// For machine shops
AI for machine shops, starting with quotes your estimator already sent.
For CNC job shops and contract machining shops that make parts for industrial equipment, energy, food and packaging machinery, automotive suppliers and, where it fits, medical customers. The first job is quotes drafted from customer drawings: stock, operations, setups, send-outs and quantity breaks, built from your own rates and past jobs. Outside processing POs are open too. Both run on copies of past commercial work, and defense and aerospace drawings and specs stay out of the test.
- First job
- Quotes from customer drawings
- Also open
- Outside processing POs and returned certs
- You send
- Copies of 20 to 30 past RFQs or send-outs, after an NDA
- We touch
- No ERP, CAM or purchasing system
- Left out
- Defense and aerospace drawings and specs
- Price
- A range on the first call
// Jobs in the front office
Where a machine shop's office hours go
Quotes from customer drawings
Stock size, operations, setups, outside processing and quantity breaks drafted from the print, with every hour traced to a job you ran, for your estimator to check and price.
Read the quoting pageSend-outs to finishers and heat treaters
Outside processing POs that carry the spec, type and class from the print, with due-back dates on the traveler and returning certs checked before parts move on.
Read the outside processing pageFlowdown clauses at contract review
The quality and paperwork clauses on each new customer PO, such as cert requirements, C of C wording and record retention, listed against your job plan before release.
Certificates of conformance
Each shipment's C of C put together from the customer's PO, the traveler and the vendor certs, ready for your quality lead's signature.
// Why quoting first
Every job here starts as a quote
A machine shop makes parts to the customer's print, one job or order at a time; that is how the Census Bureau describes the industry under NAICS 332710. So every job you run began as a quote somebody built by hand, and plenty of quotes never turn into jobs. The quotes your estimator already sent are the answer key. Your reviewer, the estimator who knows your quoting best, holds each AI draft against one of them, line by line.
The test is fair because its hours have a source. For the RFQs you won, the job record in JobBOSS², E2 Shop System, ProShop, Global Shop Solutions or Epicor Kinetic holds the setup and run hours actually logged. A draft can borrow hours from a named past job, and your reviewer can see whether it picked the right one. Where nothing similar exists, the line stays empty for your estimator.
Who the parts are for changes what the print asks. Food and packaging machinery carries sanitary finish callouts on product-contact surfaces, usually written as a maximum Ra. Automotive tier suppliers work under IATF 16949, oil and gas customers may hold suppliers to API Specification Q1, and medical device makers run ISO 13485 quality systems, and each pushes its own cert and record demands down to the shop. Your reviewer picks RFQs that match the mix of customers you actually quote.
Send-outs come second. Many machined parts leave the shop at least once for plating, anodize, passivation or heat treat, and every trip means a PO written from the print, a due-back date on the traveler and a cert to check when the lot returns. Each past send-out holds the PO your buyer wrote and the cert that came back, so the same side-by-side test works there.
Defense and aerospace drawings and specs stay out of every test on this page, because they can be export-controlled. So do CAM programming, G-code, machine monitoring and scheduling. These jobs are office work, and the calls inside them stay with the people who make them today.
// Across industries
Jobs compared with other industries
// How it runs
Past RFQs first, then a live month
- Step 01
One job, on work you already quoted
After the NDA, your estimator pulls 20 to 30 past commercial RFQs with the quotes that went out and the jobs behind the wins. If a customer's prints can't leave the shop, we build look-alike RFQs together.
- Step 02
The owner names your reviewer
Before anything is copied, the owner picks the reviewer, and the success criteria and a price range for the live job go in writing. Your reviewer then scores every draft against the real quote.
- Step 03
Roughly 30 days live
After a yes, new RFQs get draft worksheets for about 30 days. Your estimator prices and sends each quote, and passing on a job stays their call.
Every job is priced separately: a range on the first call, then a fixed price after the proof of concept and before you sign.
For quoting, the range depends on RFQs a month and part numbers per RFQ; for send-outs, on lots a month and how many vendors you use.
// Questions
Questions machine shops ask
We do some defense or aerospace work too. Can we still take part?
We run Swiss and bar-fed lathes on long runs. Does this fit a production turning shop?
Will AI program our machines or write CAM?
Our quotes are spreadsheets and our ERP is JobBOSS². Does that matter?
We make parts for medical device customers. Can those come in?
Rob Eason, founder
// Book a proof of concept call
Start with RFQs your estimator already answered.
Thirty minutes with Rob. You'll be asked for your company and role, which job you would test and roughly how many RFQs or send-outs go out each month. Send no prints until the NDA is signed.
- Co-owned a 60-employee financial services firm and sold his share to his partner.
- Ran GOSO Technologies, a Boston solar company rated 5/5 across 24 Google reviews.
- 5/5 across 83 reviews in HighLevel's Certified Admin Directory.
- 4.3/5 from 6 Google reviews of Massmarket AI.
- Every directory and Google review, critical ones included, is shown word for word at massmarket.ai/reviews.
- Takes every proof-of-concept call himself.