FabLab Coventry is capable of producing and helping you to produce “almost anything”. In an informal space, that’s welcoming to all, we provide you with the skills and capability to make yourself.
We provide existing and budding makers with access to over £200,000 of manufacturing equipment and associated skills, which is accessible to local citizens, students, makers and SMEs to produce products.
Machine Hire
We have a number of pieces of equipment available for hire to work on personal projects… To hire our machines / tools you will be required to have a machine and health and safety induction.
To make our equipment most accessible, all hire costs are at a lower than industry standard rate. You will be required to cover the cost of your materials, if purchased from us, alternatively, we can advise you on where to source your material locally.
Further details can be found below.
Laser Cutting
Use our laser cutter for personal projects.
The maximum bed size we can work on currently is 300x500mm.
We recommend not cutting above 6mm thickness, thicker materials would need to be discussed with us beforehand.
Our laser cutter requires a .DXF file to work from – we can help you learn how to create DXF files suitable in one of our Learn with Us workshops.
We do recommend you also save your design as a .SVG file in case of any problems when importing the design into the laser software.
Suitable Materials:
Perspex / Acrylic
Laser-rated Plywood
Matt Board
Paper / Card
Thin Polypropylene <1mm
If in doubt please do get in touch with us to ask.
We require you to bring your own materials with you, we cannot supply materials.
We do reserve the right to refuse cutting if we do not know the origin of your material as it can create health and/or fire risks.
**Please note: MDF and Laser-rated MDF are NOT permitted to be cut on our laser cutter**
Where to purchase materials from:
We recommend using either
Hobarts or Kitronik
Inductions:
All users are required to complete a machine induction. This is a compulsory requirement to ensure all health and safety practices are followed.
Inductions are scheduled on a 1-to-1 basis with a one off fee of £7.
Hire Price:
£30 per hour with a minimum charge of £5.
*Alumni will continue to receive a 50% discounted price until December 2024.
Vinyl Cutting
Use our vinyl cutter for personal projects.
The maximum cut size we can work to currently is 570mm width.
We recommend breaking large files down into smaller cut sections for your own ease.
If you are cutting text, the minimum height of text is 7mm. Anything smaller than this will not be cut.
Our vinyl cutter requires a .SVG file to work from – we can help you learn how to create SVG files suitable in one of our Learn with Us workshops.
Suitable Materials:
Paper / Card
Self-Adhesive Vinyl
Heat-Adhesive Vinyl
If in doubt please do get in touch with us to ask.
We require you to bring your own materials with you, we cannot guarantee we have the stock colour you require.
Where to purchase materials from:
We recommend using
Vinyl Warehouse
Inductions:
All users are required to complete a machine induction. This is a compulsory requirement to ensure all health and safety practices are followed.
Inductions are scheduled on a 1-to-1 basis with a one off fee of £7.
Hire Price:
£15 per hour with a minimum charge of £5.
*Alumni will continue to receive a 50% discounted price until December 2024.
Sewing Machines
Use our sewing machines for personal projects.
we have 3 Juki Industrial machines as well as a tabletop machine available for use.
Suitable Materials:
Cotton
Felt
Polyester
Nylon
Hemp
Lace
Denim
Some leather is suitable. If in doubt please do get in touch with us to ask.
We require you to bring your own materials with you. We do have a selection of different colour threads available, however, we cannot guarantee we have the colour or amount you require. Please
Inductions:
All users are required to complete a machine induction. This is a compulsory requirement to ensure all health and safety practices are followed.
Inductions are scheduled on a 1-to-1 basis with a one off fee of £7.
Hire Price:
£15 per hour rounded up to the nearest hour.
*Alumni will continue to receive a 50% discounted price until December 2024.
Hand & Power Tools
Use our hand and power tools for personal projects.
This does include a bench hire for the duration of your project time.
Tools available to you:
– Variety of hand saws
– Chisels and hand Planes
– Hammers
– Tape Measures & Combination Squares
– Band Saw
– Mortiser
– Impact Driver and Drill
– Variety of sanders
We do have a table saw, cross-cut saw and planer thicknesser that we can operate on your behalf if required. Unfortunately, we are unable to allow personal use of our large woodworking machines, due to our health and safety policies.
Inductions:
All users are required to complete a health and safety induction. This is a compulsory requirement to ensure all health and safety practices are followed.
Inductions are scheduled on a 1-to-1 basis with a one off fee of £7.
Hire Price:
£15 per hour rounded up to the nearest hour.
*Alumni will continue to receive a 50% discounted price until December 2024.
Space hire
You can hire out the FabLab space as a space for meetings / crafts / for us to deliver group sessions for you and your client groups / to run your own sessions. Prices differ depending on if staff are required.
Without technical staff:
| 1hour | £25 |
| Half Day (4hour) | £75 |
| Full Day (8hour) | £170 |
With technical staff:
| 1hour | £35 |
| Half Day (4hour) | £105 |
| Full Day (8hour) | £240 |
Technical Support & Consultancy
Our team have the creative flair to create designs within branding guidelines and design briefs, providing innovative solutions. Over the last few years we have developed a number of key products which are resourceful, making best use of reclaimed and recycled materials. We create bespoke pieces of art and products utilising the skills, knowledge and creativity of our team and have used manufacturing processes that support the use of recycled or repurposed materials where possible, supporting the need to address climate change and champion a circular economy.
Examples include, street signage, keyrings, shopfront vinyl, shop signage, stools, sandwich boards, t-shirts, mugs, small 3d printed figures, small pieces of furniture, a large portable structure – the chapel of many holding 90 removable chairs and many others.