How to price laser cutting: machine time, per metre and per pierce

The formula

The time model has the same form as a 2023 IEOM study that predicted sheet run times from part geometry with 91–92 % accuracy once it was calibrated on the shop's own machine. Calibration is the point: every default above is a starting value to replace with your own times and rates. Published shop rates for a 6 kW fiber in the US span $80–180 an hour, so €90 is a placeholder, not a recommendation.

Two ways to show the price

• A · machine time: the hourly rate times the time the job takes. Simple for the shop, hard for a customer to compare.
• B · per metre and per pierce: the way many shops write quotes. Zorocut derives both from A — price per metre = rate ÷ (60 × speed in m/min), price per pierce = rate × (pierce time + head time) ÷ 3600 — unless you enter your own.
• Derived from A, style B gives the same total; it is A written in units a customer can check against another quote.

A worked example

100 plates of 100 × 50 mm with four Ø10 holes, 3 mm mild steel, cut with oxygen on a 3 kW fiber laser, before the setup fee and minimum order:

• Cut length 0.426 m per part — the 300 mm outline plus four holes of 31.4 mm — and 5 pierces.
• Speed 3.5 m/min, the lower bound of the IPG 3 kW chart: 7.3 s of cutting. Pierces 5 × (0.4 s + 0.5 s) = 4.5 s. Rapids 5 s. About 16.8 s per part.
• 100 parts take 28 min; with 15 min of setup and 5 min for the sheet that is 0.80 h — about €72 of machine time at €90/h.
• Material on the part rectangle plus 5 mm spacing: 105 × 55 mm × 3 mm × 7850 kg/m³ = 0.136 kg per part. At an assumed €1.20/kg plus 25 % markup: about €20 for all 100.
• With a 10 % margin: about €102 for the batch, €1.02 per part. In style B that is €0.43 per metre and €0.0225 per pierce.

What moves the price most

• Thickness: speed falls fast — about 3.5 m/min for 3 mm mild steel and 1.1 m/min for 10 mm at 3 kW — while the pierce time rises from 0.4 s to 2 s. See the speed chart.
• Holes: every hole is a pierce, a lead-in and a short, slow contour; SendCutSend lists more cutouts as more processing time. See pierce time.
• Gas: a 2018 study measured 20–28 m³ of nitrogen an hour on stainless. Give nitrogen jobs their own rate or a surcharge.
• Batch size: setup and sheet handling are shared over fewer parts, so the same part costs more in a batch of 5 than in a batch of 500.
• Material billing: part rectangle, net area or whole sheets can change the material line a lot on a sparse nest — see remnants.