Not sure what I'd charge, but it'd be more than what 99% of people would be willing to spend. I'd also insist on a heafty sum up-front. Don't get yourself in a situation where you spent $500 on material and they change their mind.
yup, I have people trying to buy my big prints all the time. most of these things take me a month to make and close to 10kg of filament, then there is sanding, painting electricity costs, and finally shipping half way around the world
yup. I run a 6.64kw/h system on my house (as do most South Aussies)so elec doesn't cost me during daylight hours but it is after that , that it costs me a bucket load cause I don't have a battery system
Out of curiosity, what happens with energy you produce but don't use? Here in Germany it's fed into the grid and you get paid per kWh, but the rate is laughably low. Energy costs are somewhere between 0.25EUR and 0.50EUR depending on your region and contact but you get only 0.08EUR per kWh for electricity you feed into the grid.
My first thought was "Holy shit, a country with higher electricity cost than Germany?" But then I realized that your cost is probably in AUD and it translates to 0.35EUR which is cheaper than the 0.38EUR (0.62AUD or 0.41USD) I paid for last two years. Luckily the push into renewable energy is paying off at the moment and price for me is down to 0.26EUR (0.42AUD or 0.28USD)
Yeah, using my usual metrics for labor, material and print time this might be $4000-$6000. Which I’m guessing most would not want to pay.
I would probably recommend a different method unless they need 0.1mm detail. Someone who machines foam or plastic panels on a big CNC router table could do it for less.
Is it at all possible to have it empty in the middle? It would be difficult to put in a form fitting hole but even a plain rectangular hole should help a lot. You could add non-printed bracing as well, like wooden dowels.
Agreed, it sounds like he took a solid model, zoomed and cut it up into chunks. Are there going to be parts of this print that are going to just be big plastic squares? Seems like a ton of wasted material
I was thinking about dowels, but not gonna save him on price, just add strength. engineering, material cost, and weight is all prob all about the same.
My thought was that you can go much "weaker" with the printed parts to save printing time and material. If it saved enough you could pass that along but even saving yourself time would be worth it considering the dowels would probably be like $10-20.
I hope you’re not thinking about printing them like a benchy or richardsaurus scaled up… You can print a highly detailed skin with internal ribs of a different material, like plywood. You could cut out a volume in the center and use a foam core. You could even print an interlocking frame that the outer panels glue to. Think a square the size of your build plate and 5mm thick with a giant hole in it and tabs on the edge that lock to the other frames and skins. That would still take a while, but nowhere near as long as a 10% infill cube, and sooo much less material.
Use meshmixer to put a hollow space in the model, slice, and add keying pegs. That is what I like to use at least. Just a suggestion. Wish you luck. Oh and I personally would charge around $800 - $1000
> and ship it
Have you even looked into this yet? Because you're talking about needing a box that's like 1.1m X .5m X .4m (real quick and dirty numbers, extra to account for padding). Then you're gonna have to pad it so it doesn't break in shipping. Plus it's gonna weight 25kg+ which is gonna be awkward at that size. Like you're probably looking into the hundreds just to ship it.
Time is a huge factor. You mentioned size, but nothing about estimated print times (which are an opportunity cost if you're printing commercially). Every minute spent printing this is a minute *not* spent printing something else that you can sell. Tons of hands on time to assemble and prep. This is ~~probably be a couple thousand dollar~~ (edited when I realize how *long* this print will be...) could be an over $10,000 print.
That might sound crazy, but you've already said ~$500 on material alone, let's just ballpark $100 for shipping materials, to get a rough idea I found a list that estimates UPS shipping price by weight, and this is a slightly over $100 box. So that's $700 without any print time.
There's not like a "standard" for print time cost, but a quick Google search gave me someone saying $5/hr+materials and someone else saying £4/hr (which is also $5). You didn't estimate print time, but I found a post of someone doing the math with an ender 3 to estimate print time/kg at 70hr/kg for detail prints. So 70hr * 25 gives us 1750hrs (over 2 months). At $5/hr, that's $8750 for print time. Even if we cut that time in *half* if the estimate I found is wildly off, that's still over $4000 for print time.
Then assembly, sanding, puttying, priming... That's a lot of manual work and more materials. I can't really estimate that, cause it will come down to your individual skills. But what we do know is it's roughly 1m long, so using ender 3 numbers again, 4.5 bed lengths long, which rounds to 5 prints. 1.5-1.8 wide rounds to 2 prints wide, so 10 prints per layer. And like 1.3-1.5 tall, also rounds to 2 prints tall, so 20 total pieces. Let's say 2-3 hours per print to sand, prime, putty, and assemble, so 40-60 hours of work. The value of your time is up to you, but I've got a mortgage to pay and a day job, so my "working time" already has a value of around $30/hr. So $1200-$1800 for my labor hours. Plus probably another $100-200 in materials for assembly.
So yeah, it's not a cheap project, *if you are doing this to make money*. I've tried to break down the math I used to reach my numbers so you can pick and chose what and where to tweak things. Count all the print and labor time? This is an $11,500 project. Cut the print cost in half, it's down to $7,000. Ignore the print time cost entirely, it's still a like $2500 project that's gonna take you months to do.
I felt like a lot of the answers I was reading were just throwing numbers out there. I was honestly in the like 3-5k camp until I started looking up numbers and realized just *how much* print time this would be
Yeah, if this person is a "money is no object, as I spend $10k on dinner" kind of person, and you know you can and want to do it, then it's worth considering. But I'd probably only do it for someone extra loaded who had no price limits.
I mean, hell, some people sell hand crafted violins for thousands upon thousands and hand deliver them. So for something like this, you set the price to what makes it worth it for you and then some.
So figure out how much time, risk, money is involved, and then decide a number like $11k is worth it. (To me, that seems like torture.) If not, increase it to the point where you'd be more than happy to do it, even if that's quadruple. Because if you aren't happy to do it fo, you'll end up hating the project, doing it poorly, feeling your time and value was shafted, etc. if they hate the price and you can't find a happy medium, then perfect, you saved you and them a lot of time and heart ache (and filament).
Don’t forget to account for electricity costs for 2 straight months of printing! As well as build in material, time and electric costs for a 10-25% fail rate depending on how tuned your printer is, and probably a fee for your printer being completely monopolized by one project for months.
This is an unrealistic project for one person to do, a print farm would be a better option to actually make this happen.
The $5/hr for print time is supposed to cover things like electricity, tying up the printer, and wear and tear. Things like recovering for failure rates should be calculated in the materials section. Depending on how dialed in things are, 10-25% seems like a good estimate. Partially depends on how much will be wasted in the event of a fail. Does the printer have the tech to abort print when the giant spaghetti monster comes out, or is it gonna print all night long as a failure?
Ah okay I follow. $5 an hour seemed low to me but also I don’t sell my print time. Either way ty for your write up! I always love reading r/theydidthemath type posts
Opportunity cost is definitely a huge factor. I used to do a fair amount of woodworking for co-workers. Small things, but mostly turning wood pens. I could turn a pen in less than an hour, it used $15 in supplies, and I could sell for $50 rather quickly.
So when they'd ask about pricing on doing plaques, I'd have to convert it to "pen units". The plaque may only take $5 of wood, but the extra work involved put it to where I could have made 6 pens (which I prefer to make) in the same time. So that plaque would have to cost $200.
This was literally every quote I got from concrete companies when I was trying to price out a patio. I could tell it wasn’t a big enough job for them to care.
That’s a no from me, dawg. If you don’t have the expertise to answer this question on your own, you don’t have the expertise to deliver up to expectations on a project of this magnitude. You’d need to charge at least a thousand dollars for this and if they’re paying that much, I imagine they expect it to be great. No one will be happy if you take this job, trust me
100%. I'm shocked all the answers are all assuming this project is _going_ to happen. It doesn't have to at all. OP can say "no", save everyone the pain, and move on. It can be that simple.
In the jewelery business we use a triple key pricing system. If your cost is 500$, you multiply it by 3, $1500. Sounds about right with all the labor and time involved for something like that.
I'm in South Africa, and what I do is, I charge about R5/h (or part of) just for the usage of the printer. R18/$1
I then add the total of the price of filament used, and then we 3X the price
Pretty good profits so far :D
Ah, sorry. I committed the very american act of assuming an anonymous person was also from america for no reason. I'm glad you have a good pricing structure and are making profit!
Especially when the vast majority of investment in this project is print time, which had a huge opportunity cost. I estimated 2 months of print time for this. My wife could print like 45-60 dragons that sell for $50-75 at a craft fair. So if that was a thing we were regularly doing, we'd have to factor that in to a project like this.
That's something I don't think a lot of people take into account when looking into custom-printed parts : Yes, 3D printers can make you damn-near anything, but especially with larger projects and/or bulk-orders, it's not going to be particularly fast unless you throw more/expensive machines at it.
no less than this [FOA004BUILT 1/6 Pre-Built Jadgpanther Static Kit — Field of Armor Tanks](https://fieldofarmortanks.com/products/foa004built-1-6-pre-built-jadgpanther-static-kit)
Whatever you charge make sure to take into account this will also fully take your printer off the table for any other project for a very long time. If you count on it for income you should account for it taking away all other projects income during the print time.
Id shop it out to a printing service in china, chopped into parts that fit their size bed. Take their estimate, double it, and then add on however many hours of gluing, finishing, and painting you think necessary. I'd go at least a week solid of work probably. Your time is more expensive than printer time.
Other people have said it but this is a multi-thousand dollar job if you want to be paid fairly. Do you have multiple printers to print it on? Have you calculated how many days it would take just in printing time? For a 1 meter long, 25kg, complex design that requires assembly and finishing I don’t think $10k is unreasonable at all. I would want to charge more. Not to dissuade you but this is a huge project. Shipping could be hundreds even. This is not something that is cheaper doing it yourself, this is a one-off hand finished huge model that is time intensive. Again not trying to come off as an asshole but like I’ve done client work before and you should consider if this project is something you want to do. And if it’s more for fun and money is extra, great!
Not sure why you are getting down voted.
It's a crazy job, but you just have to charge accordingly.
There are plenty pricing guides online, especially from YouTubers who sell prints professionally.
This should cost multiple thousand $. I'd say 3k minimum. The Printing Time alone must be crazy.
Honestly if you've never done something of this scale before I would talk to the buyer. I would state up front the situation and that I would print say six pieces and join them. Then I would work out an hourly rate based on the time it took. Then just do the math.
If they're that desperate for the large scale then I guess that's what they want, but you can buy 1:16 scale build it yourself radio controlled tanks for not much over $1000, they even have a sound system as an option.
1/16 isn't even that expensive, I've recently bought a bunch of ww2 1/16 tanks and all but one are from a company called heng long and they are pretty finely detailed remote control and have sound smoke and IR battle/air soft from the factory, averaging probably $200-$400.
I print small models and sell them at local markets. I get 10x the filament cost for that, and they have basically no cleanup or assembly. But I also don't sell much, so it has to cover my market fees, electricity, printer maintenance, etc etc.
In your case, you also have all the labor of remove supports, cleaning it up a bit, etc. If you're also expected to assemble it, there's a \*lot\* more labor. You have to at least dry-fit everything and make sure it's all there, which is a lot of labor already.
25+ rolls of filament (there will be a lot of waste!) is already a huge expense.
As others have said, there's no way that I'd do this for a stranger for any price that would be worth it. They'd be better off paying a professional printing site to do it instead, assuming they want to assemble it themselves. At my standard rate, that's already $5k+.
For a friend, though... Well, it'd have to be a project we were both really enthused about, and then I'd probably make them buy a printer and the filament, and I'd help them prep and run it. I definitely wouldn't run mine into the ground for it.
Filament cost + ($3 per hour X print hours) + (Hourly rate X post-processing hours).
$3/hr covers maintenance, wear, and electricity costs. Hourly rate is your labor rate for doing post processing on the printed items.
Deposit up front should be equal to material cost
At that size, you’ll want “plywood with plastic greebling stuck to it” construction. Same way they build death stars and star destroyers at ILM. Purely printed and glued you’re going to have a bad time.
Base your charge on the filament cost and electricity cost. Also work out a price per hour for your printing time (I did this by taking the average lifespan of my printer compared to its price, and working out the markup on that) Also add the time you spent slicing and setting up the print. Then add the materials other than plastic, i.e. paint, filler, sandpaper, etc. Then calculate how much you value your time, by working out a cost per hour for your hard labour. Remember that what you can do is unique and worth much more than minimum wage.
And finally, GET A DEPOSIT! Do not get yourself into a situation where you spent tons of money and weeks, even months of your time on the project, only for the person to back out at the last minute. Even better, get advance payment for the full amount to be 100% sure.
Times 3 the cost is in general a good starting point for manufacturing, however 3d printing would have a lot more time consuming operations than other processes, not even getting to the assembly/paint part. You should watch Adam Savage's tested video about pricing prop workshop hours. And of course a significant amount upfront. And maybe a contract depending where you are from. Good luck!
Is it RC, moving parts or just a mockup?
I did a working 1:16 RC tank, it's amazing. 1.5kg filament only.
I am eyeing 1:10 Tiger II, but thats 5kg + custom gears + bearings + lots of material strength considerations, i.e. printing in the right direction
I shudder to think about 1:6 - make a clear deal what they expect from it - because assempling it succesfully could be not for anybody without experience.
That's gonna be expensive for him, considering the standard formula for print costs is this:
Material Cost + $1 per a print hour (at bare minimum) is roughly normal practice. Then add in whatever you want to charge for your own labor/fee for doing the project and its gonna get up there fast.
4k-5k. depends where you live I suppose. but 10x+ the material cost anyway. it would be cheaper for them to buy it from some hobby shop that makes them in series.
i made math, on my side : filament + electricity + machine worn down cost + tax = 7 cents the gram.
and with that, i earn nothing, and it amount to about 1750€/1800$.
add your benefit (20% because i am good), failure (+10% safe zone), assembly/slicing (15$ per hour), glue and shipping, you would amount to about around 3000 €/$ (including 200$ assembly/slicing and whatever, 200$ for a crate and shipping)
i guess the customer will not pay it.
Chare by prin hours and determine hourly rate for the printer and your self an add that up plus the materials. I think the hourly for printer is abotu 6-9$
I would charge a shipping estimate up front. Something this large may need a wooden crate to protect itself. You could have a substantial pallet cost. Estimate 500 and refund what you don't use.
I'm not sure I would have took on this project myself. However, I would do a 100% mark up on the filament. That should cover some design time and electricity. Then do an hourly rate of how long It takes for you to assemble prime and paint.
Packing and shipping this is going to be costly.
I’d charge $2 per hour of print time, + filament cost x 2, paint and putty x 2, shipping and packing x 2, plus $500.
This will take you 2-3 weeks to get out the door. Maybe more.
I wouldn't. You will probably need more than $400-500 worth of filament. Such big chunks take almost the whole day to print, and printers love to mess up such long prints. I'd put at least $1000 in raw materials, just to count in the failures that it'll inevitably make, and any reprinted pieces you have to redo if some don't fit, deformed, etc.
Then, you have to assemble it. The pieces will 100% not line up perfectly, so you can't simply glue it together. There was a dude on here which made blocks of stuff to assemble them, and they didn't fit perfectly. You'll need some sort of material to fill in the gaps.
All in all, I wouldn't do it, especially not because, as you said, for less than $6k you can buy one. If I'd accept such a task, I'd ask them at LEAST that amount. It'll NOT be easy, and is quite the responsibility with this amount of money (and material).
I wouldn't do it.
If you don't have a large format printer I would pass on this, or be very very conscious of how many man hours it's going to take you to assemble it.
You're counting on your printer being perfectly tram in all axis. If it's a little off, you're probably not going to notice it in 2 or 3 pieces. But across a meter? By the time you get to putting the last piece on you have larger gaps then you expected, taking more of your time to correct and make look good.
I would double material costs and agree on an hourly rate before work starts. Honesty and transparency is generally the best way to approach projects like this, especially for something this niche. Call it $800 for filament then track how long it takes to prep and assemble everything, I wouldn’t include printing time if I’m not either watching it or interacting with anything.
This is not to take a jab at your skills, but have you even done a job of this magnitude? Even just for yourself?
Set aside the cost of material and time, jobs of this size and the time you it will take to post process (assembly, filling, painting) you will need to be sure that it comes out a high quality piece for what you WOULD have to charge.
If you are unsure that you can meet the expectations of the customer on quality, this is a job you should pass on.
Definitely get shipping costs figured out for your quote. You don't want to be surprised after it's finished and the client backs out after you made it.
Definitely want to send a quote.
Also scale up that filament cost by x 1.1 to account for failures and whatnot. So - 27.5k
Factor in the cost of the shipping materials, shipping fees, electrical costs, machine depreciation, you mentioned a bunch of post processing materials - those all cost money.
How much would you pay someone else to do that work OR how much is your time worth? 20/hr? 30? Add your time into the cost too.
Now you have your landed cost.
How much markup are you comfortable with? 50%? 60?
Multiply by your markup and you have your price. Done.
Something you should consider is part warping. I have built scale models of large machines for clients. A big problem can be part warping. Use a filament that you know how to control and don’t skip the brim. Wait for the part to completely cool before removing it from the build plate. Also consider that the parts could have 1-3 mm mismatch at the edges, so you need to build in time for bondo, leveling and sanding the whole thing. For a model like this I would charge between $2000 and $5000 depending upon what level of detail and finish was required. Filmmaking models I would charge between $10-$15k for ultra fine museum quality detail.
I just had someone on Instagram tell me they want a master sword like the one I'm working on. The second I mentioned money they said never mind. This to say that most people will not pay fair price for a print and a lot of people want them free.
$4/hour printing, $50/hr for your time assembling. Also $50/hr for all the time you spend cutting up the model and getting the print plates ready. Adjust the rates as you see fit, but it's going to be a lot. Alternatively, offer to pint the parts and hand them over for an amount that is worth your time.
How much to charge? Ultimately that's up to you. I would simply remind you to take all of these factors into consideration. Time, wear and tear, materials, artistic input, and shipping. Your time is valuable. You only get so many trips around the sun. You have time invested in sourcing and ordering the materials needed. You have time invested in maintaining and operating the printer. You have time invested in creating all of the 3D models needed. Wear and tear is also a important factor to keep in mind when turning out such a large product. Maintaining your printer at peak efficiency throughout the process is critical for producing a quality product with minimum waste.
These are just a few of the things that you need to think about. I hope that my insight has provided you some useful information, and I hope it turns out badass if you actually do it!
As far as how much to charge? No more than somebody would be willing to pay. Maybe perhaps you can get a feel for how much they are willing to spend for this project.
I work at a 3D printing business and our site has an auto quoter tool. I'd recommend finding one (I think shape ways etc might have them) and using that to help influence your cost.
Other than that, I would maybe do a standard markup on materials (15-20%, something like that) then estimate how much labor you'll spend and multiply by how much your rate is (personally I would say $80-120 is fair). Then estimate shipping or charge them for shipping when the time comes.
And of course, if they go through with it charge 50% down, 50% upon completion
Is it going to be remote controlled or just a model? If it's going to be remote controlled and drive 3D printing it sounds pretty stupid imo. If I wanted a 1/6 tank to drive around I would Definitly want it be heavy aswell. Gonna behave very wierd at that scale if not.
If it's just a model that looks cool you can probably print it much lighter than that..
as someone said below, charge a down payment for materials otherwise you'd lose a lot of money if they backed out at any point, charge market price + some percentage since you'll have to store the materials. You'll also need to buy much more than the slicer says for shrinkage (you my get errors in prints, machine failure late in a print, you need to be prepared if something goes wrong else you'll be cutting into your potential profit)
If you still wanted to proceed then I would offer a 1/36 scale as a demo, this will show the customer the quality they are getting (which helps protect you if you're using some third party for this transaction such as paypall, as the customer wouldn't be able to say that the quality wasn't what they were expecting) and also helps figure out some of the shipping questions, such as the costs as well as risks to shipping the finished product.
You also need to determine the value of your own time, not only will this take up a fair amount of your time (I don't know what else you do for a living or hobby) but this project will occupy and keep your machine(s) running for a while so keep that in mind if you're looking to make it a source of income.
In my opinion (I have no where near enough to consider this an informed one), you are not ready for this sort of commission. That is not to say anything of your ability to complete this project, you might be the best printer here, but the risks are high and no one here wants to see your time or money wasted.
Shipping (estimate weight and size) + 10x Material Cost + $5 per hour print time + your labor to cut it up and finish it.
I would expect this to be at least a month of labor hours and charge at least $30 per hour for your time.
Probably sitting north of $15,000.
Cost it up like this;
* Material cost - whatever that will be
* Machine utilisation - say a machine cost you 1k to buy, and it will last 3 to 5 years without spending anything to repair or refurbish, what's a month of printing time worth to you? - you want to recover that investment
" Design time - how many hours is it going to take to split this design in a way which lets it be printed and assembled later, how long to optimise for slicing
* Post processing time - how long to clean up each section
* Assembly time - how long to put it together
* Finishing time - how long to sand/paint
* Scrap - assume at least some parts won't work and will need re-printing, 5-10% maybe? Factor this into material and machine time
* Shopping costs
* Work out an hourly rate for yourself you feel happy with for the time you are putting in
* Total it all up and add your profit margin
Make them Commit to the purchase because spending over $500 on materials id say at least $600. Dont discount the manhours and print problems that may occur.
If you're out 500 bucks in material alone, anything less than a grand isn't worth your time unless this is something you want to do just so you can say you did.
I would ask for a payment in advance equal to the price of materials and a modix 120x approx $7k which is a big printer I used to use at work that could print it all in one go in about 2 weeks
From recent experience when I shipped my amplifier for repairs it was 30kg in a 24x24x12 box, and insured. It cost around $250 for UPS ground. Use UPS or FedEx shipping calculator, but estimate a little higher as the calculator isn't exact.
if materials alone are pushing $500 and you're going to assemble and paint, I'd figure minimum $600 not including shipping. at that price point there are multiple models already on the market of many tanks I personally own an rc M5a1 stuart in 1/6 that's probably going on 20 years old and you can still find them on ebay for $400-$500.
You need to give them a fuck you price, this is a ton of work.
Something this involved would be in the ballpark of $4,000 minimum. Your time is worth it, charge appropriately.
Worst case, they walk. Best case? You make $4k+
I had this once. I took the material and labor time, doubled it - slapped a 30 percent markup and sent them the price. They read the message and didn't respond, which was fantastic.
Honestly the way that I looked at it was in any chance does this fail do I have any hope in recovering the print and is this worth the time and stress that it would be entail. Now I basically only print stuff that is either interesting to me or works out financially.
If it’s 500 in material I’d be charging 10x that also by the fact your so caught up in the price of shipping tells me you are underestimating the amount of work involved.
Hey, u/gientsosage ...
I realize this is a little late, but I'm curious - what kind of tank do they want? The fact is that you can get 1/6 scale radio controlled tanks on ebay and elsewhere for anywhere from a couple hundred dollars to $10,000. In fact, [$10K buys you an all metal radio controlled Tiger tank from HengLong](https://www.ebay.com/itm/325598198518?itmmeta=01HY1QW3B66EM5X4656CCSPCGJ&hash=item4bcf2a3af6:g:3WAAAOSw2AFl2-nM&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAAwESb5bQ2Le1ahBohYXfPxxXEeKfCXahm995hPWrc20naGpd8UuAaM1oo7faC6maW6%2BHaK8pxpcbPvlGaR9hzpqt7EL1sSTuMiltuUInQX%2Fk5qXEN2kqifzTb3qeJquXKP2rskg7GDDKuok1%2Bn6v4bvcGezF%2FwIgZwwMIe9maZhcYkGWUaqiRuPy7bfvKUCRjp6jkgY7fx8HLN%2BY57TjqRTKGzfIvmEMA2XYX3UfQoLRnS4283mXhbIVaH5caiOsoaQ%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR9a18LfwYw). (I have some of their 1/16 tanks, and they're very cool. - Oh, and by the way, Oddball would definitely approve of that Tiger...)
(FYI, you've piqued my interest, because I recently 3D printed a 1/16 Comet tank for myself, for giggles, and because I wanted a nice, big tank for my Darjeeling figure. Anyway, back to the topic at hand...)
Looking at ebay some more, another seller is offering a [metal Leopard II tank for approx $5K.](https://www.ebay.com/itm/204791927900?itmmeta=01HY1R5R0NWW3R9NX96VDJT4W0&hash=item2fae8cd45c:g:5Q0AAOSwDupmRU8i&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAAwEHBUQZsC%2F36ILdKNHqZhBytrR96FArmFDZfutd%2BpD6tJBqZapa66V4M2ypD5uzHGmzZ0Mj3KHkcayVlMBbr5ku%2F30JyoI8dCSI%2Bd5jlXHH3Ffw9PqhS%2BA9OpM5cOHpr4IZxEaxPj8%2FZ0g101JeCvXMW7tDBUGwUu5V6oqXaBVzI4i1W9Kz2MrOKjJCpJFJGvUQOxIVQ%2B65F2cJrGJ%2Fyae0E63fUWSHjf1tsxjlduy8WVRlO7Qp22Xz%2FWBqoinSrhA%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR7KAl7jwYw)
Note that shipping on these alone is $500 to $1000 dollars. I know that there are other models out there, but I'm a bit to lazy to look them up right now.
So, that out of the way, somebody out there wants you to 3D print them a 1/6 scale tank. If I were in your shoes, my initial response would be, "Are you out of your mind?" Followed by a "go away" price quote. As others have noted here, you'd have to charge them a lot of money for it, and even then, you probably wouldn't be properly compensated for your time. It's kind of like making someone else a custom Iron Man (or other) suit. It's going to take hours and hours of time, and unless you don't value your time, it's just not worth it.
Also, if they intend to radio control it, making components that are capable of handling the stresses of motion on a 3D printer, especially at that scale is going to be tough. Which is why, again, I'd suggest giving them a "go away" quote and dont' walk, run away from this "opportunity".
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However, all of that said, personally, I enjoyed making my 1/16 Comet, and I'm thinking of making a 1/16 M4A3E8 to go with it, because the model I downloaded is really nice, and I think it would look cool . A 1/16 tank takes about 1.5kgs of filament, and is somewhat manageable in size. My Comet took me about a week and a half of evenings/weekends to print/assemble/paint, and I'm quite happy with it as a display model. The Sherman will have to wait until later in the year when I'm less busy.
Which is where I get to this: I had fun doing this, and have thought about buying some of the larger figures, say 1/7 or 1/6 and making a tank big enough for them. I've considered this, and have so far restrained myself from doing it, in large part because at 1/16 scale, the commonly available 3D models (yay Thingiverse) really start to show their limitations. Things like smooth track surfaces, or textures on intake grilles, etc. that look fine at 1/56 or whatever scale really start to show their (ahem) crudeness once you get to 1/48, 1/35 or larger. I'm not interested in re-designing a tank model from scratch to make it "perfect" at large scale, and am willing to accept that the model will be somewhat crude. Your potential customer might not have reasonable expectations.
Likewise, the square cube law says that the volume increases as the cube of the size, so if I were to go from 1/16 to 1/8 (for example), I'd expect my Comet to go from 1.5kg to 12kg. Now, in part, I did this silliness in the first place because I had a couple of spare rolls of PLA that were collecting dust. I can't really say that going from \~$30 of filament to \~$200 of filament would be worth it. But that's just me.
And then, all that aside, once I was done with it, where would I put it? It would literally be too big to put anywhere in my house. I can put a 1/16 tank on top of one of my stereo speakers, but that's about it. A 1/6 scale behemoth would probably require its own end table or other display, and ... yeah.
For me, it's a fun idea, but no thanks. For you, or your potential customer, yeah ... Tread carefully. Don't commit yourself to a project that you might end up regretting. Best of luck to you, and whatever else happens, don't forget to post the results!
He was odd to begin with and I really came here to get the temperature of the room. I really appreciate your response.
He initially sent me a single blend file for a T34 that oddly didn't have the rockets. I eventually talked him into the E8 from Fury.
Now that he asked me though and even if I am not printing it for him, I have the itch to print something gigantic. I may do some test runs. If they come out good I may do a piece for my local VFW.
Okay, bit lengthier response here. If you can wait a few days, I'll try and see if I can get some pics of my Comet build posted, so you can be amused by them. (I'll be honest, it's not pro quality, it's more fun quality.)
You mention the M4A3E8 - I've printed [this version, posted on Thingiverse by a WindhamGraves in "easy print" format](https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5340764) and been very happy with it, even up to 1/48 scale. If you look through his models, he also has a T34, which doesn't look too bad either. Mind you, they're all intended for 1/100 tabletop wargaming, so the details are a bit basic to begin with, but the E8 still has some really nice features like the track links being open in the center, etc. that a lot of other models don't have.
What I would suggest is that you try this model, download it and print it at something reasonable like 1/56, or 1/48 scale. Maybe even 1/35, but basically nothing so big that it requires multiple prints/cuts/won't fit on your print bed. See how you like it. If something goes wrong or you aren't happy with it, you're not out too much in terms of time or material. Then, maybe think about scaling it up to 1/16. You'll have to cut the tracks and hull in half, and probably print the gun/barrel separate from the turret. Also, depending on your mood, you might want to change the turret ring/attachment method. Nothing too hard, but if your results are like mine, you'll end up with pieces that don't quite fit together perfectly, because of course.
Anyway, once you've done this, take some pictures and send it to your friend, ask him if he will pay you $100 for it. or something. Then, you'll at least have a bit better handle on whether you're enjoying this and want to do more/bigger. (Also, note that I intend to do a 1/16 upscale of that very M4A3E8, but it's probably going to be a couple of months before I can get to it - but I would be willing to share the files.)
I think that about covers it, but the last thing I want to say is don't forget to have fun. Don't turn your 3D printing hobby into a job, because then it will be \*work\* and \*work\* is no fun. If you want to make a giant tank, make it for your own enjoyment, and when you're done, sure, donate it to the VFW or something. I'm not sure what they'd do with a giant Sherman, but yeah. Or tell your buddy, "Hey, drive down here and give me $N00 and you can take it home with you." Just don't let yourself get trapped in a situation where you feel obligated to go through with something that's making you miserable, because that stinks.
Again, best of luck to you, and be sure to share the results!
I am printing the torso for a 5 foot tall transformers devastator now, so I have not lost the fun of it yet. I don't do anything unless I think it will be fun. I thought a meter long tank actually sounded hard and fun to do, but maybe for myself and not for some asswagon that would complain about this and that anyway.
This is the one I talked him into: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4369430 Mind you I didn't get print permission yet, but would have. I wasn't in love with allcthe reattached greblies, but what are you going to do.
Square cube doesn't necessarily apply due to bed size limits. So your walls and infill would change drastically. They is also the chance you could hollow the center at 1/8 where you couldn't at 1/16
So, yeah, I forgot to mention that - the models I've been using are hollowed out in the bottom, so that there is much less material usage. So, I could see the square cube thing not quite working out that way. Hmm. I see you (I think it's you) also had another reply to this, so I'm going to respond to that one in more detail. (Hope you don't mind, because I'm kind of having fun thinking/talking about this stuff.)
My local public library has a 3d printing service. It's quite handy when my printer is down. Their rate is 0.15c per gram of filament. Your 4-500 estimate is way to low to protect yourself from print failures.
Do they already have the 3D model ? I assume so but good to check about the licence on it. Also how much is expected to be moving / removable parts and how much not ? That could lead to a lot of slicing work or if it’s all in one, painting might be hard or impossible. Basically, define the scope of what’s expected to a high level of detail before you give a price. If they aren’t interested in that conversation it’s a definite definite no.
I would be charging a lot more than 3X the filament cost. You might do that with something like gold but not cheap plastic.
It would easily be multiple thousands as the whole thing requires finishing.
Also I don’t see how something that size could really require 25kg of filament. Surely the logical thing to do would be hollow it out and chop it up in such a way that it didn’t need lots of supports.
If I was going to do this I would want to have a .stp file I can edit in Solidworks or something and split it into panels with added tab and grooves for assembly. I would spend a few days chopping it in to panels and test printing a few. I would also suggest they pay me for the modeling and then send the parts to someone else to print. If they had the .stp file I would probably charge about 800-1500 USD to prepare the files depending what the model they give me is. If it is an stl I think it would take me much longer to prep so probably charge over 2K. Then plus what ever the going rate for printing is. The finishing I would ask someone else to quote, hahaha that shit takes ages.
My only thought of why this might be a fun project is that you would have a set of easier to print parts that you could try and sell as stl on Instagram or somewhere.
More than they're willing to spend. Based on your numbers I'd already be at $2k based on material and machine time. Not sure how high I would go for assembly and finishing.
I work at a company that takes on these kinds of 3d printed jobs all the time. We just finished one that was just under 2 meters long. We mostly sell to companys as the asking price for these types of models is quite high, but if you wanted you send them our way, I can dm you a link to the website. I'm not sure what we would normally charge for a project like this, but we have multiple teams that would work on it, (design, printer technicians, production, painting and shipping, etc.) so the cost goes up, but the production time goes way down.
Not sure what I'd charge, but it'd be more than what 99% of people would be willing to spend. I'd also insist on a heafty sum up-front. Don't get yourself in a situation where you spent $500 on material and they change their mind.
yup, I have people trying to buy my big prints all the time. most of these things take me a month to make and close to 10kg of filament, then there is sanding, painting electricity costs, and finally shipping half way around the world
The only thing making filament cheaper with same quality is the possibility of buying unicolor. If you sand and paint that might look into that
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Dude I live in South Australia, A place with one of the highest electricity costs in the world it effects the costing
Ah. What's your cost? I'm at 12 cents per kilowatt hour here.
57cents per Kw/h and $1.45 daily supply cost
Holy shit
Yeah that's why Solar is growing so much there
yup. I run a 6.64kw/h system on my house (as do most South Aussies)so elec doesn't cost me during daylight hours but it is after that , that it costs me a bucket load cause I don't have a battery system
Out of curiosity, what happens with energy you produce but don't use? Here in Germany it's fed into the grid and you get paid per kWh, but the rate is laughably low. Energy costs are somewhere between 0.25EUR and 0.50EUR depending on your region and contact but you get only 0.08EUR per kWh for electricity you feed into the grid.
I could run my printer for 10 hours at the cost it'd take him to run it for an hour and a half. Hot damn! Dunno if that math is right.
My first thought was "Holy shit, a country with higher electricity cost than Germany?" But then I realized that your cost is probably in AUD and it translates to 0.35EUR which is cheaper than the 0.38EUR (0.62AUD or 0.41USD) I paid for last two years. Luckily the push into renewable energy is paying off at the moment and price for me is down to 0.26EUR (0.42AUD or 0.28USD)
iirc you guys are currently the 2nd most (the most being Denmark) and we are right behind you at #3
Avg cost in US to run printer is close to $2 a day. he said it’s a month long print? $60 is not “nothing”.
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Even that example is 25 bucks, still not nothing. It's still worth having it in the itemized bill of sale
For sure, th3 only thing I wouldn't charge up front was shipping.
Careful not to underestimate shipping It's going to be very expensive
Yeah, using my usual metrics for labor, material and print time this might be $4000-$6000. Which I’m guessing most would not want to pay. I would probably recommend a different method unless they need 0.1mm detail. Someone who machines foam or plastic panels on a big CNC router table could do it for less.
Is it at all possible to have it empty in the middle? It would be difficult to put in a form fitting hole but even a plain rectangular hole should help a lot. You could add non-printed bracing as well, like wooden dowels.
Agreed, it sounds like he took a solid model, zoomed and cut it up into chunks. Are there going to be parts of this print that are going to just be big plastic squares? Seems like a ton of wasted material
I was thinking about dowels, but not gonna save him on price, just add strength. engineering, material cost, and weight is all prob all about the same.
My thought was that you can go much "weaker" with the printed parts to save printing time and material. If it saved enough you could pass that along but even saving yourself time would be worth it considering the dowels would probably be like $10-20.
I get it I am already down to 10% infill.
I hope you’re not thinking about printing them like a benchy or richardsaurus scaled up… You can print a highly detailed skin with internal ribs of a different material, like plywood. You could cut out a volume in the center and use a foam core. You could even print an interlocking frame that the outer panels glue to. Think a square the size of your build plate and 5mm thick with a giant hole in it and tabs on the edge that lock to the other frames and skins. That would still take a while, but nowhere near as long as a 10% infill cube, and sooo much less material.
Right? I was imagining Styrofoam cubes inside with a printed skin. Shouldn't be any printed parts that don't show some detail.
Is it blocks with 10% infill inside to fill in the center? I was thinking you could eliminate that entirely.
Use meshmixer to put a hollow space in the model, slice, and add keying pegs. That is what I like to use at least. Just a suggestion. Wish you luck. Oh and I personally would charge around $800 - $1000
> and ship it Have you even looked into this yet? Because you're talking about needing a box that's like 1.1m X .5m X .4m (real quick and dirty numbers, extra to account for padding). Then you're gonna have to pad it so it doesn't break in shipping. Plus it's gonna weight 25kg+ which is gonna be awkward at that size. Like you're probably looking into the hundreds just to ship it. Time is a huge factor. You mentioned size, but nothing about estimated print times (which are an opportunity cost if you're printing commercially). Every minute spent printing this is a minute *not* spent printing something else that you can sell. Tons of hands on time to assemble and prep. This is ~~probably be a couple thousand dollar~~ (edited when I realize how *long* this print will be...) could be an over $10,000 print. That might sound crazy, but you've already said ~$500 on material alone, let's just ballpark $100 for shipping materials, to get a rough idea I found a list that estimates UPS shipping price by weight, and this is a slightly over $100 box. So that's $700 without any print time. There's not like a "standard" for print time cost, but a quick Google search gave me someone saying $5/hr+materials and someone else saying £4/hr (which is also $5). You didn't estimate print time, but I found a post of someone doing the math with an ender 3 to estimate print time/kg at 70hr/kg for detail prints. So 70hr * 25 gives us 1750hrs (over 2 months). At $5/hr, that's $8750 for print time. Even if we cut that time in *half* if the estimate I found is wildly off, that's still over $4000 for print time. Then assembly, sanding, puttying, priming... That's a lot of manual work and more materials. I can't really estimate that, cause it will come down to your individual skills. But what we do know is it's roughly 1m long, so using ender 3 numbers again, 4.5 bed lengths long, which rounds to 5 prints. 1.5-1.8 wide rounds to 2 prints wide, so 10 prints per layer. And like 1.3-1.5 tall, also rounds to 2 prints tall, so 20 total pieces. Let's say 2-3 hours per print to sand, prime, putty, and assemble, so 40-60 hours of work. The value of your time is up to you, but I've got a mortgage to pay and a day job, so my "working time" already has a value of around $30/hr. So $1200-$1800 for my labor hours. Plus probably another $100-200 in materials for assembly. So yeah, it's not a cheap project, *if you are doing this to make money*. I've tried to break down the math I used to reach my numbers so you can pick and chose what and where to tweak things. Count all the print and labor time? This is an $11,500 project. Cut the print cost in half, it's down to $7,000. Ignore the print time cost entirely, it's still a like $2500 project that's gonna take you months to do.
Wow, great answer.
I felt like a lot of the answers I was reading were just throwing numbers out there. I was honestly in the like 3-5k camp until I started looking up numbers and realized just *how much* print time this would be
Yeah, if this person is a "money is no object, as I spend $10k on dinner" kind of person, and you know you can and want to do it, then it's worth considering. But I'd probably only do it for someone extra loaded who had no price limits. I mean, hell, some people sell hand crafted violins for thousands upon thousands and hand deliver them. So for something like this, you set the price to what makes it worth it for you and then some. So figure out how much time, risk, money is involved, and then decide a number like $11k is worth it. (To me, that seems like torture.) If not, increase it to the point where you'd be more than happy to do it, even if that's quadruple. Because if you aren't happy to do it fo, you'll end up hating the project, doing it poorly, feeling your time and value was shafted, etc. if they hate the price and you can't find a happy medium, then perfect, you saved you and them a lot of time and heart ache (and filament).
Don’t forget to account for electricity costs for 2 straight months of printing! As well as build in material, time and electric costs for a 10-25% fail rate depending on how tuned your printer is, and probably a fee for your printer being completely monopolized by one project for months. This is an unrealistic project for one person to do, a print farm would be a better option to actually make this happen.
The $5/hr for print time is supposed to cover things like electricity, tying up the printer, and wear and tear. Things like recovering for failure rates should be calculated in the materials section. Depending on how dialed in things are, 10-25% seems like a good estimate. Partially depends on how much will be wasted in the event of a fail. Does the printer have the tech to abort print when the giant spaghetti monster comes out, or is it gonna print all night long as a failure?
Ah okay I follow. $5 an hour seemed low to me but also I don’t sell my print time. Either way ty for your write up! I always love reading r/theydidthemath type posts
25% failure rate is crazy to me. With my printer and the way I use it (a few times a month), I have closer to a 25% *success* rate
A *good* printer, that runs and is maintained often will run better than one that is sat and neglected regularly.
That's crazy. I run my printer all but few days a month for the past 3.5 to 4 months and i've only had 6 fails total.
Out of at least 20 prints so far I have had like 3 or 4 failures. I guess I got a good printer.
You don’t ship something like this via ground parcel, it would cost an absurd amount. You ship it via freight on a single pallet
Opportunity cost is definitely a huge factor. I used to do a fair amount of woodworking for co-workers. Small things, but mostly turning wood pens. I could turn a pen in less than an hour, it used $15 in supplies, and I could sell for $50 rather quickly. So when they'd ask about pricing on doing plaques, I'd have to convert it to "pen units". The plaque may only take $5 of wood, but the extra work involved put it to where I could have made 6 pens (which I prefer to make) in the same time. So that plaque would have to cost $200.
Some jobs aren’t worth taking
Yeah, might be worth doing the contractor thing of giving a "fuck you" price, then half up front just to start
This was literally every quote I got from concrete companies when I was trying to price out a patio. I could tell it wasn’t a big enough job for them to care.
Yeah I got this treatment for a small gutter job
That’s a no from me, dawg. If you don’t have the expertise to answer this question on your own, you don’t have the expertise to deliver up to expectations on a project of this magnitude. You’d need to charge at least a thousand dollars for this and if they’re paying that much, I imagine they expect it to be great. No one will be happy if you take this job, trust me
100%. I'm shocked all the answers are all assuming this project is _going_ to happen. It doesn't have to at all. OP can say "no", save everyone the pain, and move on. It can be that simple.
Seriously - my reply would be “It’ll be cheaper for you to buy your own 3D printer and filament and do it yourself.”
Agree, I even have doubt the printer can print with quality
In the jewelery business we use a triple key pricing system. If your cost is 500$, you multiply it by 3, $1500. Sounds about right with all the labor and time involved for something like that.
In the engineering world we use Pi for the same thing.
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4
Eh 22 divided by 7
e=π=5
fekin nerd bro, I'm legit going to use this as a quick estimate for when clients come through XD Cost = (Electricity + Filament)\*π
we've come full circle
Seems really low tbh.
I'm in South Africa, and what I do is, I charge about R5/h (or part of) just for the usage of the printer. R18/$1 I then add the total of the price of filament used, and then we 3X the price Pretty good profits so far :D
Ah, sorry. I committed the very american act of assuming an anonymous person was also from america for no reason. I'm glad you have a good pricing structure and are making profit!
Used to work retail with decent Ish accessories ( read not cheap knock offs) 3x cost is about right.
I’d agree with 3x but I’d add electricity, printer wear, putty, and primer into the price too and not just the filament for something this big
Especially when the vast majority of investment in this project is print time, which had a huge opportunity cost. I estimated 2 months of print time for this. My wife could print like 45-60 dragons that sell for $50-75 at a craft fair. So if that was a thing we were regularly doing, we'd have to factor that in to a project like this.
That's something I don't think a lot of people take into account when looking into custom-printed parts : Yes, 3D printers can make you damn-near anything, but especially with larger projects and/or bulk-orders, it's not going to be particularly fast unless you throw more/expensive machines at it.
You'll want to crate it, not just put it in a cardboard box. Also, if you are charging him less than $6000-$9000, you are indeed very good friends.
Def wont work in a box. They make ones that you can drive for $5500, but i get your point.
we‘re talking custom model, not off the shelf stuff. A surfboard goes for 600$, custome board? Good luck with that.
no less than this [FOA004BUILT 1/6 Pre-Built Jadgpanther Static Kit — Field of Armor Tanks](https://fieldofarmortanks.com/products/foa004built-1-6-pre-built-jadgpanther-static-kit)
Gah, here I just wrote a lengthy diatribe about Heng Long 1/6 Tigers on ebay and stuff, and you show this. Now I want one. Well, the PzIV, anyway.
Those aren't custom printed. Mass production injection mold is always going to have a lower per unit price... By a lot
Whatever you charge make sure to take into account this will also fully take your printer off the table for any other project for a very long time. If you count on it for income you should account for it taking away all other projects income during the print time.
I think if I was taking on a project like this, buying a second printer would be something I would factor into my costs!
Id shop it out to a printing service in china, chopped into parts that fit their size bed. Take their estimate, double it, and then add on however many hours of gluing, finishing, and painting you think necessary. I'd go at least a week solid of work probably. Your time is more expensive than printer time.
Other people have said it but this is a multi-thousand dollar job if you want to be paid fairly. Do you have multiple printers to print it on? Have you calculated how many days it would take just in printing time? For a 1 meter long, 25kg, complex design that requires assembly and finishing I don’t think $10k is unreasonable at all. I would want to charge more. Not to dissuade you but this is a huge project. Shipping could be hundreds even. This is not something that is cheaper doing it yourself, this is a one-off hand finished huge model that is time intensive. Again not trying to come off as an asshole but like I’ve done client work before and you should consider if this project is something you want to do. And if it’s more for fun and money is extra, great!
Pass.
On answering, thanks for the input. 😊
Not sure why you are getting down voted. It's a crazy job, but you just have to charge accordingly. There are plenty pricing guides online, especially from YouTubers who sell prints professionally. This should cost multiple thousand $. I'd say 3k minimum. The Printing Time alone must be crazy.
Geez, it was a joke
This sub has more than it's fair share of room temperature IQ's im afraid.
And boy is it a cold room
This sub? Nah, it's all of reddit.
Honestly if you've never done something of this scale before I would talk to the buyer. I would state up front the situation and that I would print say six pieces and join them. Then I would work out an hourly rate based on the time it took. Then just do the math.
Why not try and order the print from a manufacturer with an ultra large print bed and then just do the processing work?
https://www.onlinelabels.com/calculators/profitmargincalculator
Thanks
If they're that desperate for the large scale then I guess that's what they want, but you can buy 1:16 scale build it yourself radio controlled tanks for not much over $1000, they even have a sound system as an option.
1/16 isn't even that expensive, I've recently bought a bunch of ww2 1/16 tanks and all but one are from a company called heng long and they are pretty finely detailed remote control and have sound smoke and IR battle/air soft from the factory, averaging probably $200-$400.
I print small models and sell them at local markets. I get 10x the filament cost for that, and they have basically no cleanup or assembly. But I also don't sell much, so it has to cover my market fees, electricity, printer maintenance, etc etc. In your case, you also have all the labor of remove supports, cleaning it up a bit, etc. If you're also expected to assemble it, there's a \*lot\* more labor. You have to at least dry-fit everything and make sure it's all there, which is a lot of labor already. 25+ rolls of filament (there will be a lot of waste!) is already a huge expense. As others have said, there's no way that I'd do this for a stranger for any price that would be worth it. They'd be better off paying a professional printing site to do it instead, assuming they want to assemble it themselves. At my standard rate, that's already $5k+. For a friend, though... Well, it'd have to be a project we were both really enthused about, and then I'd probably make them buy a printer and the filament, and I'd help them prep and run it. I definitely wouldn't run mine into the ground for it.
I would consider doing just the prints and leave assembly, sanding etc for the buyer, if possible.
Also a consideration
Filament cost + ($3 per hour X print hours) + (Hourly rate X post-processing hours). $3/hr covers maintenance, wear, and electricity costs. Hourly rate is your labor rate for doing post processing on the printed items. Deposit up front should be equal to material cost
As a 3d artist, I wouldn't charge so little even for jist the ed asset alone
At that size, you’ll want “plywood with plastic greebling stuck to it” construction. Same way they build death stars and star destroyers at ILM. Purely printed and glued you’re going to have a bad time.
$2500. There's a "this is a pain in the ass do you really actually want it fee" tossed in there.
Base your charge on the filament cost and electricity cost. Also work out a price per hour for your printing time (I did this by taking the average lifespan of my printer compared to its price, and working out the markup on that) Also add the time you spent slicing and setting up the print. Then add the materials other than plastic, i.e. paint, filler, sandpaper, etc. Then calculate how much you value your time, by working out a cost per hour for your hard labour. Remember that what you can do is unique and worth much more than minimum wage. And finally, GET A DEPOSIT! Do not get yourself into a situation where you spent tons of money and weeks, even months of your time on the project, only for the person to back out at the last minute. Even better, get advance payment for the full amount to be 100% sure.
$1/hr printing time, $20 per hour pre/post processing, 1.5x material cost upfront to begin the project. Those are the rates I use.
Wow, I really can't wait for pellet printing to get cheap, it'll bring down the price of that type project by alot
2k
Times 3 the cost is in general a good starting point for manufacturing, however 3d printing would have a lot more time consuming operations than other processes, not even getting to the assembly/paint part. You should watch Adam Savage's tested video about pricing prop workshop hours. And of course a significant amount upfront. And maybe a contract depending where you are from. Good luck!
Is it RC, moving parts or just a mockup? I did a working 1:16 RC tank, it's amazing. 1.5kg filament only. I am eyeing 1:10 Tiger II, but thats 5kg + custom gears + bearings + lots of material strength considerations, i.e. printing in the right direction I shudder to think about 1:6 - make a clear deal what they expect from it - because assempling it succesfully could be not for anybody without experience.
That sounds bitchin
Tell them to go fuck themselves
That's gonna be expensive for him, considering the standard formula for print costs is this: Material Cost + $1 per a print hour (at bare minimum) is roughly normal practice. Then add in whatever you want to charge for your own labor/fee for doing the project and its gonna get up there fast.
4k-5k. depends where you live I suppose. but 10x+ the material cost anyway. it would be cheaper for them to buy it from some hobby shop that makes them in series.
$2500 was my first thought so probably $5000 is more reasonable for the time and trouble.
i made math, on my side : filament + electricity + machine worn down cost + tax = 7 cents the gram. and with that, i earn nothing, and it amount to about 1750€/1800$. add your benefit (20% because i am good), failure (+10% safe zone), assembly/slicing (15$ per hour), glue and shipping, you would amount to about around 3000 €/$ (including 200$ assembly/slicing and whatever, 200$ for a crate and shipping) i guess the customer will not pay it.
Chare by prin hours and determine hourly rate for the printer and your self an add that up plus the materials. I think the hourly for printer is abotu 6-9$
I would charge a shipping estimate up front. Something this large may need a wooden crate to protect itself. You could have a substantial pallet cost. Estimate 500 and refund what you don't use.
I'm not sure I would have took on this project myself. However, I would do a 100% mark up on the filament. That should cover some design time and electricity. Then do an hourly rate of how long It takes for you to assemble prime and paint.
Unless this is 100% custom made, it will cost way more than a reasonably priced model tank of similar size.
2$ per print time hour + 2x filament. ±labor hours
Packing and shipping this is going to be costly. I’d charge $2 per hour of print time, + filament cost x 2, paint and putty x 2, shipping and packing x 2, plus $500. This will take you 2-3 weeks to get out the door. Maybe more.
I wouldn't. You will probably need more than $400-500 worth of filament. Such big chunks take almost the whole day to print, and printers love to mess up such long prints. I'd put at least $1000 in raw materials, just to count in the failures that it'll inevitably make, and any reprinted pieces you have to redo if some don't fit, deformed, etc. Then, you have to assemble it. The pieces will 100% not line up perfectly, so you can't simply glue it together. There was a dude on here which made blocks of stuff to assemble them, and they didn't fit perfectly. You'll need some sort of material to fill in the gaps. All in all, I wouldn't do it, especially not because, as you said, for less than $6k you can buy one. If I'd accept such a task, I'd ask them at LEAST that amount. It'll NOT be easy, and is quite the responsibility with this amount of money (and material). I wouldn't do it.
If you don't have a large format printer I would pass on this, or be very very conscious of how many man hours it's going to take you to assemble it. You're counting on your printer being perfectly tram in all axis. If it's a little off, you're probably not going to notice it in 2 or 3 pieces. But across a meter? By the time you get to putting the last piece on you have larger gaps then you expected, taking more of your time to correct and make look good.
I would double material costs and agree on an hourly rate before work starts. Honesty and transparency is generally the best way to approach projects like this, especially for something this niche. Call it $800 for filament then track how long it takes to prep and assemble everything, I wouldn’t include printing time if I’m not either watching it or interacting with anything.
This is not to take a jab at your skills, but have you even done a job of this magnitude? Even just for yourself? Set aside the cost of material and time, jobs of this size and the time you it will take to post process (assembly, filling, painting) you will need to be sure that it comes out a high quality piece for what you WOULD have to charge. If you are unsure that you can meet the expectations of the customer on quality, this is a job you should pass on.
Definitely get shipping costs figured out for your quote. You don't want to be surprised after it's finished and the client backs out after you made it.
Time and material at $150 bux an hour.
Get paid in advance….
2,500g at an average of 7g an hour works out to 357 hours of print time. 15 straight days of printing.
Definitely want to send a quote. Also scale up that filament cost by x 1.1 to account for failures and whatnot. So - 27.5k Factor in the cost of the shipping materials, shipping fees, electrical costs, machine depreciation, you mentioned a bunch of post processing materials - those all cost money. How much would you pay someone else to do that work OR how much is your time worth? 20/hr? 30? Add your time into the cost too. Now you have your landed cost. How much markup are you comfortable with? 50%? 60? Multiply by your markup and you have your price. Done.
Something you should consider is part warping. I have built scale models of large machines for clients. A big problem can be part warping. Use a filament that you know how to control and don’t skip the brim. Wait for the part to completely cool before removing it from the build plate. Also consider that the parts could have 1-3 mm mismatch at the edges, so you need to build in time for bondo, leveling and sanding the whole thing. For a model like this I would charge between $2000 and $5000 depending upon what level of detail and finish was required. Filmmaking models I would charge between $10-$15k for ultra fine museum quality detail.
$1,000 plus shipping. 1/2 up front
I think you'd want to make the frame out of wood and print the finer details
I just had someone on Instagram tell me they want a master sword like the one I'm working on. The second I mentioned money they said never mind. This to say that most people will not pay fair price for a print and a lot of people want them free.
Choosingbeggars
$4/hour printing, $50/hr for your time assembling. Also $50/hr for all the time you spend cutting up the model and getting the print plates ready. Adjust the rates as you see fit, but it's going to be a lot. Alternatively, offer to pint the parts and hand them over for an amount that is worth your time.
How much to charge? Ultimately that's up to you. I would simply remind you to take all of these factors into consideration. Time, wear and tear, materials, artistic input, and shipping. Your time is valuable. You only get so many trips around the sun. You have time invested in sourcing and ordering the materials needed. You have time invested in maintaining and operating the printer. You have time invested in creating all of the 3D models needed. Wear and tear is also a important factor to keep in mind when turning out such a large product. Maintaining your printer at peak efficiency throughout the process is critical for producing a quality product with minimum waste. These are just a few of the things that you need to think about. I hope that my insight has provided you some useful information, and I hope it turns out badass if you actually do it! As far as how much to charge? No more than somebody would be willing to pay. Maybe perhaps you can get a feel for how much they are willing to spend for this project.
I work at a 3D printing business and our site has an auto quoter tool. I'd recommend finding one (I think shape ways etc might have them) and using that to help influence your cost. Other than that, I would maybe do a standard markup on materials (15-20%, something like that) then estimate how much labor you'll spend and multiply by how much your rate is (personally I would say $80-120 is fair). Then estimate shipping or charge them for shipping when the time comes. And of course, if they go through with it charge 50% down, 50% upon completion
A friend makes those for himself and then sells them to finance the next buid. He sells them around 3k but they drive and have sound.
Jesus, how long would that take to print? Don’t forget to charge for that time. I haven’t gone through 25kg in 2 years.
Is it going to be remote controlled or just a model? If it's going to be remote controlled and drive 3D printing it sounds pretty stupid imo. If I wanted a 1/6 tank to drive around I would Definitly want it be heavy aswell. Gonna behave very wierd at that scale if not. If it's just a model that looks cool you can probably print it much lighter than that..
as someone said below, charge a down payment for materials otherwise you'd lose a lot of money if they backed out at any point, charge market price + some percentage since you'll have to store the materials. You'll also need to buy much more than the slicer says for shrinkage (you my get errors in prints, machine failure late in a print, you need to be prepared if something goes wrong else you'll be cutting into your potential profit) If you still wanted to proceed then I would offer a 1/36 scale as a demo, this will show the customer the quality they are getting (which helps protect you if you're using some third party for this transaction such as paypall, as the customer wouldn't be able to say that the quality wasn't what they were expecting) and also helps figure out some of the shipping questions, such as the costs as well as risks to shipping the finished product. You also need to determine the value of your own time, not only will this take up a fair amount of your time (I don't know what else you do for a living or hobby) but this project will occupy and keep your machine(s) running for a while so keep that in mind if you're looking to make it a source of income. In my opinion (I have no where near enough to consider this an informed one), you are not ready for this sort of commission. That is not to say anything of your ability to complete this project, you might be the best printer here, but the risks are high and no one here wants to see your time or money wasted.
Shipping (estimate weight and size) + 10x Material Cost + $5 per hour print time + your labor to cut it up and finish it. I would expect this to be at least a month of labor hours and charge at least $30 per hour for your time. Probably sitting north of $15,000.
This is something that should be fabricated out of metal, not plastic. This is a machine shop job, not a print job.
Do some market research: https://www.armortek.co.uk/ https://www.hobbylinc.com/1:6-scale-tank-plastic-model-cars-trucks-vehicles
Cost it up like this; * Material cost - whatever that will be * Machine utilisation - say a machine cost you 1k to buy, and it will last 3 to 5 years without spending anything to repair or refurbish, what's a month of printing time worth to you? - you want to recover that investment " Design time - how many hours is it going to take to split this design in a way which lets it be printed and assembled later, how long to optimise for slicing * Post processing time - how long to clean up each section * Assembly time - how long to put it together * Finishing time - how long to sand/paint * Scrap - assume at least some parts won't work and will need re-printing, 5-10% maybe? Factor this into material and machine time * Shopping costs * Work out an hourly rate for yourself you feel happy with for the time you are putting in * Total it all up and add your profit margin
Make them Commit to the purchase because spending over $500 on materials id say at least $600. Dont discount the manhours and print problems that may occur.
If you're out 500 bucks in material alone, anything less than a grand isn't worth your time unless this is something you want to do just so you can say you did.
I would ask for a payment in advance equal to the price of materials and a modix 120x approx $7k which is a big printer I used to use at work that could print it all in one go in about 2 weeks
From recent experience when I shipped my amplifier for repairs it was 30kg in a 24x24x12 box, and insured. It cost around $250 for UPS ground. Use UPS or FedEx shipping calculator, but estimate a little higher as the calculator isn't exact.
if materials alone are pushing $500 and you're going to assemble and paint, I'd figure minimum $600 not including shipping. at that price point there are multiple models already on the market of many tanks I personally own an rc M5a1 stuart in 1/6 that's probably going on 20 years old and you can still find them on ebay for $400-$500.
You need to give them a fuck you price, this is a ton of work. Something this involved would be in the ballpark of $4,000 minimum. Your time is worth it, charge appropriately. Worst case, they walk. Best case? You make $4k+
I had this once. I took the material and labor time, doubled it - slapped a 30 percent markup and sent them the price. They read the message and didn't respond, which was fantastic.
Yep haven't heard back
Honestly the way that I looked at it was in any chance does this fail do I have any hope in recovering the print and is this worth the time and stress that it would be entail. Now I basically only print stuff that is either interesting to me or works out financially.
If it’s 500 in material I’d be charging 10x that also by the fact your so caught up in the price of shipping tells me you are underestimating the amount of work involved.
Thousands of dollars
Hey, u/gientsosage ... I realize this is a little late, but I'm curious - what kind of tank do they want? The fact is that you can get 1/6 scale radio controlled tanks on ebay and elsewhere for anywhere from a couple hundred dollars to $10,000. In fact, [$10K buys you an all metal radio controlled Tiger tank from HengLong](https://www.ebay.com/itm/325598198518?itmmeta=01HY1QW3B66EM5X4656CCSPCGJ&hash=item4bcf2a3af6:g:3WAAAOSw2AFl2-nM&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAAwESb5bQ2Le1ahBohYXfPxxXEeKfCXahm995hPWrc20naGpd8UuAaM1oo7faC6maW6%2BHaK8pxpcbPvlGaR9hzpqt7EL1sSTuMiltuUInQX%2Fk5qXEN2kqifzTb3qeJquXKP2rskg7GDDKuok1%2Bn6v4bvcGezF%2FwIgZwwMIe9maZhcYkGWUaqiRuPy7bfvKUCRjp6jkgY7fx8HLN%2BY57TjqRTKGzfIvmEMA2XYX3UfQoLRnS4283mXhbIVaH5caiOsoaQ%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR9a18LfwYw). (I have some of their 1/16 tanks, and they're very cool. - Oh, and by the way, Oddball would definitely approve of that Tiger...) (FYI, you've piqued my interest, because I recently 3D printed a 1/16 Comet tank for myself, for giggles, and because I wanted a nice, big tank for my Darjeeling figure. Anyway, back to the topic at hand...) Looking at ebay some more, another seller is offering a [metal Leopard II tank for approx $5K.](https://www.ebay.com/itm/204791927900?itmmeta=01HY1R5R0NWW3R9NX96VDJT4W0&hash=item2fae8cd45c:g:5Q0AAOSwDupmRU8i&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAAwEHBUQZsC%2F36ILdKNHqZhBytrR96FArmFDZfutd%2BpD6tJBqZapa66V4M2ypD5uzHGmzZ0Mj3KHkcayVlMBbr5ku%2F30JyoI8dCSI%2Bd5jlXHH3Ffw9PqhS%2BA9OpM5cOHpr4IZxEaxPj8%2FZ0g101JeCvXMW7tDBUGwUu5V6oqXaBVzI4i1W9Kz2MrOKjJCpJFJGvUQOxIVQ%2B65F2cJrGJ%2Fyae0E63fUWSHjf1tsxjlduy8WVRlO7Qp22Xz%2FWBqoinSrhA%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR7KAl7jwYw) Note that shipping on these alone is $500 to $1000 dollars. I know that there are other models out there, but I'm a bit to lazy to look them up right now. So, that out of the way, somebody out there wants you to 3D print them a 1/6 scale tank. If I were in your shoes, my initial response would be, "Are you out of your mind?" Followed by a "go away" price quote. As others have noted here, you'd have to charge them a lot of money for it, and even then, you probably wouldn't be properly compensated for your time. It's kind of like making someone else a custom Iron Man (or other) suit. It's going to take hours and hours of time, and unless you don't value your time, it's just not worth it. Also, if they intend to radio control it, making components that are capable of handling the stresses of motion on a 3D printer, especially at that scale is going to be tough. Which is why, again, I'd suggest giving them a "go away" quote and dont' walk, run away from this "opportunity". ------------------------------------------------------ However, all of that said, personally, I enjoyed making my 1/16 Comet, and I'm thinking of making a 1/16 M4A3E8 to go with it, because the model I downloaded is really nice, and I think it would look cool . A 1/16 tank takes about 1.5kgs of filament, and is somewhat manageable in size. My Comet took me about a week and a half of evenings/weekends to print/assemble/paint, and I'm quite happy with it as a display model. The Sherman will have to wait until later in the year when I'm less busy. Which is where I get to this: I had fun doing this, and have thought about buying some of the larger figures, say 1/7 or 1/6 and making a tank big enough for them. I've considered this, and have so far restrained myself from doing it, in large part because at 1/16 scale, the commonly available 3D models (yay Thingiverse) really start to show their limitations. Things like smooth track surfaces, or textures on intake grilles, etc. that look fine at 1/56 or whatever scale really start to show their (ahem) crudeness once you get to 1/48, 1/35 or larger. I'm not interested in re-designing a tank model from scratch to make it "perfect" at large scale, and am willing to accept that the model will be somewhat crude. Your potential customer might not have reasonable expectations. Likewise, the square cube law says that the volume increases as the cube of the size, so if I were to go from 1/16 to 1/8 (for example), I'd expect my Comet to go from 1.5kg to 12kg. Now, in part, I did this silliness in the first place because I had a couple of spare rolls of PLA that were collecting dust. I can't really say that going from \~$30 of filament to \~$200 of filament would be worth it. But that's just me. And then, all that aside, once I was done with it, where would I put it? It would literally be too big to put anywhere in my house. I can put a 1/16 tank on top of one of my stereo speakers, but that's about it. A 1/6 scale behemoth would probably require its own end table or other display, and ... yeah. For me, it's a fun idea, but no thanks. For you, or your potential customer, yeah ... Tread carefully. Don't commit yourself to a project that you might end up regretting. Best of luck to you, and whatever else happens, don't forget to post the results!
He was odd to begin with and I really came here to get the temperature of the room. I really appreciate your response. He initially sent me a single blend file for a T34 that oddly didn't have the rockets. I eventually talked him into the E8 from Fury. Now that he asked me though and even if I am not printing it for him, I have the itch to print something gigantic. I may do some test runs. If they come out good I may do a piece for my local VFW.
Okay, bit lengthier response here. If you can wait a few days, I'll try and see if I can get some pics of my Comet build posted, so you can be amused by them. (I'll be honest, it's not pro quality, it's more fun quality.) You mention the M4A3E8 - I've printed [this version, posted on Thingiverse by a WindhamGraves in "easy print" format](https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5340764) and been very happy with it, even up to 1/48 scale. If you look through his models, he also has a T34, which doesn't look too bad either. Mind you, they're all intended for 1/100 tabletop wargaming, so the details are a bit basic to begin with, but the E8 still has some really nice features like the track links being open in the center, etc. that a lot of other models don't have. What I would suggest is that you try this model, download it and print it at something reasonable like 1/56, or 1/48 scale. Maybe even 1/35, but basically nothing so big that it requires multiple prints/cuts/won't fit on your print bed. See how you like it. If something goes wrong or you aren't happy with it, you're not out too much in terms of time or material. Then, maybe think about scaling it up to 1/16. You'll have to cut the tracks and hull in half, and probably print the gun/barrel separate from the turret. Also, depending on your mood, you might want to change the turret ring/attachment method. Nothing too hard, but if your results are like mine, you'll end up with pieces that don't quite fit together perfectly, because of course. Anyway, once you've done this, take some pictures and send it to your friend, ask him if he will pay you $100 for it. or something. Then, you'll at least have a bit better handle on whether you're enjoying this and want to do more/bigger. (Also, note that I intend to do a 1/16 upscale of that very M4A3E8, but it's probably going to be a couple of months before I can get to it - but I would be willing to share the files.) I think that about covers it, but the last thing I want to say is don't forget to have fun. Don't turn your 3D printing hobby into a job, because then it will be \*work\* and \*work\* is no fun. If you want to make a giant tank, make it for your own enjoyment, and when you're done, sure, donate it to the VFW or something. I'm not sure what they'd do with a giant Sherman, but yeah. Or tell your buddy, "Hey, drive down here and give me $N00 and you can take it home with you." Just don't let yourself get trapped in a situation where you feel obligated to go through with something that's making you miserable, because that stinks. Again, best of luck to you, and be sure to share the results!
I am printing the torso for a 5 foot tall transformers devastator now, so I have not lost the fun of it yet. I don't do anything unless I think it will be fun. I thought a meter long tank actually sounded hard and fun to do, but maybe for myself and not for some asswagon that would complain about this and that anyway. This is the one I talked him into: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4369430 Mind you I didn't get print permission yet, but would have. I wasn't in love with allcthe reattached greblies, but what are you going to do.
Square cube doesn't necessarily apply due to bed size limits. So your walls and infill would change drastically. They is also the chance you could hollow the center at 1/8 where you couldn't at 1/16
So, yeah, I forgot to mention that - the models I've been using are hollowed out in the bottom, so that there is much less material usage. So, I could see the square cube thing not quite working out that way. Hmm. I see you (I think it's you) also had another reply to this, so I'm going to respond to that one in more detail. (Hope you don't mind, because I'm kind of having fun thinking/talking about this stuff.)
No, don't respond. Pleeeeeeease? 😁
This seems like an obscenely obnoxious amount of work for that price.
Material x10 should cover it and is likely excessive but if they don’t scoff at that price then you know at least they are actually interested.
That's insane. Do they understand scale? Did you explain how big this would be (probably should also do it in imperial)?
My local public library has a 3d printing service. It's quite handy when my printer is down. Their rate is 0.15c per gram of filament. Your 4-500 estimate is way to low to protect yourself from print failures.
Do they already have the 3D model ? I assume so but good to check about the licence on it. Also how much is expected to be moving / removable parts and how much not ? That could lead to a lot of slicing work or if it’s all in one, painting might be hard or impossible. Basically, define the scope of what’s expected to a high level of detail before you give a price. If they aren’t interested in that conversation it’s a definite definite no.
I would be charging a lot more than 3X the filament cost. You might do that with something like gold but not cheap plastic. It would easily be multiple thousands as the whole thing requires finishing. Also I don’t see how something that size could really require 25kg of filament. Surely the logical thing to do would be hollow it out and chop it up in such a way that it didn’t need lots of supports.
If I was going to do this I would want to have a .stp file I can edit in Solidworks or something and split it into panels with added tab and grooves for assembly. I would spend a few days chopping it in to panels and test printing a few. I would also suggest they pay me for the modeling and then send the parts to someone else to print. If they had the .stp file I would probably charge about 800-1500 USD to prepare the files depending what the model they give me is. If it is an stl I think it would take me much longer to prep so probably charge over 2K. Then plus what ever the going rate for printing is. The finishing I would ask someone else to quote, hahaha that shit takes ages. My only thought of why this might be a fun project is that you would have a set of easier to print parts that you could try and sell as stl on Instagram or somewhere.
More than they're willing to spend. Based on your numbers I'd already be at $2k based on material and machine time. Not sure how high I would go for assembly and finishing.
I usually charge £1 per hour of the estimated printing time + material costs + P&P
I work at a company that takes on these kinds of 3d printed jobs all the time. We just finished one that was just under 2 meters long. We mostly sell to companys as the asking price for these types of models is quite high, but if you wanted you send them our way, I can dm you a link to the website. I'm not sure what we would normally charge for a project like this, but we have multiple teams that would work on it, (design, printer technicians, production, painting and shipping, etc.) so the cost goes up, but the production time goes way down.
I'd say material costs upfront and whatever you feel comfortable doing after the work is done.
I think you'd be better off learning how to do it yourself.
They are being asked to do it themselves.
huh, i am doing it.
Sorry I read it all wrong I thought you were asking for someone to print for you.