business owners / machinests question

[crazycuda]

I wanted to find out how you guys figure out your labor charges for valve jobs, porting, boring etc. I have been using mitchell labor guide for times but there is so many gray areas and areas not covered. Ive spoke with other shops in my area and averaged there prices out so im in the same ball park with my prices. But they dont offer flowbench or porting work.

Also does anyone have any suggestions on software that is more dedicated to machine shops for repair orders, labor charges, parts codes etc.
Thanks

mod im sorry if I posted this in the wrong section

[Mike Rogers]

This is how i set up my pricing.
First my hour rate is $65.00 i,am 25 miles north of philly

I spent 2 weeks down loading all the price sheets i could find on the net and then broke them up into groups

Heads,blocks,rods

You have to remember if you build a full blow shop just the machines will cost you 250,000.00 this is new stuff.

And in my opion if you want to keep up with newer stuff some of the machines are going to have to be upgraded in 10 to 12 years.

But you have asked a question that every shop owener ask what do i charge.

I could sit here and rant for hours on this but i will let other poeple jump in.

[k-star]

This topic should generate some good discussion!!!

I feel that you need to figure out how much money you need to charge for each service to make money in your shop.....

There is a shop close to me that will remove cam bearings, freeze plugs, hot tank, bore,hone, square deck, install new bearings and plugs for $125 or $150 ( i can't remember) and that includes parts...... It's some shady deal so i would never use them. I charge more then that just to bore and hone in my shop.... then there is a shop about the same distance from me in the other direction that charges $450 for the same amount of work. I charge less then that...

The thing is my shop and the other 2 are very busy.......So i just put it out to make a point. It can be dangerous to compair you labor to other shops..... I work full time and run my shop part time so i could do the work for the cheep price but i am not going to work for free.. I have money tied up in the equipment, light, building etc.......

I came up with a price list... I feel i need "X" money for each operation and i charge that. I look it over a few times a year and adjust as needed.... I am not the cheepest guy but also not the most expensive.

I guess it's up to the typ of person that you are... Some guys want to get the most money they can get at any cost,, others charge fair prices for quality work.. and they all seam to make a go of it....

Keith

[crazycuda]

Thanks for the quick responces. I agree with you k-star on not wanting to be the cheapest shop in town, Ill never be abol to pay off the equipment going that route.
Mike, I tried the downloading of local prices. To my surprise none of the local machine shops have anything on the web. Two of the machine shops that I am friends with don't even like computers and think the web is a waste of time. I even did a 50mile radius on my search. I checked with the local repair shops, they are charging $80.00 hr for labor and the dealers are charging $85.00 soon to go to 95.00 hr
What i did find out (talking with 5 seperate dealership service managers) is the local car dealers don't resurface heads and flywheels like they used to. They just replace them with either new or order in a reman part.

[idunno]

If you can charge more you will not have to do as much. In this buisness there is no real such thing as comparitive shopping like with parts suppliers. Your reputation will bring you the work no matter what the cost. The biggest downfall to machining is to get too much overhead to where you must turn volume to make ends meet. I pick and choose the people I do work for,if they are too concerned about the price of my labor,they are gonna be a hassle on the parts also, spend less time with these type of impossible customers and concentrate on the ones that just want the job done right. It worked for me ,I quit taking in labor only jobs that customers brought in their mail order parts that were wrong costing me time to explain to both the customer then the mail order company and focused on the total package quotes and soon thats all the type of customers I had. I charged more for what I did and so I wasn't up against the eight ball to turn jobs around. That allowed me time to do a better job and were off from there. Try it ,you'll see.

[cboggs]

I only do cylinder head work, .. deck, guides, seats, porting and development.

The first thing I did was figure my over head, .. cost of doing business, ..
and most important is to include your salary in that.

You have to know what it costs you to do the work before thinking
about putting a price on it.

Then there is the "value" of the work, .. like for porting with all the
experience and engineering knowledge it takes.
Some guys will port heads for $600 a pair, . . cheap, ... I'm not one of them.
I prefer to get customers who want more "in-depth" work then that.

Curtis

[OldSStroker]

If you can charge more you will not have to do as much. In this buisness there is no real such thing as comparitive shopping like with parts suppliers. Your reputation will bring you the work no matter what the cost. The biggest downfall to machining is to get too much overhead to where you must turn volume to make ends meet. I pick and choose the people I do work for,if they are too concerned about the price of my labor,they are gonna be a hassle on the parts also, spend less time with these type of impossible customers and concentrate on the ones that just want the job done right. It worked for me ,I quit taking in labor only jobs that customers brought in their mail order parts that were wrong costing me time to explain to both the customer then the mail order company and focused on the total package quotes and soon thats all the type of customers I had. I charged more for what I did and so I wasn't up against the eight ball to turn jobs around. That allowed me time to do a better job and were off from there. Try it ,you'll see.

Excellent words.

Sooner or later everyone in a business like engine building or specialty parts manufacturing should come to these conclusions...but many don't.

I've seen exactly what you went thru, and saw the same conclusion reached by the engine buider. You need to understand that there are potential clients that you don't need...at any price, and they are often the ones who beat you up the most on price. Of course when you refuse to work for them they are shocked and don't have a clue as to why. It's difficult to tactfully tell them why without getting personal.

If you do an excellent job on what you do, eventually the right work will come your way. If you are checking local or even national prices, look more at quality of the work, and use those prices as your benchmark, not the LBF pricing. (LBF= vulgar acronym for "cheap").

[crazycuda]

thanks for everyones input.
On an average about how much time do you guys alot for boring and honing a v8 block.

[joe]

whatever you decide on pricing make the customer aware of it and stick to it ! If something might happen which would elevate the cost call the customer and TELL HIM .
I'm obviously reporting from a customers standpoint , and this is one of the biggest ,general complaints I have about the sheen shops I have dealt with .

They take your phone # when you drop the stuff off ,quote you a price , then you don't hear from them again ! finally you figure enough time has passed and you call back .
They then tell you this ,this and the other thing happened while we were working on your stuff and it's gonna cost you XXX more than what we quoted.
I had a block line honed once ,was quoted 60 dollars, and when I called back after about 2 weeks they said " those caps didn't even go to that block it's gonna cost you 175 "

I understand that it takes a good deal more time to make the wrong caps fit ,and I can see why the price was elevated , but they should have CALLED ME ..because that's why I gave them my PHONE NUMBER . I had the right caps I just got them mixed up , now when I have the other block fixed up it's gonna cost me 175 as opposed to 60 again ,cause they're the wrong caps !

This has happened to me more times than not in having machine work done. I have had work done by disreputable shops that throw in "extras" which you pay for . I took a flywheel in once and told them too put a new ring gear on it , they did that and ALSO sandblasted it , retapped all the threads , and resurfaced it ! They said "yeah but you wanted it done right" I wanted the ring gear replaced ... that was all I told them , that would have been "right", that was all it needed .

OK I'll shut up now ! you've read enough griping !

Think about filling niches which haven't already been covered in your area and you can enjoy a symbiotic relationship with the other shops in your area . Around here no one has a sonic checker or an engine dyno or a really good flow bench . I have been thinking that that would be an area prime for exploitation and since I'm not competing with anyone locally they could reffer clients to me and I could reffer clients to them for the respective work needed.