If you want to avai of chemical etching services then cost is probably one of your primary concerns. It will be useful for you to know how the cost of chemical etching is calculated. With this knowledge, you’ll be able to understand why companies charge the way they do. What you need to know is that the cost of chemical etching depends on several factors. These include the metal used, the number of elements, labor cost, technical cost, machine time, etc. Usually, the company’s overhead expenses also affect the cost of the service. These include rent, water bill, power bill, etc.
The price of raw materials are the biggest factor in determining the cost of chemical etching services. What you need to know is that the prices of raw materials can vary dramatically. As you may have guessed, the cost of standard grade stainless steel, nickel, silver, and brass are significantly cheaper than the cost of exotic alloys. such as molybdenum, titanium, betyllium, and shape memory alloys. It should also come to your attention that the etching process is actually composed of different processes such as cleaning, sheet sizing, phtoresist lamination. developing, printing, photo etching, and stripping. Work is needed in each of these processes and that entails labor cost. Labor is another important factor in determining total service cost. And when it comes to labor, the cost is the same regardless of sheet size.
Smaller parts or larger sheet sizes are cheaper. This is because the components are pricd per sheet. But you also need to understahd that when a sheet is large the dimensional tolerance across that sheet is also large. So if you want to achieve exceptionallt tight tolerances, you need to use smaller sheet sizes. The parts are supplied either loose or are tabbed into the sheet. The latter facilitates lowere plating costs and reduced packing.
Another factor that affects the overall cost of the services is the thickness of the materials. This is because the thicker the material the longer it takes to etch it. Components should be less than 1.55mm thick. Othewise, etching it is going to be uneconomical. The last factor that determines the overall cost is volume. To drmataically reduce the cost, companies try to process tens and even hunreds.
To appreciate the cost of chemica etching services, you need to compare it with the costs of other methods. For example, you can compare it to stamping or laser profiling, which are actually less cost-effective. Stamping is expensive because reuires hard tooling. On the other hand, chemical etching relies on digital tooling, a process that costs cheaper and is eve faster to make. Laser profiling, on the other hand, is charged by time. In comparison, chemical etching is charged by the sheet.
Indeed, the costing of chemical etching services is a complicated one. But at least now, you have a better understanding of chemical etching costs. But what you should be able to take away from this article is that chemical etching is a very affordable process.