Utility
Laser Machine Hourly Rate Calculator
Calculate a laser machine's productive-hour cost from investment, salvage, useful hours, annual maintenance, utilities and allocated overhead. Local and transparent.
Machine cost breakdown
- Depreciation / hour
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- Maintenance / hour
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- Utilities / hour
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- Fixed overhead / hour
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- Total modeled machine cost / hour
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All results are currency units per productive machine hour. Labour, job materials, selling fees, taxes and profit margin are excluded. This cost model is not a selling-price recommendation or tax depreciation schedule.
Use the total as your machine hourly cost assumption in the Laser Engraving Pricing Calculator; add hands-on labour separately there.
How it works
Depreciation per hour = (machine and setup investment − salvage value) ÷ useful lifetime productive hours. Maintenance per hour = annual maintenance ÷ annual productive hours. Fixed overhead per hour = allocated annual shop overhead ÷ annual productive hours. Add entered utilities and extraction per productive hour to get total modeled machine cost.
Include equipment installation once in investment. Allocate only this machine's share of shop overhead. Do not count a cost in more than one field. Lifetime productive hours and annual productive hours serve different purposes: the first allocates ownership cost, the second allocates recurring annual costs.
Example
Investment 10,000, salvage 1,000 and 9,000 lifetime productive hours give 1.00/hour depreciation. At 1,000 productive hours/year, annual maintenance 1,000 adds 1.00/hour and overhead 2,000 adds 2.00/hour. Utilities 0.50/hour make the total 4.50/hour, in your chosen currency.
Limitations
Use realistic productive utilization rather than all calendar hours. No forecast or recommended utilization is supplied. Labour, job materials, finance costs, taxes, selling fees and profit are excluded. Add omitted relevant costs separately when quoting. This is an operational cost allocation model, not tax depreciation advice. It provides no material-safety advice, laser settings or machine control. Values stay in this browser tab; inputs and results are not uploaded or saved.
FAQ
Is this a selling price?
No. It is a machine cost assumption. Add labour, materials, fees and a separately chosen margin when preparing a quote.
What if I run fewer hours?
Annual maintenance and overhead are spread over fewer productive hours, so those hourly allocations rise. Ownership cost per hour still uses your separately entered useful lifetime hours.
Can salvage equal the investment?
Yes; modeled depreciation becomes zero. Salvage above investment is rejected. Productive-hour denominators must be greater than zero.
Related
Use the resulting machine cost in the Laser Engraving Pricing Calculator.