Manual

01Getting started

Pre6 Costing turns a 3D CAD model into a manufacturing quote you can send to a customer. Sign in with your work email to create an organisation, or use guest mode from the home page to try it without an account.

Who this is for:

• Contract manufacturers preparing customer quotes
• OEM engineering teams sanity-checking supplier numbers
• Procurement teams comparing process and material options

Billing is pay-per-RFQ — no annual contracts, no per-seat licences. The first ten analyses are free, no credit card required, so you can validate the tool against a real part before paying anything.

02Upload a part

Drop a STEP file (.step or .stp) onto the upload area on the home page. Most CAD tools — SolidWorks, Fusion 360, Inventor, Creo, NX — can export STEP from File → Export.

File guidelines:

• Single solid bodies analyse fastest. Multi-body assemblies are split into individual parts before costing.
• Up to 50 MB per file in guest mode. Larger files are supported once you sign in.
• Geometry is processed in your browser — your CAD never leaves the device until you save the analysis.

For multi-part RFQs (e.g. an entire bill of materials), use the RFQ flow from the dashboard to upload a batch and get a per-part costing sheet in one go.

03Choose a process and material

After upload, pick the manufacturing process and the material you intend to use. The process drives every downstream analysis, heatmap, and cost calculation, so this choice matters.

Supported processes:

• Injection Molding — for plastics. Detects core/cavity split, pull direction, parting line, runners, cooling channels, ejector pins, lifters, and sliders.
• HPDC (High-Pressure Die Casting) — for aluminium and zinc. Detects cover/ejector surfaces, parting axis, side actions, and approximates fill behaviour.
• Other processes (machining, sheet metal, vacuum casting) — supported via your own Excel costing template; see Custom processes below.

The material catalogue carries 30+ profiles (PA6, ABS, PC, A380, ADC12, and more) with thermal, mechanical, and pricing data baked in. You can override any parameter for a specific quote without changing the catalogue.

04Review the cost estimate

The dashboard shows a per-part cost broken into three buckets — material, machine time, and tooling amortised over your annual volume — plus an optional margin layered on top.

Tune the estimate to match your shop:

• Annual volume — drives tooling amortisation per part
• Machine class / tonnage — sized automatically from clamp force; override if your shop has different machines
• Material grade — switch grades to see cost sensitivity instantly
• Cycle time — auto-derived from fill approximation and cooling; override if you have measured data
• Defect rate and profit margin — applied on top of the engineering cost

Every number is derived from the geometry plus the parameters above, so the breakdown stays consistent with the assumptions you can defend to a customer.

05DFM heatmaps

More than a dozen heatmaps give the engineering reasoning behind the cost numbers. Each one colours the part directly so you can spot problem regions and walk customers through the trade-offs.

Common heatmaps:

• Wall thickness — flags thin or unevenly thick regions that hurt fill and cooling
• Draft analysis — colours faces by how easily they release from the mold
• Fill time — how long the polymer or metal takes to reach each face
• Sharp corners — locations that concentrate stress or wear out tooling
• Parting line and core/cavity split — proposed mold split visualised on the part
• Shrinkage (HPDC) — risk regions for porosity and shrinkage defects

Each heatmap has a legend with units and thresholds. Thresholds come from the material profile, so changing the material updates the colours instantly.

06Custom processes

For machining, sheet metal, vacuum casting, or any process not natively supported, upload your existing Excel costing sheet. Pre6 reads its structure, learns your formulas and column conventions, and from then on quotes use your template.

What gets learned from your sheet:

• Cost columns and roll-up formulas
• Branding (logo, footer, terms)
• Quote layout and section ordering

DFM heatmaps still apply — wall thickness, sharp-corner, and other geometric insights are layered on top of your familiar quote format.

07Export your quote

When you are happy with the numbers, export from the dashboard in one of three formats — pick whichever your customer expects:

• PDF — customer-ready, with your branding, the cost breakdown, and the headline DFM findings
• PowerPoint — same content as the PDF but as editable slides for sales handovers
• Excel — the full costing model, every cell, for procurement teams that want to audit the math

Branding (logo, header, footer text, terms-and-conditions block) is configured once in Settings and applied to every export from then on.

08Pricing and billing

Pre6 Costing is pay-per-RFQ — you only pay for the quotes you generate. No monthly minimums, no annual contracts, no per-seat licences.

Two tiers, billed per quote:

• Custom processes — $2 / RFQ (₹99 in India). Upload your own Excel costing sheet and Pre6 automates it with engineering insights. Any process: machining, sheet metal, vacuum casting, and more.
• In-built processes — $20 / RFQ (₹599 in India). Full DFM-powered costing for Injection Molding and HPDC: 12+ heatmaps, fill approximation, auto gate placement, tooling cost breakdown, cycle time analysis, branded PDF / PPT / Excel export.

The first 10 analyses are free — no credit card required. Pricing is shown in INR for users in India and USD elsewhere; the rate is detected automatically from your location at sign-in.

09Data and privacy

Geometry is parsed and meshed locally in your browser. We only persist what you explicitly save — analyses, exports, and quote metadata. Your CAD files are not used to train models.

Good to know:

• Saved analyses are scoped to your organisation; teammates can see them, customers cannot.
• Exports are generated client-side where possible; PDF assembly happens on our servers and is deleted after delivery.
• If you need an NDA or a written data-handling addendum, email enquiry@pre6.ai and we will arrange it.

10Need help?

Email enquiry@pre6.ai with your STEP file (or a screenshot if confidentiality is a concern) and a short description of what you are trying to quote. We typically respond within one business day.

Feedback on missing materials, processes, or heatmaps is always welcome — most requests ship within a week or two of being raised.