Solutions · Manufacturing
Digital Manufacturing
Printing, CNC routing and laser cutting under one division. Upload a model and get a real price against a real print time.
4
capabilities
6
stage engagement
4
deliverables
ManufacturingDigital 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.
Capability
What this division does
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.
Subtractive: CNC routing
Sheet goods, hardwood and soft metals. Priced by material removal, tool time and setup rather than by weight. That is why it needs its own pricing strategy, not a scaled 3D-printing one.
Laser cutting & engraving
60 W cutting and marking on ply, acrylic, slate, leather and anodised aluminium. Priced by cut length and pass count.
Finishing
Sanding, vapour smoothing, painting, and laser marking on request. Specified at quote time so the price is the price.
Audience
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
Process
How the work moves
Upload
Analyse
Slice & price
Produce
Finish
Ship
Deliverables
What you actually receive
Named artefacts rather than adjectives: the things that exist at the end, and can be checked against this list.
The finished parts
Printed, machined or cut to the specification agreed at quote, packed for transport.
A dimensional report
Critical dimensions measured against the model, on request for parts that have to mate with something.
The production file
The sliced or toolpathed file as run, so an identical repeat order is a reprint rather than a re-quote.
Material documentation
Batch and spec sheet for the material used, where a project needs it on record.
Engagement
The practical detail
- Typical lead time
- 2 to 5 working days
- Rush turnaround
- 48 hours, subject to queue
- Minimum order
- None, single parts welcome
- File formats
- STL, OBJ, STEP, DXF
- Build volume
- Up to 300 × 300 × 400 mm
- Quoting
- Instant, from the uploaded file
Quoting
One quoting core,three workflows
Additive prices from filament grams. CNC and laser price by material removal and cut length. Different arithmetic on the same upload, admin and payment machinery.
CNC Machining
SeamMaterial removal, tool time, setup
/quote/cnc · reserved
Laser Cutting
SeamCut length, pass count, sheet area
/quote/laser · reserved
This phase builds the seam, not the CNC and laser pricing logic. Those are priced once the material and rate model for each is ready. The point is that they plug in rather than being built alongside.
Questions
Asked before commissioning
The questions that come up on nearly every enquiry, answered here so the first call can start further along.
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.