Guides / For Shops
Quoting Titanium: The Five Lines and the Four Things That Kill Margin
Titanium punishes a quote built on habit. A shop that scales its stainless numbers by a comfortable-sounding factor will usually be wrong in the same direction, and the direction is down.
Here is the structure that survives contact with Ti-6Al-4V, and the four places margin disappears.
Quote it in five lines
Internally, always. Whether the customer sees the split is a separate decision.
| Line | What goes in it |
|---|---|
| Material | Stock size you will actually buy, at today’s price, including the drop |
| Setup | Programming, fixturing, first article, one time per order |
| Machine time | Cycle time per part times your rate, built from titanium cutting data |
| Outside processes | Anodize, passivation, stress relief, plus transport each way |
| Documentation | Certificates, traceability handling, inspection reports |
A shop that cannot see those five lines separately cannot tell you where a job lost money afterwards, which means it will lose money the same way again.
Trap 1: material priced from the part, not the bar
You do not buy a part. You buy a bar, in a size that exists, and you throw most of it away.
Price the stock you will actually purchase, at the size you can actually get, at this week’s price. Titanium moves more than aluminium does, and an old price in a spreadsheet is a real risk on a long quote validity.
Two things to check before you send it:
- Is the size on a shelf? In titanium the bar sets the lead time more often than the machine does. Quoting a four week delivery on a diameter that is a mill order is how a shop loses a customer while making the parts correctly.
- Does the certificate match? A grade and size in stock that carries a B348 certificate is not the same material as the AMS 4928 the drawing asked for. Same metal, wrong paperwork, scrapped order.
If the buyer’s size is awkward, propose one that is not. Most will take it, and it makes you look like a shop that has done this before.
Trap 2: cycle time scaled from another material
This is where most first titanium jobs are lost.
Ti-6Al-4V runs at roughly 30 to 60 m/min with carbide in milling, against around 80 m/min for Grade 2, around 120 m/min for 316L and 300 m/min and up for aluminium. Those are not linear scaling factors you can apply to an existing estimate, because depth of cut, radial engagement and the number of finishing passes all change too.
Build the estimate from titanium data. If you do not have your own numbers yet, start from the tool supplier’s published titanium ranges and log the actual against the estimate on every job until you do. Two or three jobs of real data is worth more than any rule of thumb.
Watch specifically for:
- Deep pockets, where chip evacuation rather than cutting speed sets the pace
- Thin walls, where the finishing pass is light and slow and there are several of them
- Small internal corner radii, which force a small cutter and a low feed across the whole feature
- Interrupted cuts, which wreck tool life and have to be programmed around
Trap 3: tooling treated as overhead
Titanium is abrasive and keeps heat at the cutting edge. Inserts and end mills do not last the way they do in steel.
If tool consumption is buried in a blanket shop rate calculated on aluminium and stainless work, every titanium job quietly subsidises itself out of your margin. Track minutes in cut per edge on titanium specifically, and either carry a separate titanium rate or add a tooling line.
The same applies to coolant. High pressure through spindle coolant is the difference between a sensible cycle and a slow one on deep features. If you have it, quote the fast cycle. If you do not, quote the slow one honestly rather than the one you wish you could run.
Trap 4: fixturing quoted as an afterthought
Titanium deflects under cutting force and springs back. A part with a thin wall, a long reach or an awkward clamping situation needs a plan, and the plan is engineering hours plus aluminium.
Quote it as a one time setup cost, visible and separate. Two reasons. It stops a quantity of one looking absurd relative to a quantity of fifty, and it gives you something concrete to amortise if the customer comes back, which is a strong reason for them to come back.
The documentation line nobody costs properly
Mill certificate to EN 10204 3.1 is cheap. The rest is not.
- Heat lot traceability is a process: transfer marking before the original marking is machined away, witnessed, segregated storage, identification that survives an outside process.
- A first article inspection report to AS9102 on a part with 120 characteristics is real hours on a CMM and a document somebody has to write.
- Segregating Grade 23 from Grade 5 is physical work, because the two are visually identical and mixing them on an implant part is a scrap event.
Cost these as labour, because they are labour. And ask the buyer whether they need what they asked for. A customer who requested a 3.2 certificate out of habit will often drop it when you explain it needs a third party witness and adds weeks. You have just saved them money and removed a cost from your own quote.
Quote validity and the things you cannot control
Two lines that belong on every titanium quote:
- A validity period that reflects material volatility, not a copied 90 days.
- A statement that lead time is subject to stock confirmation at order, unless you have already confirmed it.
Neither is defensive. They describe what is actually true in this material, and buyers who work in titanium read them as competence.
The one sentence version
Price the bar you will buy, build the cycle from titanium data, carry tooling explicitly, quote fixturing separately, and cost the paperwork as the labour it is.
Where the enquiries come from
If your titanium capability is real and underused, we introduce RFQs to shops cutting the grade in question now. You see an anonymous preview before you pay and you quote the buyer directly.
Register your shop, or read what buyers are testing when they read your quote.
Frequently asked questions
Why do shops lose money on their first titanium job?
Almost always cycle time, because the estimate was scaled from stainless rather than built from titanium cutting data. Ti-6Al-4V runs at roughly half the surface speed of Grade 2 and a fraction of aluminium, so a linear scaling factor from another material underestimates badly.
Should tool cost be a separate line in a titanium quote?
Internally, yes. Titanium consumes inserts and end mills fast enough that burying it in a blanket shop rate hides where margin is going. Whether you show it to the customer is a commercial choice, but you should know the number yourself.
How should a shop price a first article in titanium?
Separately from the parts, and honestly. Programming, fixturing and the first article inspection report are one time costs that have nothing to do with quantity. Bundling them into a per part price makes small orders look extortionate and large ones look cheap.
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