Digital probe pricing

[jr_bourget]

I’m a new owner of a PRS standard 4’ x 8’. It is working very well so far and I love it.

I’m working on a quote and I need some input/advices. The problem is I don’t know how to price it. The project is to use a digital probe and copy an existing sculpture on a cabinet. The hand carved sculptures are about 1/2"x5”x8”. My question is how do you guy’s price digitizing a part? To my understanding it is a long process. I know we have variable: spacing between each probe points, the size of the part and more... This project is for a hand carving company and they are trying to be more competitive. Is the cost of digitalizing really competitive for one or two sculptures? The material is cherry wood.

Thanks
J-R Bourget

[jben007]

Hello, I have heard of companies charging a 2,0000 to 5,000 to do guitar bodies and necks for clients.Initially the time consuming scanning would be high cost to the client,but the advantage is once that is done you can make the part over and over again.I'm also fairly new, closing in on one year .I was told that an average cost for machine time was 150.00 -180.00 per hour.Obviously there are a lot of factors to consider , your shop rate,power consumption ,overhead.But also keep in mind you can set it to scan and leave it,you do not have to check it,except new probes will stick sometimes until they are broke in, in which you basically wiggle the probe and resume.If you were going to do a lot of scanning I would look into a laser scanner...very fast ,but $$$$$ 2k or so.there is a new hand held model out that is suppose to be a little cheaper, but I have not checked the price.
Ben

[Brady Watson]

Generally speaking, the size of the part is proportional to the amount of time that it will take to probe. Time is also a factor when you choose your point spacing. Depending on the detail of the design, it may take a full day to probe the size that you quote. It is hard to make money 3D digitizing with a probe because it ties up your machine for hours (sometimes days) on end - and, there is only so much the customer will bear when it comes to charging them for it. If I were quoting the size part you mention & using a SB probe, I would charge about $150 to $200 - which is a bit high considering you could have it laser scanned with 100X more resolution than the SB probe for around the same price or less.

Another aspect of probing is the data itself. You need a good program to smooth and edit the probe data, as there will be some data anomolies and areas that you will want to clean up. While it can be done, going from probed part to SBP to cut part often yields less than desirable results. If you have PartWorks3D (or Cut3D), it will import a probe file directly, but will not allow you to edit the data. The best program for messing with probed files is ArtCAM. Not everyone has the cash to invest in the program, and investing in the program often means diving head-first into the world of 3D carving. While it is exciting, it can be quite challenging to recoup your 3D equipment & software investment unless you really have a good amount of 3D work.

Knowing what I know now, I would send it out to be laser scanned - I'd recommend that even if I didn't do laser scanning professionally. The data is better, cleaner and cheaper than a touch probe.

-B

[Brady Watson]

Here are a few pics of a 3D part probe via SB probe & a few parts professionally laser scanned. No smoothing algorithms applied to parts. ALL are completely raw scan data as viewed in ArtCAM Pro 2008:

SB Probe @ .015 point spacing, 1/16" stylus:


6013

Copper Penny scanned via HiDef Laser:
(Detail photo showing engraver's initials)


6014

6015

Hand-carved crown scanned via HiDef Laser:
(Detail photo showing actual wood grain)


6016

6017



-B

[Brady Watson]

FYI - there's a Roland Picza for sale on Ebay: http://cgi.ebay.com/Roland-PICZA-PIX-3-3D-scanner-digitizer_W0QQitemZ110237842147QQihZ001QQcategoryZ 3751QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I used one of these for parts smaller than the SB probe could pick up.

-B

[jr_bourget]

Brady. Thank you very much for all your information. The feedback you are giving is very constructive and it helps me understand more about the probing. I still don’t know what I will do about the SP and my project. My shopbot is not working a lot. I have a primary job and the shopbot it a part time job.

Thanks for your feedback
J-R

[joe]

Shoot,

I'd take a picture of it and send to James Booth. He does great 3D files that aren't that expensive.
He's the best!

www.Carve3D.com (http://www.Carve3D.com)

[joe_manor]

Are there laser scanners available that you can attach to the bot and scan items? It seems like the one for sale on ebay only has a 4x6 scanning area. Anyone have any links?

[Brady Watson]

Joe C,
James does excellent work, and is the ideal solution when a physical object to be scanned doesn't exist. I routinely refer customers to James when they have a complex model and only a photograph or sketch to go off of. You are correct - he is the best! When physical items already exist, like J-R's case, it is almost always cheaper to have the parts laser scanned.

Joe M,
No. I am not aware of any devices currently available to interface with the ShopBot. If your budget is under $2500 you can pick up a NextEngine desktop laser scanner (which gives questional results), the ShopBot Probe, or a used Roland Picza touch probe. You'll still need software to edit scan data. The price of the software ranges from free to $40k, depending on what you need to do with the data. Search this site for posts regarding laser scanning.

-B

[billp]

There is now a Picza 30 posted on Ebay !
http://cgi.ebay.com/Roland-Picza-Pix-30-Digital-3D-Scanner_W0QQitemZ180228638830QQcmdZViewItem?hash=i tem180228638830
Brand new these are about 4 grand ( I know, I have one, great tool ! ).
This version of the Picza does about 8"by 11" and roughly 2.37"deep. There is even an after market rotary axis available ( from somewhere in Australia if you Google it).
A touch probe can never be as fast as a laser, but for day to day digitizing they are hard to beat. The advantage of the Piczas is that they do NOT tie up your Shopbot while they are scanning an item, so you can run it off of an old P3 computer
( AND you can run it overnight, etc. with little/no danger...). And the native file format for a Picza scan is much smaller than the same data when saved as an .Stl, Obj, 3D DXF file, etc. so you can e-mail your scans.
They have stopped manufacturing Piczas so they are more valuable than ever. (The corporate story on that is they claim there is an internal component that uses something which is now being legislated out of existence, probably lead...). And rather than re-design the unit they have decided to concentrate on their laser scanning units instead.