine you create anything from a soup to dry powder and everything in between, this will ruin the coolants and the machine long term, MDF is abrasive. A lot of people will not put things like MDF along with cast Iron on their machines.. If they do it means a big clean down if the machine to prevent the MDF getting into the side ways, its damage limitation. This brings is the next point.

Extraction. MDF is recognised as carcinogenic, a such this gives co's headaches unless they are geared to work with it with extraction. This means the HSE etc etc and all that old bull, so from that point of along with what's written above its a lot more hassle than is worth. For them to do it will be reflected in the costs you have been given.

As always there are is a lot of info in between the information above but I hope it gives you a skeletal outline of why you may well had problems. Ihave worked along side pattern making companies for many years, so i hope yuo find this info helpful.

As I mentioned. I do have a machine which is new to me and has a work cube of 800 x 500x 550 In the X,Y and Z respectively. I Also have extraction which needs to be set up. I am looking for new work for this machine to make it earn its keep. it is also industrial based machine which is highly ridged compared to gantry stye machine allowing bigger cuts.

You are welcome at the least to have a chat even if its to point you in the right direction.

My kind regards,

Scott

**ktc** · 11-08-2013

Thanks for such a comprehensive reply Scott. That explains why the companies I find are not interested!

It's a shame that there is no directory for small workshops that could take on this sort of work.

The laser workshop I use is in Medway and they were good but I need to go down the cnc route with the product now. I lived in Medway up until 10 months ago.

Matt

**spluppit** · 11-08-2013

Hi Matt,

The answers are always there, It's a matter of if we can discover what they are. As always, all it needs is that person with that sort of knowledge to give the answers. Fortunately my working life has crossed the boundaries of different manufacturing sectors to know such generally useless information :)

I agree a directory of us small guys would be a mass bonus. Maybe the forum could set up a section for the guys like me (and the others I see here) who are in Engineering orientated business, but very small. In the forumi often see guys who really need a business rather than a homer to do work due to factors, scale, quantity, knowledge, time scale etc. It would help out both parties in making a small forum section.

Who did you use for the cutting Matt? Again there are several of them in this area.

Kind regards,

Scott