Machine bases · frames · heavy weldments
Machine Base Manufacturing, Matched to Your Drawing
Send the drawing for a base, column, gantry or bed. We put it in front of up to 3 fabricators in Vietnam that already build structures of that size and class, and you get an answer within 24 business hours.
We are a sourcing service, not a foundry and not a fabrication shop. We match, the fabricator builds, and the order goes straight between the two of you.
You pay the fabricator you pick, nothing to us.
One RFQ reaches a short, matched list, not a broadcast to a whole directory.
Ask for it and we sign before your drawing or model is shared with anyone.
Every RFQ gets a human answer in that window, including the ones we cannot place.
Why buyers send machine base work here
It comes down to the match: fabricators that fit your base, from the first quote.
Matched by specialisation
Your drawing goes to up to 3 fabricators that already build structures of that size and class, picked for construction, size, weight and flatness. Not a general directory.
Professional suppliers
Fabricators in the network quote to your drawing, communicate clearly and keep you updated while your base is made.
You deal with the fabricator
Quotes, terms and delivery are agreed between you and the fabricator. Free for buyers.
The decision that sets your price
Cast iron, welded steel, filled weldment or epoxy granite
Most of the cost, the lead time and the vibration behaviour of a machine base is decided before anyone quotes it, by how it is built. These are the published characteristics of each construction class, not the promises of any one shop.
| Grey cast iron | Welded steel | Filled weldment | Epoxy granite | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| How it is made | Pattern, sand mould, poured iron, aged, then machined. | Plate and tube cut, jigged, welded, stress relieved, machined. | Steel weldment used as a shell and filled with a mineral-epoxy or concrete core. | Granite aggregate and epoxy cast cold in a mould; inserts cast in place. |
| Damping | Good. Graphite flakes absorb vibration; the default for grinders and precision lathes. | Lowest of the four. Rings unless ribbing, mass or filling is added. | Good to very good, and the cheapest way to add damping to a steel design. | Highest. Typically several times cast iron for the same section. |
| Thermal behaviour | Conducts heat well, so it also spreads a local heat source quickly. | Similar to iron, and the thin sections react faster to shop temperature swings. | Slower than bare steel; the core evens out short thermal spikes. | Low conductivity and high capacity, so it drifts slowly but recovers slowly too. |
| Tooling and first part | Pattern cost and foundry queue. First casting usually measured in months. | No pattern. Fixtures only, so the first unit is the fastest of the four. | Weldment lead time plus cure, so a little behind a bare weldment. | Mould cost, then a long cure before machining. Slow first unit. |
| Where the cost sits | Amortised pattern. Gets cheap per unit once the run is long enough. | Material and welder hours. Nearly flat cost per unit across quantities. | Weldment cost plus fill material and cure time. | Mould plus resin. Only sensible once the design is frozen. |
| Design changes | Expensive. A geometry change usually means a new or reworked pattern. | Easy. Cut, add a rib, re-weld, re-machine. | Easy on the shell, awkward once the fill design is set. | Hard. The mould is the design. |
| Normally chosen when | A repeat machine model in steady annual volume, where damping matters. | Prototypes, low volume, large envelopes, or a design still moving. | A steel design that fails a vibration target and needs mass and damping. | Metrology frames, coordinate measuring machines, laser and optical bases. |
The common mistake is to compare a cast iron price and a weldment price as if they were the same product. At one-off and low volume the weldment nearly always wins on both cost and lead time; the argument for iron starts at steady annual volume, or when you need the damping and cannot get it any other way.
Self-check
Which construction fits your machine?
Six questions about volume, damping, weight and timing. They are the same questions we would ask you on a call, and answering them here means your RFQ arrives with the part a fabricator needs in order to quote it properly.
Nothing is submitted. The scoring runs in your browser and the result never leaves this page.
Indication
This is a rule of thumb, not an engineering decision. Send the drawing or the load case and the fabricators quoting it will tell you what they would actually build.
Send the drawingAnswer all six and an indication appears here. Nothing is sent anywhere; the scoring runs in your browser.
Typical ranges, not promises
What the network can quote
The bands below cover what the fabricators we work with routinely handle. Anything outside them is worth asking about rather than assuming. The last column is the part that saves you a week of email.
| Item | Typical range | State this in your RFQ |
|---|---|---|
| Part envelope | Weldments to roughly 6 x 2.5 x 2 m in one piece; larger structures split and bolted or site welded. | Overall length, width, height, and whether a bolted split is acceptable. |
| Weight class | From about 80 kg up to the 12 - 20 t range, limited by the shop crane and the machining table. | Target finished weight, or the weight of the machine that sits on it. |
| Plate and section | Mild steel S235 / S355 and equivalents, 6 - 80 mm plate, hollow section, channel and heavy bar. | Grade and thickness if fixed, or the load case so the fabricator can size it. |
| Casting classes | Grey iron GG20 - GG30 (EN-GJL-200 to 300) and ductile iron, via partner foundries. | Grade, casting weight, and whether a pattern already exists. |
| Stress relief | Furnace thermal cycle or vibratory treatment, before rough and again before finish machining on critical work. | Which method you require, and whether you want the chart or certificate. |
| Machined geometry | Flatness commonly held in the 0.02 - 0.10 mm band over a metre on machined pads; ground or scraped work goes tighter. | Flatness, parallelism and squareness per surface, with the datum scheme. |
| Features | Machined pads, dowel holes, tapped and reamed holes, T-slots, linear-rail mounting faces, bearing bores. | Which faces are functional and what mounts to each one. |
| Finish | Shot blast, primer, two-pack industrial paint, or machine-tool enamel; machined faces oiled and protected. | Colour, system, film thickness, and which faces must stay bare. |
| Inspection | Dimensional report, weld inspection (visual, MT, UT as specified), material certificates, CMM report where the shop has one. | Which documents you need in the box and which are pass or fail. |
| Packing | Steel-braced pallet or bolted skid, machined faces protected, sea-worthy crate on request. | Destination, lifting points, and whether the crate must be fumigation-free. |
Who sends us drawings
Builders of machines, not end users of them. The base is a bought-in structure and the accuracy of the machine sits on top of it.
How it works
Three steps, no account to create, and no order routed through us.
Send the drawing
A drawing or STEP model, the quantity, and when you need the first unit. If the design is not final, send the envelope, the approximate weight and the load case and say so.
We match it
We check the size against crane and machining capacity, the construction against what each shop actually runs, and pass it to up to 3 of them. If nobody in the network fits, we tell you that instead of guessing.
They quote you directly
You compare, you ask your own questions, you place the order with the shop you choose. No commission, no margin hidden in the price, and nothing passes through us.
Before you compare quotes
What actually drives the price
Two quotes for the same base can differ by half and both be honest. Usually one of the seven items on the right was read differently. Pin them down in the RFQ and the numbers become comparable.
- Weight and plate thickness
- Steel is bought by the kilo and heavy plate is cut, handled and welded slower than thin. A rib pattern that hits the same stiffness with less mass usually beats a thicker wall on both cost and lead time.
- Weld length and access
- The quote tracks metres of weld and how awkward each joint is to reach, not the outline size. A closed box section that has to be welded from outside only can cost more than a larger open frame.
- Stress relief method
- A furnace cycle is oven time, crane moves and a queue behind other work. Vibratory treatment is cheaper and faster but not accepted by every specification. Say which one you need before you compare prices.
- Machined area and tolerance
- What matters is how much surface is machined and how tight it is held, not the mass. Going from 0.10 mm to 0.02 mm flatness over a metre can mean a different machine, a second setup and a temperature-controlled bay.
- Number of setups
- Each time a multi-tonne structure is lifted, re-clocked and re-datumed, hours go in. A design that can be finished in two setups on a floor-type borer quotes very differently from one that needs five.
- Inspection paperwork
- Material certs, weld inspection reports and a full CMM map are real hours. Ask for what you will actually read and check.
- Crating and Incoterm
- A 4-tonne base is oversize cargo. Crate design, lifting points, inland haulage to port and the term you quote on can move the landed number more than the weld hours do.
Start here
Send the drawing
Six fields is enough to tell you whether this is worth pursuing. You get an answer within 24 business hours, including when the answer is that we cannot place it.
Need the full form with weight, flatness, stress relief and shipping terms? Use the complete RFQ form. Prefer email? Write to sales at cncmachinebase.com.
Become a partner
For fabricators in Vietnam
If you weld and machine large structures, this is where the enquiries land. Register your real capacity: crane, machining envelope, stress relief and inspection. You see the part, the weight, the construction and the destination before you decide whether to take the lead.
No exclusivity, no commission on the order you win. Terms are agreed one-to-one before the first enquiry. Questions go to partner at cncmachinebase.com.
Join the networkWhat you get
Matched enquiries only: a machine base RFQ that fits your crane, your table size and the construction you actually run, with the drawing attached.
What we never do
Take a commission, sit inside the order, hold the money, or ask for exclusivity. Once you take a lead the buyer is yours to work with directly.
Questions buyers ask first
Are you a foundry or a fabrication shop?
No. We are a sourcing service. We read your drawing, decide which construction and which shops suit it, and put the RFQ in front of a short list of fabricators and foundries in Vietnam. They quote you directly, you sign with them, and the parts never pass through us.
What does this cost me?
Nothing. Buyers pay no fee and no commission on the order. We still care whether your enquiry is real and whether it fits the shop we send it to.
Who sees my drawing?
Only the fabricators we match it to, and only after you tick the consent box on the form. If you ask for an NDA we sign one before your files go anywhere. Files are kept for 12 months from your last contact and then deleted.
Can you quote a base without a finished drawing?
A budget number, yes, if you give the envelope, the approximate weight, the machined faces and the tolerance you expect. A firm price needs a drawing or a STEP model with the datums and machined features defined. Send what you have and we will tell you which of the two you are getting.
Why source a machine base from Vietnam?
Heavy fabrication and large-part machining are established there, driven by shipbuilding and the industrial equipment supply chain, and the labour-intensive part of a base is the welding and the fitting. It is worth a look when you want the plate and hours cheaper without moving the precision work. It is a poor fit when the freight cost of several tonnes outweighs the saving, or when you need a base delivered in three weeks.
Do you handle inspection and shipping?
That is between you and the fabricator. We tell you which of the matched shops can supply a dimensional report, weld inspection or a sea-worthy crate, so you can ask for it in the quote rather than discover it later. Third-party inspection is easy to arrange and we can point you at firms that do it.
Guides
How these structures are actually built, specified and shipped.
- Design
Fabricating Hydraulic Press Frames: Fatigue and Deflection
How welded hydraulic press frames are designed for deflection and fatigue, why weld detail matters more than steel grade, and what thick-plate fabrication needs from a shop.
- Accuracy
Hand Scraping Machine Ways: When It Still Pays Off
What hand scraping gives a machine base that grinding does not, how bearing contact is measured, what it costs in hours and when a buyer should ask for it or decline it.
- Design
Grinding Machine Bases: Damping and Thermal Stability Rules
What a grinder base has to do differently from a milling base: damp wheel and floor vibration, hold temperature, carry coolant. Material choices, layout rules and what to specify.