# 3D Printing > General 3D Printing Discussion >  Costs of prints?

## rene1981

Hello,

i just tried my 3d printer (up! plus 2) for the first time today.
Wenn i have only the material costs, it is: 
price of filament / weight of filament rol * used weight of filament:
€35,- / 700 * 6 = €0,30

How is it possible that people can ask a lot of money for 1 print then?
Of course, I know you have also the hardware, energy costs etc. But, its still a low price...

Gr. René

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## DrLuigi

well depending on the weight the value changes of course, also shipping and the time they putted into making the print.

Also well they need some sort of profit for the effort, wich is easly already 4-6 euros wich is 10/20 times the value of example your product and well else they just don't see any profit to do it :P

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## rene1981

Sending costs are awfull. The lowest costs here in the Netherlands is about €6,00.
Unless someone else know a cheaper price?  :Big Grin: .

So, as you say for the model only (without shippings costs I mean), I can ask around €4,00?

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## DrLuigi

well your the seller, you choose.
but as retailing goes thats a normal price i guess depending on size,

I normaly give it for alot cheaper, but thats also since i only sold to friends so far :P

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## bshadown

An small question, how long a typical roll is? I know most people simply measure the weight but every time i use slic3r it tells me the total cúbic mm the desing has, and i want a faster way to measure the total filament used with out the need of Actually print the desing ( had some troubles with some customers already, they want cheaper on bigger prints)
And according to my math theres 2'405 cúbic mm per meter in a1.75mm filament. Any idea?

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## GOC

> ...
> How is it possible that people can ask a lot of money for 1 print then?
> Of course, I know you have also the hardware, energy costs etc. But, its still a low price...


-    For me the answer is simple, 'time'. I consider my time pretty valuable, and since starting a print is not a quick process I tend to keep my prices between $10-$100 per print. For some my costs are not practical, but that keeps me from getting overwhelmed with print orders. (_I do however offer heavy education discounts and discounts for any other organization designed to help our local youngsters_)




> An small question, how long a typical roll is?...


-    A typical 1kg roll of 1.75mm PLA filament is 330m. A typical 1kg roll of 1.75mm ABS filament is 400m.
Resource: http://www.toybuilderlabs.com/blogs/...ume-and-length




> ...i want a faster way to measure the total filament used with out the need of Actually print the desing...


-    Utilize the volume formula of:  
V = (π*r²) * h
 [Cubic Volume] = [ (PI) * Filament Radius(squared) ] * [filament length]

-    So if your slicer gives you cm³(centimeters cubed) then you will want to use the following:
cm³ / (π*r²) = h

*Example of 2cm³ @ 1.75mm filament:*
2 / (π * 0.0875²) = 83.15cm of length

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## Wolfie

> An small question, how long a typical roll is? I know most people simply measure the weight but every time i use slic3r it tells me the total cúbic mm the desing has, and i want a faster way to measure the total filament used with out the need of Actually print the desing ( had some troubles with some customers already, they want cheaper on bigger prints)
> And according to my math theres 2'405 cúbic mm per meter in a1.75mm filament. Any idea?


According to MakerGeeks:
 *Big question of the day is... how long is a spool of 3D Printing Filament!?* Hummmmm, I think even Blinky the wise old MakerGeeks.com owl might have a hard time with that question but never fear... *we have the answer!!**1/kg Spool*
*PLA 1.75mm*
*PLA 3mm*
*ABS 1.75mm*
*ABS 3mm*


302,000.00mm
120,192.30mm
245,000.00mm
147,732.30mm



  ... and what does that mean to me and you!!     *Well, check this out... if you are printing with 3.00mm filament*  for a iPhone case you need about 2,700mm of filament; for a EPIC  Starship Enterprize Model you'll need about 12,000mm of 3D Filament and  for a full Kossel 3D Printer Kit  we normally use about 50,000mm of filament. Another way to look at it  according to MakerBot is that 1 spool of 3D Filament produces about *392 full sized chess pieces. Whoa... that's a lot of chess!!*

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## ram3d

> How is it possible that people can ask a lot of money for 1 print then?
> Of course, I know you have also the hardware, energy costs etc. But, its still a low price...
> 
> Gr. René


Well for me, I'm a 3d modeler and anything I print is usually something I also 3d modeled. I take into consideration R&D time, how long it took me to 3d model an object. If I end up making molds and casting copies all that time is added into cost. You can't just base everything on material cost alone. Plus take into account how much you invested in paying for the 3d printer. You want to make the money back and all the time and effort, blood, sweat, tears. 

I could go on and on. I guess it depends on if you are trying to make this a business or it's just a hobby. If it's just a hobby and you are printing for friends and family then just charge them material cost. If you have a dream of being an entrepreneaur then I'd advise against it.

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## bshadown

> Well for me, I'm a 3d modeler and anything I print is usually something I also 3d modeled. I take into consideration R&D time, how long it took me to 3d model an object. ..... You can't just base everything on material cost alone. Plus take into account how much you invested in paying for the 3d printer. You want to make the money back and all the time and effort, blood, sweat, tears. ........


well, according to my mat, an small base of 7.5 cubic cm cost at least  USD $0.58 for material only, if you add the use of the printer (USD $0.7) + the desing + my time = i get at least USD $1.98 per print, and if i charge at least 3 times that price ( once for the production cost, once for another print in future and once for my own income ) people barely accept the job and they want me to reduce the price at least half or even less, in other words they want me to give them a gift not a job.

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## MercedesStolp

It was just a common mentality of people that do bargaining for most of the thing. The cost of prints will depend on the work done, but people can't understand it becasue they don't the process of printing of 3-d printer. Many printers are there who are providing the low quality print outs which is not possible for all printers.

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## awerby

Since you now own your own printer, you can go ahead and offer to print people's parts for them for just the cost of the filament. It makes about as much sense as buying expensive 3D modeling software, creating a nice 3D model, and uploading it to Thingiverse for everybody to use for free...

Andrew Werby
Juxtamorph.com

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## GOC

> ... as much sense as buying expensive 3D modeling software, creating a nice 3D model, and uploading it to Thingiverse for everybody to use for free...


-    All the time :-D

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## wenganxiang

You cannot calculate like that. Printing a model with 3D printer will save a lot money and time. If you customize a model, it's not only more expensive, but also time-consuming.

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## bshadown

ok here goes a tricky one, whats the lenght of taulman's bridge nylon??   i manage to get an aprox for most prints using all  the info from the latest post and its working wonders, but now i got some nylon bridge, but i cant find the lengh of it, and this is one i defintly dont wana waiste even a gram, is too damn expensive. cheers

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## curious aardvark

you think that's expensive ? Try buying bronzefil. 

have to admit that both makerware and simplify3d give me length of filament used. Just divide that by  4.375 (filament diameter 1.75 nozzle 0.4 so length of extruded filament is 4.375 times longer than filament taken from the roll). and you have the length of filament used. 

To work out total length of any filament. Get a jewellers digital scale (about £10 from amazon) weigh 10gms and measure it's length. 
Then just multiple that 10gms divided into the weight of the total spool.

As to what to sell prints for. Well as mentioned it depends on whether it's your original design or just something you downloaded off the net. 
If it's your design. Then it's unique and you can charge a sensible amount. 

The thing is - with any homemade item you can never charge for your time or things would cost too much.

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## bshadown

well, i been working on this for some time and i was using the total used lenght of filament, then divide that betwen the total lenght of the roll, and then multiply that by the price of the roll, and it was working fairly ok, but i didnt know the extruded filament was longer, i guess i need check that, as for the way to measure i need to buy an scale, i dont have one, anything i will tell you back people

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