Custom lengths

It is hard to offer customers custom lengths of MakerBeam and OpenBeam. For commercial purposes the beams need to be cut smooth and with high precision. Equipment is expensive. So is having the cutting done by another company. It also adds shipping cost.

Our beams come precut from the factory both MakerBeam and OpenBeam. In order to cut the beams smoothly and with a high precision in length you need professional/industrial quality equipment. We do not have this equipment. It is still not commercially viable to offer the service. We sometimes use the service of a company that can offer high quality cutting (VDL MPC). The startup costs are high: €150,-. After this it is 10cents per cut. We also have to ship it to another facility so additional shipping cost have to be calculated as well. We thought the price would be too high to advertise on our website.

Regarding this topic there is some other news to mention. We are in the process of partnering a Dutch company called 'De Metaalwinkel' (The Metal Shop). You can buy metal there in all shapes and sizes, plus they cut, saw, drill etc. Our idea is that Dutch customers can be guided here for their wishes. It will take some time before we can set up a commercially viable (better price for small quantities!) setup for customers outside The Netherlands.

In Utrecht (and other cities in The Netherlands) we have fablabs or Hacker Spaces where you can rent machines for only a few hours. A high-speed saw works the best (3000 rounds minimum).  For non-commercial purposes the beams can also be cut with low tech equipment. We had a blog post about this.  Here is a link.

Hopefully we can offer you a better priced service for custom lengths soon!