The Truth about Hobby CNC Businesses

this machine I'm sitting in front of is the onefinity elite and it's a 4x4 hobby machine so it's a hobby CNC machine now there's a lot of people talking about making money on hobby CNC machines around the internet and today I want to talk about the truth of that fact like what it really looks like to try and earn an income or a reasonable income on a hobby CNC machine and yes it is doable there's a few factors that we want to take into play first of all what are we cutting and what's that profit look like between the material cost the labor cost and you know what we're getting out of it also want to look at how I would set up a CNC machine so we're going to show you how we set up this machine for basically production it's going to run production for us for a sign business or a side sign business that we accidentally kind of fell into with our bigger CNC machine when Megan and I had our big CNC machine we mostly just cut parts for other manufacturers for ourselves for our tools there's a lot of money in just making small parts and that's really what that machine was designed designed for but when we decided to kind of retire or slow down we got rid of the bigger machine cuz we didn't really need a machine that was designed for production in the shop now one of the things that had happened is some of our business owner friends and some of the clients we did work for would occasionally ask us to make signs for their businesses and we started doing that and the material we were using is this stuff this is hdp color core so it has different colors on the face and then the center and on the back and you can get it like this with just the two colors and three sandwiches or you can get it to like up to four different colors in different thicknesses so it's a really versatile material one of the other things that we did a lot was the same thing but with like a brushed aluminum or a painted aluminum on a hdp substrate something and we started doing this quite often and it turned into a pretty lucrative little weekend side business cuz it didn't take much time and we were able to turn a tiny little profit on that just by working a few hours on the weekend so much so that that's one of the things we didn't want to stop doing now we took a break from it but now that we're all set up with the one Infinity we're going to get back into doing this right away now some of you may have remembered these we kind of got into this after we found this material and started doing work for other people and we started making some signs for ourselves that we sold online now the one downside to HTP color core like this is it is expensive it is no joke but that said that's a cost that gets passed on to the customer and you can't beat the quality the durability and the look and it's good for indoors or out so it's pretty versatile as well we'll talk more about the htb and how we're using this towards the end of the video and start talking about some numbers like some real numbers but first let's jump into the 1finity and look at how we set it up for production and also a little bit of fun the base was actually pretty simple we build up we build up some Maple and then we created two pretty beefy sides now my buddy Mark came and helped us put this together so big thank you markk I really appreciate all the help that you gave us now each side was put into position and then we used some stretchers across it and these are deep stretchers so they're like 1 and 1/2 in by like 6 and 1/2 in and then we screw those in from each side making a really stable base now because this is just a business machine for us we're not going to put a complicated hold down table we're not going to do any of that we're just screwing material directly to the substrate so the MDF that we use for the top it's just getting screwed down one of the big reasons that we decided on the 1finity is because it is a beefy beefy hobby machine it's got really thick rails it's ball screw driven and the Gantry on this machine has three linear supports so it is really strong which means we're going to be able to run this machine at pretty significant speeds and you know everybody knows the faster you can get something done the more money you're going to make the that old adage time is money has never been more true especially in the production world cncd together is so easy and fact meie and Mark did most of it it was just a matter of setting both the rails in place and getting those bolted down and then setting the Gantry on top of that bolting that down and each position has four bolts so it's not like you're going to spend all day with little bits of hardware and and fussing around once everything was bolted together Maggie went through with the wiring which is really well marked and super easy to install you know where everything goes in fact it's just like a socket fit you just push in the wiring and you move on to the next the other big reason that we picked the onefinity elite was the new masso controller that they're putting out the masso controller for this system is absolutely freaking amazing when it comes to user-friendly UI or user interface the masso is about one of the best I've seen on a hobby machine so with this type of machine you can just use a Makita router now you'd use the corded one not the battery powered one and you don't need to put a spindle on it but because we're going to be running this quite often and we want to run it fairly aggressively we really wanted to put a spindle on ours because we're going to be running it for extended periods of time and with just the typical router you really want to take breakes and give the router time to cool down or you'll keep burning up routers the other side of it is we really wanted to keep this 110 and I did not want water cooled spindles I know a lot of people like them I do not like the extra maintenance that comes along with a water cooled spindle a big thank you to Pon CNC they sent us a 1.5 KW 110 spindle that means we can run this machine for extended periods of time without worrying about burning up routers we can run this a little bit more aggressively because it's a 1.5k spindle which is a lot more powerful than the 1.25 horses that the small Makita router has another great thing that pwn has is their dust shoe system for this machine so instead of having the hose right in front their system is designed to go in the back and it's pretty easy to adjust just loosen these two things up and you can move it up and down really easily all this combined makes for a really nice hobby production machine and it has been a dream so far we' really enjoyed using it this is a little fun sign I made for Magie while learning that new machine and what I mean by learning the new machine is really learning what it's capable of trying different bits in the machine cutting different materials testing different feed rates and testing spindle speeds to get the optimum results so whenever I get a new machine I use buy an extra couple of bits that I'm going to break all that means is that I'm going to run that machine as hard as I can until a bit breaks or the cut quality starts degrading and if the bit breaks I back it off about 20% and that's where I run the machine and I do that for each particular bit I'd be using on a machine in the material that I'd be cutting I hope that makes sense we spent the last few minutes talking about how we set up the one Infinity for our little sign side business now how you set it up is going to differ depending on what kind of business model or what kind of material you're going to be be cutting most often now for us this made the most sense and a big thank you to 1 infinity CNC and to pone for sending us this setup this is really going to make what we want to do very very doable at the beginning of this video we were focusing on HTP and that's because that's the material Magie and I are using for our side business now there are a lot of different things you can do with this including Wood Products other types of plastics and even some non-ferrous Metals could be cut on this so there's a lot of options available for business platforms this is what we know so this is what we're talking about and I wanted to give you guys some ideas of numbers like real numbers what we can expect to make using this machine to make signs so we're going to talk about what we know before we jump into numbers I want to preface it with these are just numbers so we're talking about what the machine is capable of cutting what the potential is using htpe for making signs and remember this is a hobby thing that Maggie and I do on the weekends it's not something we do full-time we really don't have any interest in getting out in the world and marketing oursel as a sign company but if somebody was willing to do that there's a pretty substantial amount of money to be made doing so but it takes work owning a CNC machine and cutting some signs is not going to sell signs you have to get out there and sell in order to make money with a machine that said let's talk a little bit about the numbers that you could expect at least for what we can expect here locally by making signs with this material the cost of this color core HTP quter inch so you know yellow black yellow and other colors in that realm is about $30 a sheet so roughly $5 $6 a square foot which doesn't sound terrible unless you're buying 7 8 10 sheets to keep in stock so you can make your signs quickly then that number can get pretty big now if you jump up to like 3/4 in material same stuff you know different colors obviously it's more expensive 3/4 in stuff sells for over $400 a sheet and you charge accordingly locally there's only one other sign company that I know of that's cutting HTP color core for signs for people or doing custom work and they charge roughly $3 $35 to $40 a square foot for 3/4 in signs now those are rough prices and it's going to depend on artwork and all those things but you can figure that's about the average price so if this is only costing us5 or $6 a square foot and we know that we can get competitive prices at $35 to $40 a sare foot on custom work if we come in at $30 we're under everybody else and that's still a pretty significant increase in material cost so we get some serious profitability there the one thing to keep in mind is that there's other costs involved like running the machine maintenancing the machine bit cost cost of bits those things so we always tack on another $4 per square foot so we're at $10 a square foot for the board and the tools and everything we need to cut it we can sell it for $30 a square foot that means we're making an average net profit of $20 per every square foot now what does that mean like what does that really look like what does that mean in time now when you're cutting hdp or aike materials there's a pretty standard feeds and speeds so that that just means how fast the bit is spinning and how fast the spindle is going down the cut and that's 200 in a minute and you want to keep your spindle speeds at about 20,000 RPM if you're cutting with an ol flute which is a standard bit for this kind of material now with those feeds and speeds in mind and the average size sign with those average feeds and speeds if we're cutting 4T X 4T material which is the machine size on this we can configure that 16 square ft now punching all the numbers the average time that it's going to take to cut that out is roughly 45 minutes on this machine now that will definitely vary depending on the complexity of the signs that you're cutting if there a lot more material being removed obviously the time goes up if there's less the time goes down and you adjust your cost accordingly but the average time to cut out a 16 squ ft or 4tx 4T Board of signs with hdp for us runs right around 45 minutes now it takes a little time to put the material on and take the material off so we call call it an even hour now if you multiply 16 * $20 which is the average profit we're talking about $320 an hour to cut signs that's not too shabby the one thing we want to preface is that that doesn't include design time and that doesn't include cleanup time but that said while the machine is running we can be designing new stuff we can be cleaning up this the last batch of signs so those times are kind of overlapping if that makes sense we're still roughly making $320 now we're at those averages now that can go up and down depending on the material the sign the job all those things but that's a pretty fair bet when it comes to making HTP signs on a machine obviously you have to get out and sell yourself to get the work so there's that I realized there was a lot of talking in this video but I didn't know a better way to do it I don't know how I didn't know how to get across to you the value of businesses based on hobby CNC machines they are there you can make money doing them bottom line is is it comes down to how hard you're willing to work everybody thank you so much for watching this video I hope you found some value in it now one little announcement before we go here Maggie and I are going to start putting out a CNC based video every four to five weeks and those videos are going to revolve around homebased businesses and the potential for M making money with machines at home whether that's a hobby machine or a professional machine we're going to be talking about all those things now we'll make it very clear in the thumbnail on the title that we are talking about cnc's because we know that's not for everybody and if that's not you no worries we'll have another video up shortly after with the jigs fixtures talk and Tool talk like we always have done but if you are interested in CNC and you are thinking about it as maybe a way to supplement your income or create an entire business we hope that these videos will be very valuable for you we have a lot of experience in the CNC world and turning that into income and we'd like to share that with everybody over the next 18 months so that said thank you again for watching I hope you enjoyed it and we'll see you in the next one

Channel: izzy swan

Views: 831,171

Keywords: How to, diy, tablesaw, table saw, tools, projects, woodworking, shop projects, jigs, band saw, Izzy swan, CNC, MAKING MONET WITHA CNC, CNC BUISNESS, SIGN MAKING, CNC SIGN MAKING, cnc router, cnc machine, make money with cnc, how to make money with a cnc machine, small business, cnc machining, how to make money

Id: YsCK9iU0R00

Length: 13min 7sec (787 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 14 2023