Manufacturing02 / 08

Digital Manufacturing

3D printing, CNC and laser, quoted from the real file

Drop a file to price itSTL, 3MF, OBJ or STEP

4: capabilities
6: stages
2 to 5: working days

Overview

Digital Manufacturing is the division that actually cuts material. Everything else Umbaji does either feeds it a file or takes delivery of what comes off it: an architectural model printed at 1:100, a scanned part remade to fit a housing that was cast in 1994, a run of enclosures for a survey rig going into the field in Nakuru.

It runs additive and subtractive under one roof deliberately. A bracket that is wrong in PLA at 40 grams is a cheap lesson; the same bracket wrong in aluminium after ninety minutes of tool time is an expensive one. Holding both processes in one division means the choice between them is a conversation at quote time rather than two separate suppliers each arguing for their own machine.

The part of this that is unusual is the pricing. Most shops quote from a bounding box and a gut feel, then correct the invoice afterwards. Umbaji slices the file on the server: every triangle measured, the toolpath generated, material and machine time counted against the actual geometry. The number you see before you pay is the number the machine produces, and it arrives in seconds rather than in a next-day email.

What it does

Four things this division does

0.08 mm

Additive: 3D printing

Six printers running PLA, PETG, ABS, TPU, resin and recycled filament. Layer heights from 0.08 mm for detail work up to 0.32 mm for draft geometry.

Who it is for

Who commissions this

Product teams needing functional prototypes before committing to tooling

Architects and studios who need a model the client can hold

Engineers replacing a discontinued part with no drawing left

Institutions and labs running short production batches

How work moves

From brief to delivery,
in six stages

01
Upload
Where it starts
02
Analyse
Stage 2
03
Slice & price
Stage 3
04
Produce
Stage 4
05
Finish
Stage 5
06
Ship
Where it ends

What you receive

At the end of the job

The finished partsPrinted, machined or cut to the specification agreed at quote, packed for transport.
A dimensional reportCritical dimensions measured against the model, on request for parts that have to mate with something.
The production fileThe sliced or toolpathed file as run, so an identical repeat order is a reprint rather than a re-quote.
Material documentationBatch and spec sheet for the material used, where a project needs it on record.

The practical detail

In numbers

2 to 5 working days: Typical lead time
48 hours, subject to queue: Rush turnaround
None, single parts welcome: Minimum order
STL, OBJ, STEP, DXF: File formats
Up to 300 × 300 × 400 mm: Build volume
Instant, from the uploaded file: Quoting

Quoting

Three ways to get a price

Printing is priced the moment the file is sliced. Work priced by hand comes back from the team, from your drawing.

Instant price

3D Printing

You send

STL3MFOBJSTEP

Priced by

Filament grams
Print time

You get a priceIn minutes

Upload a file

Priced by the team

CNC Machining

You send

STEPDXFPDF drawing

Priced by

Material removal
Tool time
Setup

You get a priceWithin a working day

Send a drawing

Priced by the team

Laser Cutting

You send

DXFSVGPDF drawing

Priced by

Cut length
Pass count
Sheet area

You get a priceWithin a working day

Send a drawing

Questions

Asked before commissioning

Answered here, so the first call can start further along.

Still have a question?Ask the team that runs the machines.

Ask us Book a call

The file is sliced on the server, exactly as it would be before printing. Material is priced from the grams the slicer reports, machine time from the estimated print duration, plus labour for setup and post-processing and a share of electricity. Nothing is estimated from a bounding box, which is why the quote holds when the part reaches the machine.

PLA for models and fit checks, PETG for parts that live outdoors or take a knock, ABS where heat matters, TPU where it has to flex, resin where the detail is finer than a nozzle can resolve. If the part has a job to do rather than a look to achieve, say what the job is at quote time and the material gets chosen against it.

Soft metals on the router: aluminium, brass, copper. Steel and harder alloys are outside what this shop is set up for, and we would rather say so than take the job and subcontract it without telling you.

Because the arithmetic is genuinely different. Additive prices from grams of filament; CNC prices from material removed, tool time and setup; laser from cut length and pass count. The routes and the upload machinery for both already exist. What is not built is the rate model behind them. Send the file and it is quoted by hand in the meantime.

Yes. Non-manifold edges, inverted normals, wall thicknesses below what the nozzle can lay down: these get flagged at analysis and, for anything short of a redesign, repaired as part of the job rather than billed separately.

Often the better answer if the volume is steady. The printers, routers and laser cutters in this shop are the same ones sold in Shop, supplied with commissioning and operator training so the machine is producing rather than sitting in a crate.

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