Additive Manufacturing worked example

Additive Inspection Cost with additive production lots of 15 lots: a worked example

Push additive production lots up to 15 lots and the picture changes. This example computes every intermediate figure at that operating point. a quality engineer needs to estimate AM inspection workload for production lots or validation builds

The inputs for this scenario

  • Additive production lots: 15 lots (raised for this scenario; the documented default is 6)
  • Build runs per lot: 4 runs / lot (unchanged)
  • Inspection samples per run: 3 samples / run (unchanged)

Working through the calculation

  • Applying the documented formula (Total inspection samples = lots × build runs per lot × samples per run) to the inputs above produces each figure below.
  • At this operating point the engine returns 180 samples for inspection samples required, the number this scenario is built around.
  • At this operating point the engine returns 9 hr for estimated inspection hours.
  • At this operating point the engine returns 4 lots for production lots.
  • At this operating point the engine returns 3 samples / run for samples per run.

How this compares with the baseline

  • Against the tool's baseline example, where additive production lots sits at 6 lots and the headline result is 72 samples, this scenario comes in 150% above the baseline at 180 samples.
  • It computes total inspection samples from production lots, build runs per lot, and samples per run, and estimates the inspection hours that workload implies. The value of this scenario is the size of the gap it exposes: that gap, priced out over a year, is the budget you can justify spending to close it.

Results at a glance

  • Inspection samples required: 180 samples (headline result)
  • Estimated inspection hours: 9 hr
  • Production lots: 4 lots
  • Samples per run: 3 samples / run

Run it with your numbers

  • Every input above is editable in the live Additive Inspection Cost calculator, which recalculates instantly and can be shared with the inputs intact.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.