Money for CNC Hobbyists

[ButWhat]

Hi

New here, I just wanted to make a comment. I have a small electronics company and make 20 of this or 50 of that. Things like industrial controls which have to be mounted in aluminum cases and such. I have always found it difficult to find someone to CNC cut the holes for switches and connectors on the cases. Probably because the work I do is such low volume and consists of cutting maybe 5 to 10 holes in a face plate. I ended up getting my own desktop CNC machine. But what I wanted to point out, there are probably a lot of people on this forum that loves playing around with their CNC machines and are willing to do small jobs. Well contact you local electronics supplier shop and ask if you can advertise there. I am sure you will get some work. Heck even put an ad in the phone books saying your willing to do small jobs. I bet it will help pay off your machine.


Just an example of what I payed previously, let say a plate averaged $20. There is the front plate, back plate and the bottom mounting plate for the electronics, so $60 per unit. Now over the year 150 units = $9000. So you see why I bought my own $4000 machine. If I could have found someone to cut for $10 a piece I probably would not have bought a machine. Oh and I forgot "setup charge" of $250 for each new job.

So if you have a hobby machine, consider all the small jobs around.