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Who you are dealing with
A machine shop with a niche, not a marketplace and not a broker. This page says what is here, what is not, and what we will not do, which is usually the more useful half.
What this place is
A machining shop that decided to be good at one thing rather than available for everything. The machines cut aluminium, titanium, stainless and engineering plastics, and the work that comes in is small, light, precise and made in quantities between one and a few hundred.
Unmanned aircraft happen to be exactly that kind of work. A UAV bill of materials is dozens of small parts that have to be light, repeatable and interchangeable, which is what a high mix low volume shop is built for and what a shop set up for long production runs is not.
The brand on this site is UAV MFG. Everything on it is cut in the shop described above.
In house
3, 4 and 5 axis milling. CNC turning with live tooling. Wire EDM. Surface and cylindrical grinding. CMM and optical comparator inspection.
Placed with processors
Anodising, passivation, heat treatment, PVD coating, plating and painting. Named on the quote, inspected here when the parts come back.
Not done at all
Composites, sheet metal, stamping, casting, forging, moulding, PCB assembly. Placed with partner shops or declined.
What we do not claim
Most supplier pages are a list of claims nobody checks. Here is the opposite list, which is the one worth reading.
No certifications beyond RoHS
We are not ISO 9001, AS9100, ITAR or FAA registered. What we send instead is measured evidence: a first article report against your drawing, CMM data, mill certificates.
No customer names
No logos, no case studies with names on them, no photographs of customer parts. Yours stays off here too.
No invented history
No client counts, no order volumes, no testimonials. The shop started in 2019 and the numbers above are the ones we have.
No military work
Civilian and commercial aircraft only. We screen the end use before quoting and decline rather than pass the enquiry on.
No hidden outsourcing
Anything placed outside is named on the quote. A shop that implies everything happens under one roof is telling you how the rest of the relationship will go.
No phone number
Email only, deliberately. A technical question answered in writing, with the drawing open, beats a call neither side can quote from later.
How we work
- You send a model and a quantity. A STEP file is enough to start.
- We read it before we price it. Anything ambiguous comes back as a question, not as an assumption in our favour.
- Quote within 24 business hours. Price at your quantity, tooling cost or none, lead time for first article and lot, finish and documents included, EXW in USD, valid 30 days.
- First article before the lot. Every dimension on your drawing measured and reported, on the first order and after every revision.
- If something is out, we hold it. You get the measurement and a plan before anything ships.
Why we publish the reference tools
The calculators and tables on this site are the ones we use when a drawing arrives. Publishing them costs nothing and it removes the most common reasons a part comes back wrong: a bore that closed up under hard anodise, a thread with two turns of engagement, a groove cut to the cord diameter.
A buyer who has already run those numbers gets a better part and a faster quote. That is the whole argument.
It also means you can check whether we know what we are talking about before you send anything, which is a fair thing to want from a supplier on the other side of the world.
End use
This is the part of the business we are least flexible about, and the reason is simple. A shop that takes anything is a shop whose word means nothing.
We take commercial and civilian UAV work only. Survey and mapping, agriculture, inspection, cinema, logistics, research, education and hobby aircraft. We do not quote parts for weapons, munitions, targeting, electronic warfare or any military end use, and we decline the enquiry rather than pass it on.
Every request for quotation asks for the aircraft and the intended use. We screen that answer before we price the part, and we ask again if a drawing looks like it belongs to a controlled programme.
Export classification and licensing stay with you. If your design, its drawings or its technical data are controlled under ITAR, the EAR or an equivalent national regime, do not send the files. Tell us first and we will tell you plainly whether we can be involved at all.
Questions people ask before they send anything
Why are there no photographs of the shop?
Because the honest ones are of machines and bar stock, which look the same in every shop in the world, and the interesting ones are of customer parts, which we do not publish. Photographs will go up when there are ones that show something true about this work.
Why no customer names or case studies?
Customers who send a drawing for a new aircraft do not want that aircraft on a supplier website. The worked examples page explains the engineering instead, which is the part that is actually useful to the next buyer.
Who answers my email?
Someone who can read your drawing. Questions come back with the quote rather than after it, in English, usually the same working day and always within 24 business hours.
Are you a broker?
No. Milling, turning, wire EDM, grinding and inspection are in our own shop. Anodising, passivation, heat treatment, coating and plating are placed with processors, and the quote says which is which.
Start with a question, not an order
Technical questions get answered whether or not there is an order behind them. Write to sales at uavmfg.com, or send a drawing and get a real number back within 24 business hours.