I have a rather unique issue that our office is dealing with at the moment in relation to CNC work. I am being tasked with the configuring of a machine time cost. I have seen threads that deal directly with this, but our situation is different in the fact we are a non-profit museum office. From what can gather the general machine time costs take into account programmer/operator salaries, utility costs, machine payments, maintenance and such, which are all the usual business operating costs.

We currently have 2 CNC machines, a mill and a router, both of which were paid for in cash completely. The depreciation value of the machine is handled by another office that deals with organizational capitol investments. We as an office are not responsible for paying any building rents or utilities either, and our salaries are covered by general organizational funding. So it makes it a bit difficult for me to identify the costs we incur for running the machines, so that's where I need some help/suggestions on what to plan for.

The scenario is as follows:

The material costs of the parts cut are directly estimated into the job we are running, and billed accordingly. Cutter costs are also billed as disposables on the job and billed to each. Since we are not responsible for paying any type of overhead, what type of costs can we plan for on a yearly basis? Some of the things I was thinking of are the maintenance costs, to have a tech come in on an either an annual or biannual basis to do PM Service, yearly cost for coolants, and grease.

Currently, any additional tooling like collets and such, we either bill to a job or wait till year end funds are available. In the past acquiring accessories like a 4th axis or other bigger ticket items, we have had to look into grants. So far this has worked out somewhat successful. But what we are looking to do, is be able to charge on per hour basis for the machine in order to build a pool of funds that we can use for machine upgrades or replacement.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Chris