AM Quote Cost

What Drives Cost Per Part in 3D Printing Service Bureau Quotes

A money-focused breakdown of what actually drives additive quote cost, how to build a defensible price, and the estimating gaps that quietly erode margin.

Cost per part in an additive quote is dominated by four buckets: material, machine time, post-processing labor, and overhead recovery, with scrap and failure risk layered on top. The mix shifts hard by technology. For a production SLS bracket, material and machine time might each be 30 to 40 percent of cost, while post-processing stays under 15 percent. For a cosmetic SLA prototype, hand finishing can swallow 50 percent or more. Before quoting, know which bucket dominates your part, because that is where estimating error costs the most money. The Service Bureau Margin calculator only tells the truth if the cost feeding it is complete.

Material cost is deceptively simple and routinely understated. On powder bed systems, you pay for refresh, not just the powder in the part. A 30 percent refresh policy means every kilogram fused pulls roughly 0.43 kilograms of fresh virgin powder into the blend, and at 74 to 120 dollars per kilogram for PA12 or aluminum, that adds up fast. Use the Powder Refresh Quote Cost tool so refresh, sieving, and traceability charges are visible. On resin, trapped resin in hollow or cupped geometry can add 15 to 25 percent to the volume the slicer reports, so the Resin Service Cost figure should sit above the nominal part volume.

Machine time is where nesting economics decide profitability. A build has a nearly fixed hour cost regardless of how many parts you pack, so cost per part falls as packing density rises. If a 9-hour build costs 190 dollars in burdened machine time and you nest 86 good parts, that is 2.21 per part. Drop to 60 parts because of poor orientation or oversized spacing and it jumps to 3.17, a 43 percent increase in the machine bucket for identical geometry. Check packing with the Nesting Yield calculator before pricing, and never quote from theoretical capacity you cannot actually achieve.

Post-processing labor is the most frequently underquoted line, especially support removal, depowdering, and cosmetic work. Estimators quote print time from the slicer and then guess finishing, usually low. A resin batch needing 4.17 hours of support removal at 45 dollars per hour is 187.50 that never appears if you eyeball it. Price finishing as a visible line using the Support Removal Labor Time and Post-Processing Quote Cost calculators. A useful check: if hand labor is under 10 percent of a cosmetic SLA quote, you almost certainly missed something, because sanding, dyeing, and inspection rarely come that cheap.

Overhead recovery is where undercapitalized shops quietly lose money. Your machine hour rate must recover depreciation, service contracts, software licenses, facility burden, and normal utilization loss, not just electricity. A printer costing 50,000 per year that runs only 2,400 billable hours carries a burdened floor near 21 dollars per hour before any labor or margin. If utilization slips to 1,800 hours, that floor climbs to 27.80, a 33 percent increase you must recover in the rate. The Machine Hour Rate Recovery calculator flags when a quoted rate no longer covers the burdened cost basis.

Scrap and build failure are real costs, not hypotheticals, and mature shops price them explicitly. If a difficult geometry fails 1 in 4 builds and a failed build burns 640 dollars in powder, machine time, and labor, the expected cost across the order is 160 dollars even when nothing goes wrong on the day you quote it. Load a defensible share of that into the price using the Build Failure Exposure calculator. Absorbing failure risk silently is how a shop can run at 40 percent gross margin on paper and 12 percent in reality once the remakes land.

A defensible quote sums the buckets, then applies rate and margin transparently. Build cost per part from material plus machine plus labor plus a failure allowance plus a share of fixed setup, then run the total through the 3D Printing Quote Cost tool with your capture percentage. Confirm the result clears your floor with the Service Bureau Margin and AM Order Profitability calculators. A common failure is quoting a healthy 45 percent gross margin while a 125 dollar minimum-order charge and 4 hours of unbilled finishing quietly turn a small job into a net loss.

Estimates go wrong in predictable places, so build checks for each. Nesting quoted from theoretical rather than achievable density overstates part count and understates cost. Finishing guessed instead of measured runs 30 to 50 percent light on cosmetic work. Machine rates that recover only cash costs ignore depreciation and utilization loss. Failure risk left out entirely turns risky jobs into margin sinkholes. Re-quote effort from customer revisions goes unbilled through the Customer Revision Cost line. Catch these five before release and your quoted margin and your actual margin start to converge, which is the whole point of estimating.

Published 2026-07-01.